Feeling like...

I feel like God at the moment...or is it Jim Carrey playing God...just without the humour. Because I don't have enough to do I took on this half time job facilitating an online course for lawyers. Its the perfect teaching job really - no classroom, no drive to work, no parking dilemmas, no lectures - EXCEPT when I log on Monday morning and there are over 50 emails waiting for me...ouch! You mean there's more to this than picking up the paycheck? Maybe I should adopt Jim's approach and just email back: "YOU PASS" to all of them...

I feel like a really hot cup of fresh ground, espresso coffee. Wow! I have one! The miracle of time-lapse blogography...

I feel like I need more of God (why are you sitting here blogging then). I started this new thing of taking Friday as a Sabbath cos Sunday...well you know what happens to professional Christians on Sunday. I've become a Fifth Day Adventist - its working moderately well until I started this job which requires me to work in the real world on Friday mornings. I've long felt challenged about the DAWG concept - Day Alone With God - the SLWC team do it - here's a confession for you - in my 5 month internship in Spring Lake/Grand Haven, I never even managed one...So maybe I should do what I can on the principle that something is always better than nothing - now I'm quoting sad truisms. I could call it HOT-DAWG - Half Of The Day Alone With God. I could start a whole new product range for the really busy pastor - "Too busy to give a full day to God? Try new HOT-DAWG - half the results in half the time" There could be a whole range of these things: "WWYD" Wrist Bands - "What Would You Do" - just be yourself...

I feel like I'm the luckiest guy in the world...we had a "date night" last night - our 7 month anniversary of marriage - we were too busy to remember the 6th month, for those of you cynics who think we're still counting it month by month. Anyway, my awesome wife had informed me that she would be organising the date. So she went shopping (no small thing for an American in a foreign land), cooked a fantastic dinner and made these gift certificates for each stage of the date. I can't even begin to tell you what was on those gift certificates...what a great thing to do - to carve out time and demonstrate her love by going to all that trouble...

I feel like its time to sign off...

Short Fat Kiwi

Theology of Theft

I've been pondering: if as the bible suggests "a labourer is worthy of his hire" and in particular, as Paul highlights, a preacher of the gospel is able to be supported in that work - was I doing such a bad job on Sunday night that I went into a deficit "pay" situation that warranted my car being stolen? Or is it an example of the sometimes overlooked fact that God (generally) limits himself in relation to our free will and doesn't intervene to stop us sinning if we choose to do so - I speak not of my sinning (although it is varied and extensive) but of the behaviouarally challenged creation of God who decided he needed a crap car that night.

I once chose not to insure my household items "in faith" until I realised God was not in a position to override the free will of my thief. I learned something about attachment to material items that time. And is it a sign, all these years later, that I have matured at least on this point - I feel little sense of loss, or even anger (despite the irony of this posting). Or maybe, its just that my poor Honda was a beater?

Bring on the insurance payout...

The Walking Kiwi :)

Journey Junk

This last week has been a strange mix...so many highlights:

* I got to meet with Fonz and his wife to talk about baptism - an awesome story - I am so pumped thinking about our baptism celebration in 3 weeks
* We had our first creativity forum last night - it is so cool being in the midst of such synergy - got the next couple of series for cession|connect laid out...
* A cheque for $500 arrived anonymously in the post - thank you God and our mysterious benefactor - we needed the help
* Reuben - an awesome guy and great friend, who heads up our cession|cre8 ministry, arrives with a brand new printer - for us! Apparently someone else wanted to anonymously bless us...he's not saying
* I get to meet regularly with my cession|core leaders - this week I had time one-on-one with Reuben and Melissa - these peeps are amazing - their commitment is phenomenal
* I started my new part time job - 20 hours per week facilitating an online training course for lawyers - thank you Lord for 8 weeks of cash
* We had 2 days away on the side of a volcano overlooking the ocean thanks to a wedding gift from friends - my wife is a babe...but she got her butt kicked in mini-golf...
* Rob Reynolds - from Michigan, USA - stayed with us these past 5 days. He is a cool guy to hang out with - mainly because he laughs at my jokes - I like that in a person...I really enjoyed Rob's wisdom, encouragement and can-do attitude
* We inherited some hand me down furniture from my sister which saved us a packet

Is that enough? Its strange - I've also felt the pressure from some things as well - unfinished tasks, priorities still on the drawing board, people with unmet needs - In that sense its been a roller coaster week. I'm aware that God is blessing us but am also aware of needing to be constantly filled by Him. This is a challenge right now for some reason. So, I made my list. Start small. Thank you God.

Short stocky Kiwi

I Love...

Had an awesome time Sunday night @ cession (for those gentle readers who have ventured between the pages of the Falcon8or's blog, I'm speaking of the original cession...) Preached the third in our series "Truth Conversations" on Jesus: "Truth is a Person?" It was really great to get away from some of the more apologetic elements of previous weeks and speak to the idea of Jesus as the embodiment of truth - truth lived out in human flesh. As often happens late on a Sunday afternoon as our gathering looms, God moved me to think about Jesus as the Word - a word so pure, so powerful, so perfect, that to speak it would be as if every word ever written, every word ever spoken, every thought conceived was but a stillborn whisper. A word so far reaching that to utter it could change everything – the past, the present, the future. A word so true, so right, that to speak it would bring something out of nothing. Now imagine that word taking for its meaning a new definition – one phrased in human flesh. A medium at once limiting in its constraints but richly expressive in the nuances it could bring to its human readership.

Course we managed to find room for a Bruce Almighty clip in there...

