We Are Alive

Wade Joye, Elevation’s worship leader, one of them anyway, just reminded me, and you if you read his blog, that Elevation’s new CD is coming out July 6. Those guys are good. I can’t wait to leave that playing on my iPod for a while. Coldplay may need a break by then.

Coldplay

Can’t wait for June 17th? How about November 11th? Me neither! Just keep watching this commercial and pre-order Viva la Vida.

The Book Shelf

I’ve changed my books section ov’ere a little bit.

Here’s why:

[Number 1.]
I’ve read one that I took off and thought it was dumb to have it on this particular book shelf.

[Number 2.]
I read some good excerpts from “Change the Way you See Yourself” and thought, maybe I should/could change the way I see myself.

[Number 3.]
I put “Simple Church”, and left “Pop Goes the Church” along with “Branding Faith” not because I work in a church and need to know how to relate to the culture, but because I know these are books, among many others, are being read by leaders of great churches now. I have a strong sense that someday it is possible that I work in a church and I thought it wouldn’t be a bad idea for me to be reading some material people I look up to are reading. I want to be knowledgeable and well-rounded in leadership methods, the culture, struggles I likely will face, and ultimately the Word. (I should put that one up there…) I want to stay a step ahead so that later on in life I can keep up.

[Number 4.]
I started reading “Vintage Jesus” today. I can never know enough about who Jesus is. Let me say thanks to Grant for letting me ‘borrow’ his book. He’s in Europe being awesome. I hope he comes back with an accent.

I was a little afraid that I wouldn’t be able to get through as much reading as I wanted to this summer but thanks to audiobooks I think I’ll be able to. I finished “Sex God” in 5 days! That’s a record for me, no doubt. iTunes audiobooks section isn’t all that great, not for my preferences at least, but if I can just a get a few on there I can actually read other books at the same time. With my exceptional note-taking abilities I should be a bit smarter by the time August rolls around.

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

Man what a weekend it was. Or at least Sunday and Monday. It counts as part of the weekend this week because of Memorial Day. I’m not sure if I was supposed to have off of work yesterday but I took a personal day without asking. I believe it was understood that I was going to be at the pool or hanging out, relaxing with friends one way or another…not landscaping.
Anywho, Allie’s last free Sunday was this past and I didn’t have to work at the restaurant so we decided to make a date of that day. I was bummed we ended up missing Daniel speak at NewSpring Sunday night but we did get to check out Buckhead Church in the AM. After we found the dang place we had missed most of the worship set but the last two songs were awesome. I was pumped about being led in worship by Los. He’s a favorite blogger of mine and I was honestly hoping for a meeting for minute just to let him know I appreciate RagamuffinSoul.com. That didn’t happen but the entire experience at Buckhead was worth the drive. It got me excited, even more, about NewSpring going multi-site. North Pointe does it excellently. It was cool to see it in action. (I was really impressed with how HD the HD screen is. It didn’t look like the speaker was on video at all. I’m impressed easily sometimes.)

Thanks to Map Quest, unfortunately I’m not able to put Garmin in this sentence, wait…I just did…anyway, thanks to Map Quest Allie and I made the 11-mile drive to Turner Field without mistake and parked in just under an hour. The line we had to stand in was only 3 miles long but really didn’t take very long to get through. You say, “That’s what we get for not buying tickets in advance.” I say, “I saved $26 by standing in line.” I also say that I blew that 20 bucks on a New York Dog, a Chili Dog, and the largest Sprite they had. I say, “What a rip off!”

Good food, good game (though the Braves lost), sunburn, good conversation, good church, good date.

Instead of having to wake up Monday morning and sweat all day for a few dollars I got to sweat all day for free by the pool with some cool people. It was worth missing out on a day of work. I may change my mind when payday comes around but I don’t really think so.

I hope all my weekends this summer can be so fun. I don’t want to be missing NewSpring though; I love that place.

Atlanta Traffic

It was a simple little phrase she said to me today.

“Thank you for driving; I would have killed us by now.”

It was a compliment that landed beyond just my ears and landed directly on my heart. I stole the words out of her mouth and relayed to my God.

Thank you, God for ‘driving’. For being in control and being sovereign. Thank you for putting within my being a bit of faith that I can turn right back around and put in you. I trust you. I rely on you. I love you.

I Take my Own Straw to Subway

Well, I don’t like when bloggers do this but I found this blog looking for the public’s complaints on Subway’s straw packaging and it is almost word for word what I was going to say about the straw paper(plastic). No, I didn’t look for something to copy and paste of here, but it is the first thing Google found for me that supported my personal complaint and it is right on.

I hate these straw wrappers. How does Jared OK this? Doesn’t he go through 3 or 4 straws before getting one out to use without breaking it in half trying to slide it out of the plastic just like I do? I hope so. And I hope Subway gets a clue on how to put paper, not plastic on their straws. I’m going to start bringing my own until then.

Bree’s the Coolest

My little sister is without a doubt, absolutely, nothing short of awesome-er than any little sister you know.