This is a very interesting and funny article from GQ magazine on the Christian Alternaculture - which the author defines as: "THAT IN WHICH EVERYTHING IN MAINSTREAM CULTURE GETS CLONED AND THEN BLEACHED OF "SINFUL" CONTENT". I love his definition of the christian kids super-hero Bible-Man as "A guy in a mask who instead of socking people stands stock-still with his slushy gut sucked in, squares his not-broad shoulders, faces the evildoer and bores him into submission by quoting Isaiah. That's it. That's his superpower: the ability to compose at will tidy chapter-and-verse-packed sermonettes that send the villains into instant comas"

This article on Surviving the Occult is such a great example of what happens when you actually have hope in your life, like 1 Peter 3:15 describes. People notice it, and want to know whats up.

For some reason I awoke this morning at 4:30 AM, wide awake. I had a big 'ol Dunkin Donut's Coffee Coolatta last night, which kept me wired until about 12:30 AM. I finally fell asleep, woke up raring to go, while still in kind of a daze. I decided I'd work for a while until the gym opened up, and then take a nap later today.

So Madeline was reciting a poem the other day:

"There was a little girl, who had a little girl, right in the middle of her forehead. When she was good, she was very good. When she was bad she was a whore (Should be horror)

Does the fact that we thought this was funny enough to have her repeat it a number of times before we corrected her make us bad parents?

I love Sonic The Hedgehog. How cool that someone coverted it to be played online.

This is worth checking periodically: Strong Bad's E-mail

Click here for your daily affirmation

I've always been taught that Mission statements are key. I think the process of figuring out where you're going is great, and I see some of the value in them, but in and of themselves they never motivated me in leading or following. Sure, I've used "Misison, Vision and Value" statements, but I couldn't tell you which is which. The people I lead in Fusion know why we do what we do, but they'll tell you that mission statements aren't my gig. When I look at my leadership style in Fusion, it's always been about the relationships that the leaders and I have with each other and the fact that we all like kids. It's relationships with a purpose, but the relationships are always more important than the purpose. There was a part of me that figured I relied too heavily on relationships and should step back and lead with more "mission, vision and values" stuff. I read this in Stories of Emergence: Moving from Absolute to Authentic :

The Boomers didn't have a mission as noble as their parents. Their parents had defeated Nazism and Communism. So the Boomer mission became advancing the quality of life. The Boomer leaders had a different style. People like Steve Jobs, Michael Eisner, and Bill Gates led by mission. Mission is king The leader is the mission keeper. Many contemporary churches and para-church organizations have adopted this leadership model in which personal relationships are often sacrificed for the sake of the mission.
Many postmodern people realize how arbitrary mission statements are and fail to see the benefit of making the mission king. The challenge before us is to develop a new leadership model that is effective in building permanent relationships, where relationships are king. My observation of voluntary relational organizations (Churches) is that leadership is simply a compelling relationship.

Maybe that's swinging too far in the other direction, but I think it points to the value of relationships with leadership - being a strong leader is not enough. Community is key.

I used to believe that in order to be a good youth pastor, I needed to have all the answers to the tough questions about God. You know the ones, the "Why does God heal some people and not others?" kind of questions. A month ago, I sat down with a high school guy who was struggling with his faith because he couldn't figure out some of these types of questions. As he and I talked through them, a lot of my answers ended up being - "Great question. I don't know that's something we'll ever understand in this life". Same kind of discussion with a guy via IM the other day. As I move away from "putting God in a box", the belief that Ican have all the answers about our infinite God, it's been really freeing. Today I was reading Stories of Emergence: Moving from Absolute to Authentic and came across the story of a guy making a similar kind of transition from a mindset of modern Youth Ministry to more of a post-modern paradigm.

Here's what I've been processing:
I've been wrestling with feeling uncomfortable about people's proclamations of certainty on issues, as I recognize the biases and perspectives I bring to the table. I love the way 1 Corinthians 13:12 (MSG) puts it:

We don't yet see things clearly. We're squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won't be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We'll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!