What was very cool was a couple of chats that occurred afterward: Fonz (yup this is his real name) wants to be baptised at our post Easter baptism service - we're getting together this week. Awesome - Fonz' brother just came to Christ, following a visit from Australia - Fonz has been following Christ for about 4 weeks - shared with his very anti brother who phoned him upon returning to let him know that he too had given his life to Christ! Cool huh? Then there's Nick our resident atheist - a very funny, erudite (uses hard words) individual - described his current frame of mind on beginning a "Truth Conversation" as feeling a bit like a first time caller to talkback radio - "long time listener, first time caller" - he's still deciding whether he wants to be the sort of person who calls talkback radio. I get that.

I love our church. The people are cool.

Rock 'n' Roll...(just because I want you to know N8 that I read between the lines...)

Mr Jones

To Hymn Be the Glory

I'm not sure if my US friends have the phrase "spitting tacks" - its what I feel like doing right now! Think about it...someone will have their eye out!

I'm feeling unappreciated :( Sad old me...you can bust your a** every week helping to create a space where people can worship and all some people notice is whether you put a hymn in or not. Anyway we had one of the HP's (Hymn Police) in at the office today, making their views very clear and completely missing my point on the issue. It wasn't as if I was spouting my usual opinion - along the lines that hymns are about as useful as Latin in communicating the gospel to a largely unchurched generation (note to self - much of the Passion is in Latin yet it seems to be doing OK - maybe its time to subtitle hymns so people can understand them - not a bad suggestion - still doesn't deal with the crap music). All I was trying to communicate was that if we were going to have the team learn a new one I would prefer something that could be used year-round rather than only at Easter - didn't think that should be too hard! So suddenly this litany of complaint (should I say liturgy - it sure had a familiar ring to it) erupts completely missing my point - I guess sometimes people just want to fight with you - I'm in a good frame of mind for finishing off service prep now - funny I can't find room for a hymn suddenly...

Perhaps, I should take the tack out of my eye...

Signed with a Plagal Cadence (amen)

The Flying Kiwi

Conflicting Emotions

Had an interesting experience where my worlds collided this week...in my past life as a lawyer I often found myself in a negotiation role - in recent years, I have taught negotiation skills in a post graduate capacity to fund the pastoring passion that is my vocation deal - which brings me to the collision of worlds. We recently found ourselves in conflict with another church - now the cynic in me says its all about patch protection - as the new kids on the block (considers banal boy band joke) we dared to start a community ministry which runs parallel to another church's ministry (actually quite innocent and very much a home grown initiative rather than a copy cat effort). Anyway, faced with an escalation of incendiary emails from another local pastor we called timeout on the written diatribe and went for a visit.

It proved to be an interesting meeting - one where I found that a constructive problem solving negotiation strategy is just as useful in ministry as it is in law if preserving relationships is an underlying goal. What was also similar was the familiar positional style of the other pastor - reminded me of a lot of lawyers I've met! There was a difference though for me - it felt good to be using those skills in a genuine "peacemaking" role (remind me sometime to digress on the very dangerous but similar sounding "peaceloving" topic) and to see God work where we give Him a toehold of grace with which to work. There will be some tense times ahead I suspect but the downhill slide of relationship breakdown was halted.

A book I am reading right now titled "The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team" resonated throughout. While not directly on point the author redefines trust along the lines of a decision not to think the worst of somebody as opposed to the more familiar reliance that follows a track record of consistent behaviour. I couldn't help but wonder if when churches (re)act competitively and aggressively as in this situation, they blow the likelihood of real Kingdom building collaboration occuring between local churches. Maybe God led us to do what we did? Maybe we could have worked together? It will be enlightening to see what happens next...

I also discovered: I still hate conflict! Oh well.

Peace.

History Lessons

I suppose I could be accused of double dipping, but I made my first mistake in the blogging world - posting a blog BEFORE reading other blogs which may make incorrect assertions that one might wish to correct...

Thompson - Australia (known to NZ'ers as West Island) was (and is for some) a penal colony - New Zealand never was - it was a land of opportunity for impoverished Brits - next you'll be trying to tell me the Wright Brothers were the first to successfully fly a heavier than air flying machine - when every right thinking Antipodean knows it was Richard Pearce (a Kiwi as it happens - who says we can't fly?) Check it out at http://www.nzedge.com/heroes/pearse.html - I'll work out how to do the fancy link thing one day soon...

The Flying Kiwi

Pondering the Consumer Mindset

Its Saturday morning here in NZ...and I am discovering the strange world of garage sales...as one of the newly poor, I'm finding it an interesting angle on the current journey of dependence on God. For a start I'm struggling to decide whether to feel virtuous for recycling rather than helping fill another landfill somewhere in Godzone...or whether my subconscious consumer mentality means I am throwing out things that really still could be used - I mean, other people are buying this stuff to use - what makes me so different that I've decided its past its used by date. I'm sure Thompson (check out his blog) will have a wise word on this (I refuse to call him the Gooch...and thus enter the FalcoN8or's fantasy world). Then there's the avaricious part of me that's revelling in taking people's money off them and yet feels slightly annoyed that we're keeping tally of my mother's stuff that she's dumped on us, but not my sister's who is happy to get rid of some junk and help us at the same time. Would it be wrong for me to invoice my mother for labour on collection of said junk, sales commission and disposal of the inevitable remnant of plaid skirts and tired shoes? My financial consultant has some advice for me which I'll think some more on as I manfully read the Sports section and watch the cricket while playing backyard retailer. He never made much money but has some interesting ideas - don't worry about tomorrow, share with those in need, store up treasure in heaven, love God and your neighbour - not your cash...

Might skip the Financial section...

The Jonesboy

Well I finally gave in. It was N8 that finally did it...EVERYONE was blogging 'cept the Kiwi...so blogging down under has begun...

The Jonesboy