Here is a great post summing up greed in America...

After reading it, the question in my mind is 'what am I going to do about it?' Is this restructuring that is taking place in mine and my family's life enough, or should I be more proactive in my attempts to expose the greed in the 'body of Christ' as I am still involved in the organized local church. Do I escape from it or do I stay and teach, by word and deed, what a disciple of Christ's lifestyle might look like in todays culture?

there she is...181,662 and counting...

This morning was one of the more interesting mornings I have had in recent memory. We took off in the ol' thunderbird and I noticed shortly after taking off that we were dragging something under the car. I wasn't too worried...I mean it's an '87 T-bird and those things are pretty common, but the frequency of scrapes was increasing as we went. A slight concern began to overcome me, yet I knew it was too late to turn back. Shortly after we had reached the point of no return the scraping was replaced by several loud thuds...as I looked in my rearview mirror I saw what I had hoped beyond all hope wouldn't happen that fatefull morning. My patch work that took the place of the catylitic converter on the exhaust came off and now my exhaust pipe and the Y pipe with mufflers were separated by a 2 foot chasm.

The sound was almost deafening as we made the drive on route 6 to Napoleon...however, the trip through Naptown was unlike anything I could have imagined as I dropped off Sara, then Macee, and finally myself. WOW...the thunderous wall of sound made me, for a brief moment in time, feel as though I was driving a top fuel dragster to work. So I called around and was able to get it in to a local guy while I was at work.

As I picked her up after school I knew she would never be the same again...people would never hear me coming...my entrance into a friends driveway would go unoticed...my daughter wouldn't call out "daddy" while I was still a mile down the road...part of my identity would be forever lost in the sounds of silence...
so I got in...turned the key...quickly I realized just what I had been missing all these years...I checked under the car to see the new shiny catylitic converter and I was overcome by the peacefulness of the moment...

it doesn't get much better than that...


an old patch job on an even older exhaust system.....$15
having a friend help me drop off the car...............$2 worth of pizza
a new catylitic converter and tail pipe................$200
driving what sounds like a top fuel dragster to work...pricless

Today was the day...I made 8 dozen cookies last night and we took them to our neighbors today. I'm not sure if some of them thought we were crazy or if they just thought we were nice. Either way I guess is ok...it does seem a little odd though...baking cookies for our neighbors as we welcome ourselves into their neighborhood...

It took us 3 months to finally get it done, but we finally have broken the ice. One of the couples even has a 20 month old daughter, sounds like a playmate for Macee.

I hope and pray that this is only the beginning...

Every Sunday I serve my time in God's army aboard a luxury aircraft carrier. We move slowly and are rarely anywhere close enough to shore to actually see any of the people we are out to liberate... read more

good times had this weekend

I went up to a friend's house from work and a few of us played some poker. These were the same guys I had played with before, but I haven't been making a very strong effort to spend time with them outside of work...how hypocritical of me...
so I walked out of there $3.30 ahead after being down about $3 at one point. I know...$3? well I only go in with $5 so $3 is a pretty good night for a cheapskate like me.
plenty of laughing...nobody got drunk...up 'till 2am...and I walked away a winner...I'm not sure it gets any better than that.

tonight we had our 40 days of purpose group and one of the guys in the group, that I wasn't sure about where he was on this journey with Christ, opened up quite a bit. It was pretty cool to hear him talk about his father's by-pass surgery and how well things went and that his dad had told him that he wasn't worried because God was sitting beside his bed all night making sure he wasn't alone. Jay then thanked the group for praying for his dad and concluded, "I guess prayer works." I don't know where either of them stand with respect to their own salvation, but I know that a sense of community is beginning to develop...good stuff

"This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pitty on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth."

I John 3:16-18

Let this be true of my life...

The talk has begun about a possible "new service" at BG Naz...the thought of that makes me a little uneasy because I know what it could end up being...another meeting time where people can come and be entertained. I have been thinking a lot about my involvement in something like that but I guess I was thinking of it being in our barn, not at a "church" building.