I question my reliance on community, story and experience to teach kids. Even though they feel right, and I know it's how God has wired me to work with kids, I feel at times like I must be missing the boat somewhere. I'm getting more and more comfortable being okay with not knowing. Not in terms of ignorance, but in terms of being okay that there are answers that I won't have, don't have - that faith is enough. Whether it's faith that God is big enough and good enough to heal the right people, create the universe - in 7 days or 7 billion years, and walk with me and change me over time in just the right way.
I'm not sure that made sense, but it's bubbling around in my brain and I wanted to get it out and try and make some sense of it as I put it in front of me.

This is odd. The blog software lets me see where people linked to my page from. One person linked to my page based on a search on "Ametur Porn". My June blog archives reference a talk that a buddy of mine and I did at camp on some of the dangers of porn that guys face, and apparently I referenced porn enough times for the search engine to rank me.

Three posts in one day - maybe I'm just avoiding work. Give me a break, I've been gone for a week with lots of random thoughts floating through my brain.

Today at the gym, Zach and I tried to figure out what our one rep max was on the bench - how much you can bench press one time. I did 295, Zach 225. 295 is the most I've ever put up - last time I tried I was at 265.

On vacation, I saw a yard sign that said "Your Sin will find out". I wonder where this person is coming from? They went through a lot of trouble to have a custom made sign printed up and stuck in their yard. Sin is bad - I'll give you that, and it always comes back to bite you in the butt. Does this sign do anything than reinforce a lot of people's view that God is sitting up in heaven just waiting for you to screw up so he can put a mark down against you? People can be dumb, like me.

Back to work. I've got over a hundred e-mails at work to deal with, plus lots of voice mails.

I've been thinking a lot about what kind of legacy the Youth Ministry i've been involved in is going to leave kids with when they hit college and beyond. For the last few years most of the ministry I've done has been heavily relational and I often wonder what kind of biblical fundamentals I'm leaving kids with. My goal has been more to support kids in their walk with Jesus, showing them real people with real relationships with God and inondating them with the God's deep love for them. I wrestle with wether that's enough. I just came across this
article by George Barna dealing with a teen evaluation of the church-based ministry they received as kids. The conclusion is pretty interesting:

"We discovered fairly strong correlations between understanding how to use the Bible for life decision-making with becoming a born again Christian during the younger years, having an active spiritual life as characterized by consistent prayer, Bible reading and church attendance, and possessing a biblical worldview. Unfortunately,” Barna noted, “less than one out of every ten churched teenagers has a biblical worldview. In other words, the result of their involvement at a church is that they can recite some religious facts, they made some friends, and they had fun. That’s wonderful, but we also find that most of them have neither accepted Christ as their savior nor altered the basis on which they make their moral and ethical decisions in life. For most teenagers who have spent years attending church activities their faith is not integrated into who they are and how they live. Most of the young people who claim they developed an understanding of the Bible that enables them to make decisions based on biblical principles show no evidence of using that understanding in relation to the core beliefs and lifestyle choices that we studied.”

Cathie and I went on a date last night - we went to see Bad Boyz II. What a great flick! Cathie is a huge Will Smith fan, so she dug it of course, but I really enjoyed it. No real redeeming values or deep themes, but a great action flick, funny movie that we both laughed hard at.

Listening to Switchfoot at the moment. I'd listened to them a couple of years ago - and just read an interesting article in the National Review that caused me to check them out again.

I'm still reading Galatians - trying to let the balance of Freedom and the Law really sink in and permeate my life.

Started reading a new book - The Last Jihad by Joel Rosenberg. Fiction book - Tom Clancy type political thriller. Good so far.

