More New Music, Books and Videos

After a trip to Fort Dodge with my family and a little post-Christmas gift card usage, our collection of assorted media has expanded a bit more. "Modern Times" by Bob Dylan, "Continuum" by John Mayer, "Mute Math" by Mute Math and assorted downloads from U2 and Green Day, Wynton Marsalis and others comprised the music. "Lost: Season 2" and "The Tick: Season 1" (the cartoon, not the ill fated live action series) were added to the video library and Everybody Wants to Go to Heaven, But Nobody Wants to Die: or (the eschatology of bluegrass) by David Crowder and Mike Hogan, (Re)Understanding Prayer by Kyle Lake and Stand Against the Wind by Erwin Raphael McManus are now sitting on the book shelf.

It will take hours to take it all in and I look forward to every minute of it. Once I've absorbed a few things, I'll have to let you know what I thought.

New Music

One of the most anticipated things on my Christmas list this year has been new music. When I was a music student I purchased CD's often since listening to great musicians is one of the foundations of becoming a great musician yourself. When we were at Hanfield, I purchased a lot of new music because we needed to be exposed to a variety of resources that might be used in corporate music.

Lack of excuse (and lack of funding) have found my music collection growing much more slowly these days, but it did grow by two CD's yesterday in Yankton. I was given "See the Morning" by Chris Tomlin and "Oh! Gravity" by Switchfoot by my loving in-laws after not buying any new music in four months. I sort of suspected that I'd get the Tomlin CD since Marilyn flat out told me not to buy it at Thanksgiving, but the Switchfoot CD was a surprise since it does not release until Tuesday. One of the advantages of pre-orders is that they sometimes arrive a touch early and give you a few days to gloat that you are only one of a handful of people to have access to a new project.

I also received a gift card from Target from Casey and Heidi and expect that I'll probably pick up another CD with it after the holidays. I love new music!

Proud or embarrassed?

Xander has put his shirt on backwards the last three days in a row. This is not an uncommon occurrence in the least. Usually, I notice right away, tell him about it and he laughs a slightly embarrassed laugh while he turns his shirt around the right way. Not this morning.

He was determined that he was going to keep it on the way that he put it on when I told him it was on backwards and when Amy told him two minutes later. He stuck to his guns and wore it that way all the way to school.

As I dropped him off, I wasn't sure if I should be proud of him for making a stand and sticking with it or embarrassed that my son doesn't know how to put his shirt on the right way. I opted for proud, figuring there are far more important things to be uptight about than clothing.

For the record, when I got home from work I noticed that he had turned the shirt around. I asked him when he did it and he told me, "When I got to my locker."

NFL is on my list...

After pro cycling, NFL football is easily my favorite sport to watch and/or listen to. The NFL is really starting to tick me off though as they continue to chip away at my access to games. I recognize that the NFL is a business and, as such, needs to continue to explore avenues to increase revenue, but it's image as a blue collar friend of the people is eroding quickly as they become more proprietary toward their properties.

Since we moved to Sioux Falls, we have been on a much more restricted budget. The only technology that we allow ourselves is high speed internet access because of the way that we use the computer in our house. That means no cable and no dish, which in turn means no Monday Night Football, no games broadcast on the NFL Network and no access to Direct TV Sunday Ticket which allows you to watch the games you want to watch instead of the featured network or regional games on local TV.

Today, I'm stuck with NY Giants/Philly as my only late game on local TV. An important matchup to be sure, but neither team interests me and my beloved, beleaguered Broncos are playing for their playoff lives. I used to be able to hop online, log onto KOA radio's broadcast as the local carrier of Denver Broncos' football and at least listen to the game. Not today. The NFL has apparently finally managed to silence every voice that does not produce revenue for them and you now have to subscribe to their Field Pass program to listen to games for a subscription fee.

Thanks, NFL for continuing to make your league less accessible for low income fans while finding more ways to make millions.

