Ask Anything Sunday

This Sunday, we tried something completely new. We had a panel of people who had been through some level of theological education answer the congregation's theological questions. The questions were texted into the media guys, who then put the question on the screen. Mike Palmer was the moderator for the panel discussion.

"Ask Anything" was quite a hit. Now we've gotta find a way to address some of the questions we didn't get to and we've gotta schedule another "Ask Anything."

Thanks to my colleague, Shane Ash, for giving me the idea.

Oh Where is my Hairnet?

Yes, that's me wearing a hairnet in public. First time that's ever happened.
We just completed Gardner Community Theatre's weekend production of Bye, Bye, Birdie and it was another success.

I was an extra in a couple scenes but my mail role was the dishwasher / baritone in the bar scene quartet. With the exception of Trouble, the baritone part in this one song was harder than all my other songs combined from The Music Man. I hadn't sang in a quartet since high school, so it took Erin working with me to get my pitch back. And when I was in a quartet, I sang bass, so baritone was a bit of a change. And to top it all off, this part sings way too many sharps and flats, making it very difficult. Our music director said the baritone was the hardest part but she cast me there believing I could do it. Until the beginning of this week, I was pretty sure I was going to let her down.

But after a lot of work, I finally got it. As you can tell by the video, we're having a LOT of fun onstage. Pete, Nick and Jim were a riot to work with. We had fun singing together, moving the huge set pieces together and giving each other crap in the dressing room.

It was another great show from GCT.

I tried to upload the video to youtube, but unfortunately, it didn't work. I don't know why that happens sometimes but it's frustrating.

What I Love about Theatre

The rolling sound of the curtains opening

Being blinded by the stage lights

Seeing GCT's account in the black when ticket sales minus expenses equals money left over

The crowd's applause building in anticipation of the leads throughout the entire curtain call

The rush of trying to get the stage set before the curtains open and diving offstage just in time

Having to pause for laughter

Mingling with the crowd in costume after the show

The camaraderie that develops among cast members

The transformation that happens between readings at tryouts to the grand finale of opening night

How complete strangers become lifelong friends through the shared experience of 6 intense weeks of preparation

The cast's shout of triumph after the final curtain closes

Staying true to our roots

Every 4 years, our denomination The Church of the Nazarene has what they call their General Assembly. Pastors are automatic delegates but there was no way TFC could spend the money necessary to send me. I've been watching it online though and some of the debates have been quite fascinating. Some of the resolutions brought to the Assembly were simple administrative changes. Some resolutions however, dealt with our basic statements of faith and Christian practices. All of our beliefs, practices and by-laws can be found in our manual.

What I love about the Church of the Nazarene is that we are a middle way between many denominational movements. While the COTN views scripture as our highest authority, we also trust reason, tradition and experience (the Welseyan Quadrilateral). This distinguishes us from fundamentalism (although with all their big talk about "literal" interpretations, fundamentalists argue away passages that don't fit their paradigm - as do all of us). We're believe in God's grace bringing about salvation while rejecting the views of the reformed movement (that God predestines some to salvation and some to damnation).

Clearly, fundamentalists and Reformers play on the same team as us. They enrich the family of God in their own unique ways. The COTN however, also brings our own unique approach to living for Jesus, so it's important we stay true to our theological roots.

Our commitment to scripture without being fundamentalists was evidenced in two rejected resolutions. 1) To add a statement about the need to believe in a literal 7-day creation and 2) the rejection of our practice of infant baptism. Some of the discussion was rather heated. Two pastors used phrases from outside our tradition. One phrase was "the innerancy of scripture." The COTN does not affirm the fundamentistic idea of innerancy. Rather, we hold to a belief in the "infallibility of scripture", that scripture "tells us all we need to know about how to have eternal life and how to live with integrity." Those differences may seem minor but they are quite different.

Another phrase used by a pastor was "Sola-Scriptora." The COTN does not hold to Sola-Scriptora - "scripture alone." While we hold scripture to be the highest authority, we also look to church tradition, human reason and people's experience to discern the truth of God.

In response to some pastors wanting to lead us away from our Wesleyan heritage, one delegate stood and made this passionate speech. "There is a pervasive wind of fundamentalism and reformed theology that is creeping into our church. I believe that it is essential to retain our Wesleyan heritage."

That comment received a loud round of applause.

To watch all of General Assembly, click here. To read about the resolutions addressed by the voting body, click here.

My 30th Year

Year #30 ended today as I was born 31 years ago, today, at 3:45 AM. Ironically, I was awake this morning at 3:45 (since I drank several glasses of pink lemonade while celebrating my birthday with GCT friends at Austin's), so I acknowledged my birthday on the exact minute.

My 30th year was one of, if not the, best year of my life. To demonstrate how great year #30 was, it must be compared to year 29. During my 29th year, I was diagnosed with infertility, had a potential adopted son stillborn and had another potential birth mom stand us up. At Christmas that year, I had a meltdown watching Facing the Giants. On top of everything else, I spent my 29th year mourning the loss of my 20's. Erin said I basically turned 30 a year early, since I spent that entire year calling myself a 30 year old man.