So I've had a chance to reflect a little on last week, and why it was such a great vacation. I can sum it up in one word... Expectations. In the past, I've always gone on vacation with big expectations - expectations on what we would do, or how relaxing it would be, how much fun the kids would have, and how my wife and I would spend time with each other and the kids. I was ALWAYS disappointed, and ended up being resentful. Sounds silly, right? I resented the fact that vacation fell short of my expectations - simply because life happened, and in turn I became resentful - of vacation, of my wife, my kids and my family. It sounds pretty petty of me, as I read this. I think I'm writing this down more for me to re-read next year before vacation, because I'm sure I'll forget it before then. By going into this vacation with no expectations, I had an amazing time. The first couple days, God and I had an ongoing dialog about how this vacation was going to go, because it wasn't a simple thing, when my nature is so wound around expectations. My resolve was really tested when the forecast at the beginning of the week was cold and rainy weather ALL WEEK LONG. I spent lots of time talking and listening to God about where my heart's at and why, and in spite of the weather, was set to go. That didn't stop me from asking for great weather, but it was with the expectation that I could have a great week regardless. On Monday, in the midst of the rain, I sensed God telling me "Dave, I died on a cross for you - how big of a deal is giving you some nice weather?" We had beautiful weather the rest of the week. It poured rain 6 miles away from us all day Tuesday, but we had beautiful, sunny weather. Go figure. I spent more time with my kids, and really enjoyed the moment, rather than resenting the fact that I wasn't doing whatever. I soaked in each moment, rather than pining away about what I wasn't doing, or how it wasn't as much fun as I'd planned. Rather than focusing on whether I was spending an inordinate amount of time with my kids compared to others, I just enjoyed the time. Now I wasn't perfect throughout all of this, and I don't have all of this figure out, but what I did learn about expectations and resentment made all the difference on this vacation.
On a side note, I was reminded repeatedly (no, not by my wife) of what an amazing woman my wife is. Next to God's grace, she is the greatest gift I've ever received. I had the chance one night to watch her on the beach, playing with the kids - and I saw her beauty again in a new way. She is the greatest mom in the world (sorry to other mom's out there). She has a beauty that constantly catches me off guard and reminds me of just how gorgeous she is. 20 or 30 times this week I would stop, look at her, and see her beauty in a new way - as a mom, as a woman, and as my wife. I am madly in love with her!

Man is it good to be home. We just got back from a week's vacation at Michillinda Lodge in Whitehall, MI. We went there with Cathie's parents, and her grandparents. We actually had four generations of women from Cathie's family there.
Anyways, Michillinda is a collection of cottages, and you're there with a whole bunch of families, from little kids to senior citizens. It's pretty expensive, the accommodations aren't all that great, and the food pretty much blows. All of that in mind, we have an amazing time every year here. We've gotten to know a number of families up there - our kids play together and we hang out together. For example, for the past two years, we've played a dice game called "Sunset" that we play each night, ironically enough, at sunset. It starts with a small group at the beginning of the week, but by by the end of the week, we've got a group of 20 or more playing this game. Each person puts $3 in front of them, and it's winner take all. Aside from our nightly gambling, there are other community activities such as Bingo, a Variety show, and a real-live cowboy campfire show. All of these things make it fun, but it's really the fun that we have as a family and the community that we develop with the other people up there that makes it so much fun.

We're back from Vacation! You can check out our vacation pictuers here. Warning: There are lots of pictures there - that's part of what I like to do on vacation - photography. More thoughts on vacation later. I just got home, put the pictures online, and now I want to decompress.

:: RELEVANT magazine :: Go On, Risk it All: This article really resonates with me. This is an idea I've had to share with parents of Junior High boys a number of times. The same risk-taking nature found in God, is in us, in every Junior High boy. That's why i Love doing Jr. High Ministry!

We leave for vacation tomorrow afternoon. It'll be a week without e-mail, telephone or the internet. We're heading out to Michillinda Lodge in White Hall, Michigan, right on Lake Michigan. It's a lodge kind of like the one in Dirty Dancing, where people stay in their own cabins, eat in a common dining hall, with lots of common activities. Typically, there are other kids for Nate and Maddie to hang out with, which makes life easier. We've gone there the past three years with Cathie's parents and her brother Ed. This year, Ed & his wife Stacy aren't going, but Cathie's grandparents are, which will be fun. Both of my grandfathers died when I was young, and Cathie's Grandpa has been like a Grandpa to me, since Cathie and I start dating 15 years ago. The kids are also really excited about spending time with them, which is neat. I just remember my Great Grandma being really, really old and wrinkly. She was a nice woman, but not someone who I was excited about spending time with.
Anyways, this should be a fun vacation, but I've slowly learned to reset my expectations on these. If I go into them thinking I'm going to relax and enjoy myself, I walk away disappointed. As Brad says "Anticipations are resentments waiting to happen." This year, I'm going into vacation knowing that I'm going to spend a lot of time playing with my kids, giving Cathie a chance to relax and in the evening, kicking back and watching a beautiful sun-set. Every year we head up to the Silver Lake sand dunes, rent a jeep, and go driving on the dunes. I'd like to take Nate and Maddie canoeing this year also.

