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Kicking Off The NT

Our pastor is on vacation for a few weeks, so I filled in last night to deliver the message. I picked Matthew 1:1–17. It's one of those passages that I'd always found kinda boring and would just skip over. But then last year I started reading through Matthew along with a commentary and found this incredible depth in the passage.

I've been wanting to preach on it ever since, and this was my chance!

Once again, I spoke too quickly. Even thought I had "S L O W L Y" printed across the top of every page. I think I need to watermark it across the whole page next time.

Audio (MP3) | Text (PDF)

Oh So Quotable

Family is in town this weekend for a variety of birthdays and Mother's Day. Which has led to some rather choice moments, even within the first four hours.

Ali and Isaiah, her 8-year-old uncle, were running around. My father was sitting on the couch with his feet on the ottoman. Isaiah tried to run between the couch and ottoman and through my dad's legs. As my dad grimaced in pain, Ali says, "Isaiah, you have to be careful! He's old. He's a grandpa."

Then at dinner, Isaiah (not sure why all the stories seem to be revolving around him) said, "Do you know why kids drink lots of milk? So they can be strong boners."

Yeah, I barely keep that howl of laughter inside.

And today's soccer game reminded me of a story from a soccer game around Easter that I forgot to post about.

One of the kids grabbed the ball in the middle of the field, prompting a penalty. The coach gets the team together and says, "Do you know why we blew the whistle to stop the game?"

One of the other kids, without pausing, replies, "Do you know that Jesus died for our sin on the cross?"

And it's only Saturday morning! Should be a good weekend.

ADDENDUM: It got better! All the kids were outside on the slip 'n slide. My 3-year-old nephew decided it would be more fun naked—and really, what isn't?—so he stripped down. We have a fenced in backyard, so who cares? Live it up while you can without getting arrested.

So, you know how at the end of the slip 'n slide the "landing area" collects up with water (see here)? Well, he decides that would be a great place to sit down and pee. We, of course, start laughing incredulously. He wants to see what's so funny, so mid-stream he looks down, grabs his conducting baton, and points it at his face.

Don't worry, we dumped all the water out of the slip 'n slide before the kids could go again.

Okay, Ali snuck in a slide before we dumped it, but I'm sure it was pretty diluted by then.

ADDENDUM TO THE ADDENDUM: This weekend just keeps on rolling. Now, we've had some funny moments in Sunday School before, but this one takes the cake. We're reading in Acts 15, where "The First Council" is held in Jerusalem to discuss whether or not Gentiles should have to be circumcised to be saved (the answer is "no", btw).

Me: Alright, let's look at question 3 (in our SS curriculum) and verse 2. How did they decide to try to settle the disagreement?
Student: Ask the genitals?

I did a fairly good job not exploding in laughter, but the other teacher (not Laura) did not. And that was it for everyone. The student actually had a good sense of humor about it and said, "Let's just pretend I meant to say that. Would that be better?"

The B.O.O.K.S. Of The B.I.B.L.E.

When Ferdi goes out of town, our mid-week service often becomes an "all music" service. Twice now he's asked me to do a short message during those services. I aim for about ten minutes. You may remember the first one over here.

Anyway, I got to thinking that since it’s a music W.O.W. (that’s the service name), I should do something musical. I thought about a couple of songs I could do, but it just wasn’t catching me.

Then I read a comment in a thread on preaching (sorry, no link) that foolishly said something to the effect of, “If you can’t preach an entire book of the Bible in one to two months, you’re doing something wrong.”

I decided to go the other way—I was going to preach the entire Bible in ten minutes. Luckily for me (and thanks to my wife’s memory), Dare2Share has a “G.O.S.P.E.L.” presentation that uses the whole Bible. Click on the picture at the right to see the slide I made for the sermon.

But that wasn’t good enough for me. The whole Bible in ten minutes? Who couldn’t do that? No, I had to set the bar higher.

The entire Bible. TWICE. In ten minutes.

This led, naturally, to writing new lyrics to Jonathan Coulton’s song “The Presidents” to provide a short factoid about each book of the Bible combined with a jaunty tune. And where he used "Hail to the Chief" 'tween verses, I hearkened back to Sunday School for "The B.I.B.L.E."