I am trying to get a handle on what this could look like and what "form" it would resemble, but I don't think that is possible. It may look unlike anything else the world has ever seen. The last thing I want to do is to travel to a few churches and say "hey, I like what they are doing, lets do that..." which is what happens more times than not when you're dealing with the church. We're all about models and structures...it's got to fit into a specific box that has the paper with sparkles on it, pretty bows, a name tag for the recipient...etc...etc... and then you open it...AND THERE'S NOTHING INSIDE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, I guess if I'm involved with it I can try to make sure it doesn't end up that way, but you never know these days. I really don't want to give up on the organized church, but sometimes it makes a person crazy. I'm not down on the church...I'm just frustrated with its current form...it isn't working very well(although our local body is beginning to move along in the right direction I think)
I really believe that this may be the reason I have had that unsettled feeling about leading "sung worship" on Sundays. I know there is something else I am to be invloved in where people can come and experience grace, healing, relationships, community, forgiveness, authenticity, and the true and living God. Right now, that doesn't describe very accurately what goes on Sunday mornings so we will have our work cut out for us I think, but there is hope...

I have been reading some articles the past few days that have gotten me to think:

the excellence of love

from the 3rd floor of the garage

ok, I decided against just changing colors...I went all out and changed the template...but I did a smart thing by saving all of the template text to a word document so I could paste all my links and such back in. They really couldn't make this blog thing any easier...

got to go to bed

Alright, I am having way too much fun here...this should be illegal...especially at almost midnight when I have to get up at 5:50am. Anyway...as you can see I changed my blog's name. I have been thinking that "Daily Reflections" seems so cliche and mature, but I couldn't think of a cool name so what you see is what you get I guess.

Also, I felt that the sub-title was also a little serious and mature. "Thoughts on Life an Ministry" ...that sounds way too mature for the way I am feeling right now. I think it is also time for a color change, but I've got to get to bed now.

For anyone out there that actually reads this thing...I'm pretty stoked about having pictures here...

If you happen to have a blog and you want to post pictures check out hello and get yourself signed up for free.

I'm sure you'll be seeing more of me as I play with these new technologically sophisticated tools...

Check out the big red barn...that is what we have to work with...it's big...it's red...and it's definately a barn...we like to call it the Dilbarn. Hopefully the future site of some real people building real relationships in community together...

"...clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievences you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all of these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity."
Colossians 3:12-14

Lord give me strength today to live in this way.

Check this out...a picture on my blog...notice the new hairdo(or lack thereof)...

Sara and I celebrated our 8th year of wedded bliss this past week. We had a good evening, out to dinner and relaxing at home...ahhh, some much needed down time. Sometimes it seems like we have just started on this journey together and other times it seems like we've been here for quite a while.(that's not bad though...)

It is still a constant struggle to make sure our weeks don't fill up with activities every night. I just can't get over how much easier it was when we lived in Napoleon still. Not wanting to make the drive made it that much easier to say no to things. With summer coming soon it won't be a big deal since we will both be done with school, but I just hope that the majority of our time spent this summer is spent on things to build community around us.

Sara and I talked about the barn last night. I think we are on the same page with it, but it is still hard to know where to even start. I don't feel like I have a handle on what exactly we are supposed to do with it other than the fact that we need to start working little by little to finish out some of it on the inside.

40 days of purpose is still going and I am getting at least a little bit out of it, but so far it just seems like I've already read the book. I feel like the past couple of years would have been easier if I had just read this book to start with, but I had some character things to work on that took some time to deal with. I probably would have been on overload had I read the book back then. Also, of course, out of my desparation to find out the what, where, how and why about the things I was called to do on this earth I formed a deep friendship with my savior that I wouldn't have done otherwise.

Lord, help my love for You and for my neighbors to grow into the kind of love You displayed on the cross. You gave of yourself even unto death so that I might have life...not only life, but the abundant life is what You've give me...continue to remind me of how blessed I am and how simple Your mission is for my life.

Just reading this morning before school...wanting to get back into a morning time of quiet reflection...

"And I saw that all labor and all achievement spring from man's envy of his neighbor. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind."
Ecclesiastes 4:4

I guess things haven't changed much since the times of Solomon.

Lord, may my desire be for Your fame and Your renown to cover my life. May I become small so that you may be lifted up.