Cathie and I watched the Carson Daly Bash on MTV last night. It was basically a Friar's club type roast, where a bunch of celebrities got together and lambasted Carson. Very funny.

Here are the shows that I have set for my summer tv-viewing schedule:

Simpsons
Read World
Road Rules
Osbournes
American Chopper
Monster House
Lucky
True Life
Diary

Any suggestions?

I just got back from Cincinnati. I flew in Wednesday morning from Kansas City and met up with a team of guys from work for some meetings and some time together golfing. I'm not a great golfer, not even a good one, but I had a good time - hit a few good drives and drained some long putts, enough to bring me back the next time. I drove back from Cincinnati with two of my co-workers - it's always fun to be in a car with three cell phone conversations happening at the same time over the course of the 5 hour drive.

I started reading a new book: Stories of Emergence: Moving from Absolute to Authentic. It's a collection of stories by a bunch of different people, dealing with the church and the world, I guess. It's written by Mike Yaconelli, a guy whose done youth ministry his whole life, and even at fifty something, still has the same cynical attitude of a twenty-something youth pastor. One of Mike's favorite topics is the church - and he loves to rant against the corporate, efficient, produced, fad-following collections of believers. Here's an interesting quote:
"Today's modern service is orchestrated so nothing disturbing, uncomfortable, controversial, or shocking occurs. The music edited to eliminate mediocre musicians or off-key singers. Solo numbers are assigned to the best. Prayer requests are screened or relegated to the bulletin where they can be carefully worded. Testimonies are screened to guarantee they won't make anyone uncomfortable or go on for too long. The sermon is inviolate. No interruptions are allowed, questions can't be asked, assumptions can't be challenged, disagreements can't be voiced."
He see's the core values of the church these days as being: efficiency, pretending and doing. It's easy to get caught up in some of the rants in this book. Stories speak to my heart so much more so than just reading "smart-stuff". I have such a tendency to be self-righteous about the church, about my church specifically, that it's easy for me to fuel that by reading this book. I believe that my church is one of the most amazing around, but reading through this book, I start to re-think some of what we do and how we do it. Crossroads does so many things right - but what makes our church amazing isn't a an efficient, professional Sunday production - it's the grace centered community that defines who we are. It's a good mental exercise for me to process some of this, and deal with my own self-righteousness.

Got up this morning and went to a gym nearby to workout, came back, and figured out exactly why my hotel is so "cost effective" - no USA Today, no coffee, no continental breakfast. Oh well.
I started reading through Galatians today. On Sunday, Joe gave an amazing message on Freedom that really stirred my heart. It was a scandalous message, that probably made a lot of people uncomfortable. Honeslty, it made me a little uncomfortable in the beginning. That's exactly why I love my church so much. Our leadership and our people do not couch God's grace and freedom with a lot of "buts". Someone smart once said "If you're teaching grace correctly, you're teaching people that they have a license to sin" - and that's exactly how Joe taught it. It wasn't that part that struck me though, it was how sin actually takes away that freedom that I have. Between the talk and the worship following, the message moved from my head into my heart, but didn't strke me until later that day while I was mowing the lawn. I came to the conclusion that I look at sin from the perspective of the "law" and how I shouldn't do things, as opposed to looking at how my sin holds me back from where God wants me to be, and the amazing life that he offers. A light bulb went on in my head, and I started looking at what "Freedom" looks like in my life and where I have none. It really ptus a whole new spin on things, in terms of how I deal with sexuality, eating, drinking, relationships and self-centeredness. I love the way Galatians 5:1 puts it:"Christ has set us free to live a free life. So take your stand! Never again let anyone put a harness of slavery on you."
I know I'm probably jinxing myself even saying that I've got a clue or am starting to figure this out - because it seems like right after I do that, I totally lose sight of what I've just said I've got a grasp of...