Surprise Visit

I was at work the other night when I had a surprise visit from Patricia, my friend and former co-worker from Citibank (see previous post "Great Night At Work"). I hadn't seen her since this summer and she was actually a bit surprised to see that I was still working in the shop. Over the summer we were pursuing jobs in a number of different locations and it seemed like we might wind up leaving Sioux Falls, but God clearly closed every door along the way either by not offering us the job or telling us not to pursue it.

It was nice to catch up with Patricia a bit and I even had the opportunity to invite her to our new church. Mercy has pens that they encourage us to take and "lose" in order to spread the word about the church, so I had taken one to use in the shop until I was able to lose it. I gave it to Patricia in the hope that she might take me up on the invite and visit sometime.

Celebrating Christmas

This weekend begins our annual making of the rounds to celebrate Christmas with everybody. I'm really not complaining. It used to be that we had to squeeze it all into a week of vacation with three or four places of destination. Now it's a day in Mitchell (tomorrow), a day in Yankton (the following Saturday) and Christmas day in Fort Dodge at my Grandpa and grandma's' house. Some people would cringe at such a schedule, but I'm really looking forward to it.

I have to admit that Fort Dodge Christmases hold a favored, biased status in my esteem since it was where I spent every Christmas I remember growing up and several since. Fort Dodge holds memories of sleeping on the couch by the tree, sledding down the hill at the Crestview house and time with grandparents (both sides of the family live there), extended family and other family friends who were a regular part of the experience.

This Christmas will be uniquely special in that we will celebrate our first Christmas with Mercy Church. We get to lead on the morning of Christmas Eve and then will combine with the congregation of Good Shepherd Community Church (where we meet) for an evening Christmas Eve service. I'm looking forward to watching new memories created and hope that there will be moments in this season that stick in the minds of our kids over the years to come.

Easy Like a Wednesday Morning

I'm finding my affection for Wednesday growing by the week since it is the one day that I am guaranteed to have off. I get to sleep in a bit, see Amy for a few minutes before she goes to teach and then spend the day with Maia and Xander (after I pick him up from school). When Amy gets home, I go teach my one trumpet lesson for the week and then we cap the night off with dinner and Bible study at Mercy. The dinner and Bible study have given us a chance to get to know a few folks other than those that volunteer with us. The fact that we don't have to prepare a meal on Wednesdays is a bonus.

We're still getting acclimated to leadership at Mercy. Shel is finishing his final semester of seminary and we have yet to hit a rhythm in terms of our planning for services, so the hope is that we'll all be able to breathe a bit easier and settle into a groove after the first of the year. Amy and I will have the month of January to see how we can adjust our schedules before we start up at USF again in February in order to free up some time to actually do some planning with Shel. It's hard enough for me to find time to get together to plan with Amy sometimes.

It's definitely a different ballgame trying to lead a ministry while carrying a full time job outside the church. I miss having the luxury of being able to communicate with people throughout the day about service plans, songs, rehearsal schedules and other things and have found that it's been harder to get the pulse of the congregation because our communication is minimal. We're still uncertain of which songs the congregation knows and which ones they don't which plays a big role in congregational engagement in a service. We keep getting a little closer to feeling like we're on the same page, but it's certainly taking longer than we would have liked.

The plus of having a job outside the church and being in a ministry position is that I actually have relationships with people in the community that don't go to church. I am much more aware of representing Christ in an authentic way knowing that the guys that I work with are drawing conclusions about what Jesus is about based on the way that I behave, what I say and what my attitude is like in the shop. I think about it every day and continue to pray that God will give me peace and patience and help me to represent Him well.

The thing that I am most excited about with this whole arrangement is that Mercy is actually a place where I will invite the guys I work with to come to church. New Hope Family (where we were attending) is a good church, but I can't think of a single guy that I work with that would feel the least bit comfortable there. I think that some of the guys will at least visit Mercy and some may even find that it is a place that they would feel comfortable exploring issues of faith and God and would be free to ask any questions they may have.

I'm excited to see what's ahead.