My 30th year didn't start that well, though. 30 isn't really too old, not to me anyway, but it felt really old to still not have kids. My biological clock was ticking as loudly as Edger Allen Poe's Telltale Heart. But things started to change that September, when I got a call from a friend in the theatre telling us her niece was pregnant and wanted to place the baby in an adoptive family. To review the entire story, click on the adoption labels.

My 30th year was the year in which I received the greatest gift I could ever be given, the gift of a child. Dawson's the best birthday present I could ever ask for and he makes me feel younger. It's not that my knees don't still ache after I run or my hair isn't getting progressively thinner, it's just that I'm a dad now and that makes me feel quite youthful. Dawson did also give me a special birthday present - two full diapers. He's such a thoughtful kid.


I can understand why the Hebrew people in the Old Testament believed eternal life came through having children (they didn't have much of an idea of heaven, not like what we see in the New Testament). But I digress...

I spent the 2 months of my 30th year anticipating fatherhood and the last 4 months of my 30th year as Dawson's daddy. Of course, we had some other great things happen this past year, too but combined they still aren't as great.


Bring on year # 31.

God's Math

To put it mildly, I'm not at my best when thinking out loud in front of a group of people. So when I walked back up front to offer the blessing and was given $100 to give away to "anyone who needed it," I was scrambling for the best way to have someone get the money without everyone seeing. I ended up putting it in the prayer request basket on the stage and someone was able to take it after worship without anyone else noticing. But my verbal stumbling aside, being able to pass along a gift of $100 right on the spot was one of the most amazing things I've ever experienced during worship.

And I'd communicated pretty effectively up to that point. When I'm ending my message and can tell that a lot of people are wiping tears from their eyes, I know I've made a connection. I was having trouble keeping from crying myself. You can hear the message here. The story I shared (that just so happens to be one of the most significant stories of my life) starts at 28:37. Just the other day, the person to whom we gave that gift said it's one of the most amazing things to ever happen in their entire life.

We live by God's math when we give to God and others first. When we live according to God's math, everyone is taken care of.

In Sunday's survey, we asked for stories of "God's Math." Here are a few of them.

"Just on a regular basis I am always worried about how I will make ends meet – but when I tithe or give first out of each paycheck, God has always provided for me – or given me more than I need."

"Many times I have been asked to “sell my field” give up jobs, living arrangements car, people in my life – God always provides, He has been faithful to a promise from Psalms, “Lord, do not let me be disgraced.” My past two years have been surrender and sacrifice and learning to trust God, having nothing, God is my everything. And he is faithful! My life is simple but God’s love is extravagant."

"We helped out a homeless family not too long ago. It didn’t go very well but we know we did everything God asked us to do. We would do it again in a heartbeat. We had everything we needed."

"When we gave to 98.9 charity a month or so later I got a phone call from my brother, who makes quite a bit more money than we do and over Christmas we had been telling our family about our Dave Ramsey plan and my brother called me a month or so late and said they had been “called” to give money to help us out and they wanted to pay off our credit card! They more than doubles the amount we gave away! God is good!"

First Father's Day

I'd been waiting for this day for several years and it's been a pretty good day. It started with me feeding Dawson at 4:30 this morning, barely awake and took off from there. The past few days have been nonstop and today was more of the same. Ryder stayed the night last night, so we were giving baths, getting them dressed, cleaning up breakfast, giving bottles and everything while getting ready for set-up (me) and morning band practice (Erin). I get to watch both boys while Erin is singing.

After the craziness of church (which was AWESOME today - more on that later) and VBS set-up, I had to get over to rehearsal. I got home at 5:00 to find that Erin and Franci had taken the boys to Target and somehow gotten the last (display) model of a grill into Franci's jeep. Erin and I got it out and while she wasn't paying attention, I hauled the whole thing up the deck steps by myself (finally, something practical for all those hours in the gym). And I just finished the polish sausages I grilled on the $300 grill we got for half price. Man, it's been a long time since I've grilled.

Here are the thoughts I shared on Father's day during this morning's worship. In his own 4 month old way, Dawson knows that the two big people - the ones who always come into him room when he's crying, feed him when he's hungry, sing to him, play with him, rock him and everything else we do - care for him. I'm not sure how much he comprehends, but he knows there's something special about us.
But even though he has vague realizations that we care for him, he has NO IDEA the depth of our love for him. He couldn't even come close to grasping how much we love him. I still, sometimes, put him in his crib and then cry thankful tears as I pray over him.

And if our love for Dawson is so much greater than he can comprehend, imagine the power of our Heavenly Father's love. We could never grasp even a fraction of God's love for us. But if we could somehow come to live in the reality of that love, it would completely and eternally transform our lives.

Happy Father's Day

It's not how you start but how you finish

To see some beautiful Melrose Magic just skip ahead to 2:19.