I'm in Kansas City for the next couple of days and then on to Cinncinnati. I got up at 4:30 am this morning to fly out, worked, and played racquet ball with one fo the Sales reps down here. Hadn't played in probably three years, but everything Freier taught me came back. I really enjoyed playing. I won one, lost two games, but it was a great workout. I got to my hotel, and they'd stuck me in a skanky smoking room that smlled like ass. I went all over trying to get a hotel room, and finally called my travel agent, who eventually got me a place that at least isn't a smoking room. Doesn't seem like a big deal, but I stay in hotels enough that I get picky.

I'm watching Traci Lords on Larry King Live tonight on CNN. She became a porn star at age 15, and has a pretty wild story. She was raped at age 10, and talks about how porn was her revenge at men - all about rage, and power. What a painful story.

I had a great weekend! Friday night, I hung out with Will and Brad. We're going to put on a guys retreat this fall, and we spent some time planning of this, getting excited about how it's all coming together. Will, Brad and I hadn't had a chance to get together in a while, so it was a good chance to catch up.

On Saturday, we went to Anne and Matt's wedding. This was probably the best wedding I've ever been to, short of my own. Not only was it cool seeing little "Tractor Annie" (What my son Nate used to call her growing up, because she would take him for rides on their riding lawn-mower) and my frend Matt get hitched, but seeing my Mark as a Dad and Pastor deliver the message at their wedding and having just about all of our freinds at the wedding. Cathie danced (I only participated on the songs that required minimal rhythm) with her friends, while I hung out drinking beer with my friends. Cathie and I laughed so much that night, it was just an amazing celebration - very much my picture of what heaven will be like. We got in around 1:00 am, and our block party was still going on, so we joined in on that for a few.

Sunday, we just hung out most of the day. Nate, his buddy Austin, and I worked on the tree-fort in the backyard, and ptu a room on it, getting ready to put walls up. We then met up with the Niemi's and Girard's at the dump park that evening, and hung out while the kids played. Justin and I were messing around trying to figure out how to throw boomarangs, and just about took our heads off, and several small children while we were at it. We were so excited that we'd thrown it right, that we sat there watching it as it circled back around, and when it was about 10 feet away, realized it was going to whack us in the head if we didn't duck. What a great group of friends. Jen, Lori and Cathie have such a great time together, share their lives together and laugh hard together. The six of us get together and have a great time when we go out. We're all very different, but still get along great.

I was lying awake in bed last night thinking about how hungry I am for life, and I how I pursue it, in good and bad ways. I picked up The Journey of Desire by John Eldredge this morning and read this quote from C.S. Lewis about desire which really struck me:
"When we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, falling about with drink and sex and ambition, when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased."
Eldredge continues:
"If only it were as strong as drink and sex and ambition. We've been bought off by clean socks and television. We'll sell our birthright for a little bit of pleasure and some peace and quiet. It hasn't taken us long to realize that life is not going to offer what we truly want, and so we've learned to reduce our desires to a more manageable size. The danger is that the soul should persuade itself that it is not hungry."

Read this great quote today in an article by Dan Kimball:
"Jesus and His teachings will not seem as strange or repelling to non-Christians as will the Christian sub-culture that we have created. Emerging generations are actually very interested in Jesus, but many times Christians get in the way." It's an interesting read, discussing that people today are open to Jesus, but turned off by "Christianity".

Read this great quote today in an article by Dan Kimball:
"Jesus and His teachings will not seem as strange or repelling to non-Christians as will the Christian sub-culture that we have created. Emerging generations are actually very interested in Jesus, but many times Christians get in the way." It's an interesting read, discussing that people today are open to Jesus, but turned off by "Christianity".

Harry Potter: Leading the Troops as the War Begins to Turn: So many people are reading Harry Potter, it's a great common group for adults and kids with lots of great points in it. Tony Campolo has some good stuff to say:

"I like Harry Potter for these reasons: First, he's a great role model for kids. He gets kids off blaming other people for their problems. There is an essential goodness about him that triumphs over the existential situations of his life. Secondly, he chooses the right friends…He makes good friendships and recognizes that is core to what makes a good person. In the end, he learns the choices that you make are what determine who you are and what you [become]. The moral values of the books are wonderful!