Without further ado, I give you my mostly coherent message and incredibly rough live performance of “The B.O.O.K.S. of the B.I.B.L.E.” (AAC | MP3 | Lyrics | Chords). The song starts at about the four-minute mark.

Note from Jonathan Coulton that I pass along to anyone who may wish to perform this themselves: "All my music is licensed with a creative commons license that allows for derivative works as long as they're non-commercial, and as long as you link back to me."

Stop. Pulpit Time!

“Preached” again on Palm Sunday. It was Youth Sunday and Laura had found these cool resurrection monologues for the students to do, so I put a little message together to bracket the skits. It’s worth listening to just to hear the “Male Chauvinist Pig” monologue. I love what we can get away with on Youth Sunday.

Audio | Text

You may notice the text starts off with “Today we celebrate Palm Sunday, the day Christ rode through the streets of Jerusalem…” while the audio has me saying “Today we celebrate Youth Sunday…”.

That’s what we in the business call “saying the wrong thing”. Quite a way to kick off the sermon, eh? Didn’t even realize I said that until I listened to the recording.

I still think I spoke too quickly at times, especially during the opening. Gotta be more mindful of that. And sometimes I think I sound too… combative or “this is how it is, if you don’t believe it you’re stupid”. Something like that. Overall, I felt a lot more comfortable and that my delivery was more solid.

Too bad all the funny parts were when I did announcements.

And Away We Go!

By the time you read this, I should be driving a van full of middle and high school students up to Madison, FL for a weekend retreat. The itinerary include late-night capture the flag, kayaking, Bible studies, swimming, heinous pranks on unsuspecting students, and Winter Jam 07 at Wild Adventures. Should be a good time.

If I make it back in one piece, I'll post on Monday. And maybe the "Recent Comments" list won't be dominated by urine.

Aww, who am I kidding?!

Pray For Me

"...and I'll pray for you..." Alright, enough Smitty.

This weekend, I am taking my overweight, 32-year-old body and most likely entering into a world of hurt—namely, paintball pain. I am leading a group of middle school, high school, and college age guys from our church. I will be vainly attempting to regain a hint of my youth while maintaining my dignity at Orlando Paintball.

As long as I can get a few of them before they get me, I'll be happy. This may need to involve cheating.

Stories and, hopefully, pictures next week.

Highlights By God

From the student that thought God wanted Jeremiah to "grind up your lions", today we got the misread that God wanted him to "make yourself blond".

And yes, the student is.

What To Who?

So we're skimming through Jeremiah yesterday in Sunday School (Laura and I teach middle school SS), and one kid looks up from his Bible and says, "What does 'grind up your lions' mean?"

We lost it. Flat out lost it.

Small "R" Revelation

I don't normally link to posts on my youth ministry blog because a) I figure if you're interested in that part of my life, you're already reading it and b) I'm woefully neglectful on posting there. But I'm working on that!

Anyway, last night I had a bit of an "ah ha!" moment after youth group. Dealing with the nature of serving God and struggling with what God's "calling" might be for me. If you're so inclined, feel free to read.

Shut De Do

The young adult ministry Laura and I have been heading up this summer did the "Children's Chat" in church this Sunday. We were just going to sing "Shut De Do" (although our version is more like the live version off Until We Have Wings), a great old Randy Stonehill song, since it had sort of become the group's song. We sing it every week when we meet.

Anyway, I figured I should do some actual "chat" for Children's Chat, so I talked briefly about the Armor of God.

Now, before I go any further, you have to understand that I hold my breath every Sunday morning during this time. Because not only is the entire church looking towards my daughter, but there is very often a microphone right near her mouth. I never know what she's going to say. Thankfully, most people usually laugh.

Okay, back to the Armor. I ask the kids, "What does regular armor protect you from?" Young Jimmy gives a good answer (swords and spears), I clarify (your enemies), and I'm ready to move on. But Ali still has her hand up. I can't ignore my own child in front of the whole church.

I say, "Okay, Ali. What does armor protect you from?"

She leans into the mic and says, "Armor protects you from bad guys and aliens."

Laura says this is what we get for letting her toy of choice be D&D miniatures. Oh well, we all got a good laugh out of it. I love that crazy kid.