The real important thing to recognize is that there are spiritual forces out there, really negative spiritual forces. What Harry Potter books have brought to the fore is that there are dark forces and good forces at work in the universe that transcend human experiences. That's something we all have to learn. We have to identify with Christ and the good spirits that he brings into our lives against those dark spirits, which is where Harry Potter stands. He stands with me, and I stand with Harry!"

Frontline: merchants of cool This is an amazing video that deals with the hidden marketing machine behind the trends seem to just "happen". Makes you look at what's "cool" in a very different way.

I finished the latest Harry Potter book. What a great book with a great ending! I just started The Blue Horizon by Wilbur Smith. It's the third book in a series historical fiction book that in the mid-1700s that follows a family in South Africa involved in merchant trading. Sounds dull when I describe it, but it's a great story that really captures you into it.
I'm still cranking through the book of Romans. Trying to take it in small chunks and digest it bit at a time. I wish I could say that I'm loving it and that it's hitting me at the core, but right now I'm trudging through it.
Zach and I continue to work out in the mornings. We do a good job pushing each other on. I haven't been this sore the day after a workout in a while. I'm traveling next Monday - Thursday, and then I leave for vacation on Saturday.

I just ordered the new John Eldredge book - Waking the Dead. Can't wait to read it. I've got a great book in the bathroom that I've been reading when I poop called Cleared for Takeoff by Wayne Rice. It's a book on how to teach your kids to become responsible, self-reliant adults along the way. I know I've got a ways to go until this actually happens with my kids, but it's got great stuff in terms of installing things like respect, responsibility, resourcefulness and reverence now so they doesn't become issues down the road. Wayne Rice wrote the book Junior High Youth MInistry, which is the greatest book alive on Jr. High stuff. I read about an article by him talking about his book, and figured it was worth having. I ran into Wayne at a buffett line at a hotel in Dallas Texas and had a chance to tell him what an amazing book it was. My 10 seconds of fame.

I finally broke down and registered my name as a domain name. For $8.95 who can beat it? www.davekurt.com will now send you to my blog.

Second piece of big news is that I'm now the Vice President of our neighborhood association. I guess if the president dies, I take over. I also receive much less secret service coverage than the president. My first order of business at today's meeting was to put the kibosh on a suggestion that we put speed-bumps in our subdivision. I seriously thought this was a joke when I first heard it. My second favorite suggestion was that the association pay money to stock a local drainage area with frogs. Genius, eh? Should be an interesting two year term. The president goes away next year, making me the most powerful man in the free world - or, at least in Eagle Point Subdivision. I truly am master of my domain. Here's an arial photo of my domain. I finally know how Leonardo DiCaprio felt when he stood on the end of the titanic and yelled "I am the smartest man alive!" Oh wait, was that Billy Madison?? I always get the two confused.

:: RELEVANT magazine :: How's your relationship going?: Great article that contrasts with our perception on what a relationship with God is supposed to look like and how we gauge it versus our relationship with our friends.

Check out the new google toolbar. It's got all sorts of cool features like form-filling, pop-up blocking, and blog integration.

I've spent a large part of today reading the new Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. What a great story! I'm about 500 pages into it (out of 850). I love long books like this. Hopefully I'll get to bed before 1AM. Zach and I are still meeting at 6:45 a.m. on Monday, Wednesday and Fridays at the gym.

Madeline's 5th Birthday party was yesterday. We had a big moon-walk bouncy thing there, which was fun. At 10:30 Saturday morning we weren't sure what we were going to do, because of the rain. Even at 11:30 when they showed up to set-up the moonwalk we were hesitant because of the weather, but in the end, it was great. If you've never been to a Kurt gathering - everyone in my family is there, which means lots of kids, and all my siblings and their spouses. My younger brother Jon was able to hurt one of the kids only 17 minutes into the party! A personal best! On top of that, he ended up giving Madeline's a bloody-nose in the moon-walk. Standard fare for a Kurt party. The moon-walk had this giant butterfly on top of it, and it looked like it needed to be mounted. Kevin took the first shot at it, but forgot to clear kids out before the moon-walk collapsed from his weight. I took the second try, but was a little too heavy for it to support. In the end, Nate was the only one who climbed on and rode the thing for a while. The Heikkinen family was there, and we had a chance to hang out for a while after the party, which was fun. Cathie and I would have a fourth, if we could guarantee it would be a clone of little Jesse Heikkinen. Later that night, on a whim, the kids were still awake, so I broke out the fireworks. I had my camera and tri-pod out and was messing with the shutter-speed in order to get some of these funky pictures. The pack included wooden sparklers, which are bad. Little pieces go flying off as you use them. Apparently Noel had the same experience.
We've got a lazy day of doing nothing tomorrow. I think I'm got strep throat, or some other long-term sore throat thing and after a busy "vacation" we all need a rest.

We had our annual July 4th family picnic today at my parents house. Check out the pictures. Cathie's still recuperating, so I took the kids solo. By the time we'd hit Brighton there was a hurricane-style torrential downpour. By the time we were at my parents, it had cleared up and it was beautiful out. Power was out the entire time - so no air conditioning and no lights when you're going to the bathroom (Makes it tough to aim in a dark bathroom). We deep-fried a couple of turkeys for dinner and did the rest of the meal on the grill - beans, jalapeno poppers - everything. The turkey was phenomenal. The kids had a blast getting their squirt guns out - Grandma and Grandpa of participated of course - my mom even made water baloons for the kids. Kevin and I tried to get my brother Jon from the roof, but when he got into position, he was holding his digital camera. We did the annual grandkid picture. Typically, my kids are the ones fussing the most - and this year was no exception. By the end, we're bribing them with candy, drugs, whatever. Jon brought his dog stretch. Normally not a big deal, but since Jon torments our kids, we like to do the same to his dog. It doesn't help that the dog has bit just about everyone in the famliy at one time or another. Emily was a really high maintenance. I ended up taking her home while the rest of the family went to the Ingham County fireworks. Nate and Maddie went with my brother and his wife. I really have an amazing family. I love hanging out with them. We've got Maddie's birthday tomorrow - moonwalk and all. Cathie's feeling better and I'm done being a single dad. I found out that I'm pretty much a martyr. I really don't like serving others all that much, and it's easy for me to get self-righteous about it. I guess when I ask God to work with me on an area of my life, I need to be prepared for the worst - like my wife having the flu for three days. Sucks.

Cathie has the flu. Had it last night, actually, but still sent me off to the concert without complaining. Rough day. I suck at trying to get stuff done and hang with the kids at the same time. I get so frustrated when they're getting in the way of me completing a task. God forbid that a 2 year old doesn't jive with my plan for the day... I guess 2 year olds are like that. We've got Madeline's 5th birthday part on Saturday and we're at my folks all day tomorrow for the 4th, so we have to have most of the stuff ready to go tomorrow. Sounds like a dumb thing to lose sleep over, doesn't it?

Between Cathie going to Mexico and some things Noel talked about at Velocity has gotten me thinking about the serving ministries that I support with my time and resources. Crossroads as a church is great at being involved in helping the poor - both locally through Active Faith and different inner-city ministries like Gleaners Food Bank. Those are good ministires, and pretty typical of the kiind of ministries that churches support. In one of Noel's teachings, he mentioned how their church had a food drive for the local AIDS support center. He described how no church had ever done that for them. Jason told me about a buddy of his from school who has a ministry to abused and homosexuals, and he can't get a church to support him. It seems crazy that churches aren't jumping at the chance to support things like these. At first I thought this was a problem with the ministries our church is involved in, and then I came to the conclusion that I need to start with looking at what I'm doing in terms of serving the poor, the hurting and the outcast. I asked God a while back to change my heart towards serving others, so that I could be transformed, and in turn convey a credible vision to my kids in Fusion around the value of service in terms of spiritual formation. I'm trying to line up all these data points, points that I'd never really spent much time considering. Not sure where they'll lead.

I'm looking forward to hanging out with my family tomorrow. We always have a blast. Lots of squirt guns, hoses, people getting soaked - my Mom and Dad typically get in on the action as well. My Mom has this tradition of buying all of the grandchildren matching Old Navy and doing group pictures. Goofy, but fun. I really have a pretty amazing family.

Just got back from the Dave Matthews concert. Great show, even though I only knew 5 out of the 30 songs he did. I had amazing seats - probably the best I've ever had to a concert. A friend of mine, Bob, used his connections to get them for us. Great place to people-watch. Very little in terms of a stage show - the band members rarely move more than three feet, but musically, it was amazing. It didn't matter what he played - no matter how obscure the songs (I had Jason to explain the obscurity levels to me), people just dig every little thing Dave and his band does. Jason shot me little factoids throughout the concert on the songs, the band-members and random life events that tie back to Dave Matthews. The dude right in front of us was hitting a big doobie. Amazing how the smell of the pot, the people passing the joing and the concert atmosphere brought back a lot of memories from when I used to get high. Even a lot of years later, temptation is still there.

Jason and i came up with the following unspoken rules for a Dave Matthews Concert:
1. If you're a girl, you must be hot and wear a shirt that shows cleavage.
2. Everyone must wear Birkenstock sandals.
3. If guys are going to yell something, it must be one of the following "You F**kin rock Dave", "Dave, your the F**kin man" or "Yeah! Dave F**kin mathews!"
4. You must have a beer in your hand.
5. You must have a cell phone so you can call your friend and let them try and hear the concert.
6. Everyone must have at least one article of Abercrombie on.
7. Women must have one visible piercing.

Here are the big no-no's for concert attendance:
1. Never listen to the group you're going to see on the way to the concert.
2. Never wear the t-shirt of the band you're going to see at the concert.
3. Never wear the concert t-shirt you just bought at the concert.
4. Never call your friend in the concert venue just so you can wave at each other
5. Never call your friend so they can hear the concert
6. Never buy your girlfriend a rose at the concert.
7. Never hang out in the parking lot listening to the band that you're going to see on your car stereo (See #1)

I ended up joining Powerhouse Gym today after my gym went out of business. It's a beautiful facility, probably one of the nicest I've ever used. It's got all brand-new equipment, very well-kept and spacious. I'd worked hard to develop a lot of relationships at my old gym over the course of the three years I was tehre, and I figured most of those were gone. Working out there this morning, it looks like a lot of the regulars have moved over to Powerhouse as well, and now we've all got the common bond of getting screwed out of our membership.

I went bible shopping yesterday. I'd had a Life Application Bible that I got when I was 15, it was duct-taped, written in and well-worn. I was pretty attached to it, but I wanted more of a Study Bible that provided more background on the text, rather than reflection. I looked through a big pile of all the bibles out there, and ended up going with the NIV Quest Study Bible. Instead of just having text footnotes, it places the information in the form of questions and answers in the margins, all color coded with the matching verse.

I'm off the rest of the week, starting this afteroon - minus a conference call tomorrow morning. We've got the annual 4th of July party with the whole famliy at my Mom and Dad's on Friday, and Madeline's birthday party on Saturday. We've got one of those big moon-walk bouncy things there. It's a big family contest to see how long it takes my brother Jon to make one of the kids cry at the party by hurting them in the bouncy thing.

I'm going to see Dave Matthews tonight, with my Dave Matthews weiner friend Jason. Jason will be giddy as a school girl.

I saw the Hulk last night with Pierce. I liked it. It was very true to the comic book, and the computer generated hulk was visually amazing. It was interesting that there was virtually no blood, minimal death, and no swearing in the movie. I'm still baffled by how the hulk's shirt is torn to shreads, but his pants always stay on. They get ripped from the knees down, but the rest are in tact. Does Bruce Banner have some kind of crazy elastic pants on at all times?

I've talked to quite a few kids back from camp who are comitted to really digging in and reading their bible. I'm praying that after the warm fuzzies of camp wear off, that they're continuing on, growing and being transformed by it. Same thing applies to me. I'm reading through Romans also - Day 2.

One of my all time favorite pictures.