What I Have Been Enjoying
– Last night my sister, Kim, had her baby – Lina Nazera. She’s 5.13lbs and 20-21in. (not sure exactly). My brother-in-law, Tony is thrilled of course and my mom is so happy that she made it to Phoenix just in time. Also, I love the name, Lina is a family name from Tony’s side and Nazera was our grandmother’s name and a few of our cousins have been using it as middle names in memory of her. She’s born a day before Dad’s birthday/parents anniversary so one thing is for sure, her birthday will not be forgotten (unlike mine :-). She’s been a live for almost a day and there are still no pictures online. I guess they don’t have internet in Arizona. Anyway, in a few weeks Nathan and I will see if the rumors of her beauty are true. So far our father and son excursions have been much more local but will be headed out to visit baby Lina (too close for Susan’s due date in Oct. so she’ll get a nice little toddler break) – I can’t wait.
– Also yesterday, our Nassau Team was given the worship service to share about our experience. They were pretty sharp. Tim Nye and his students led worship, we showed our shorter video (soon to be on FB), and our team shared afterwards. It’s hard listening to reports from mission trips because among the reasons, they sometimes get too detailed and the stories get monotonous. They took turns talking about different aspects of the trip and I think they expressed themselves pretty well.
Some things from the past few weeks:
– Nathan learning new words like “Teta” (arabic for grandmother) “Gidu” (Arabic for grandfather), “house”
– Susan and baby boy doing great. Oct. 30th can’t come fast enough though
– Enjoyed going to the Yankees game with some friends. It was a comeback win and that always makes it sweeter.
– Enjoyed going to Mets game with my friend Glenn. He’s a fan of that team that has been tragically struck by the devil himself. It’s almost like the story of Job but we since we know that the good Lord is a Yankees fan, I highly doubt that the Mets will receive 10-fold of anything. Anyway, the Mets did win this game and we had a great time talking about baseball, family (both of our wives are pregnant with boys – it’s pretty cool) and the new Saturday nigh worship gathering we are working on.
kees fan, I highly doubt that the Mets will receive 10-fold of anything. Anyway, the Mets did win this game and we had a great time talking about baseball, family (both of our wives are pregnant with boys – it’s pretty cool) and the new Saturday nigh worship gathering we are working on.
– Benefit Night for Uganda – Jesse and Andrea Kroeze left for Uganda last year and were back in town for a few weeks. While here they did a benefit show at the 96 West Coffee Shop in Allendale, NJ. Our beloved Andy Zipf opened and Holler Wild Rose played a great show.
Listening to – Holler Wild Rose, Zach Williams
Reading – Karl Barth, finished Rob Bell’s Drops Like Stars (review coming eventually), and read a few chapters of Doug Pagitt‘s A Christianity Worth Believing. For the last year, I’ve been trying to carve out a good amount of time to devote my attention to it but procrastination has been embarrassing so I’m jumping in – so far so good.
Seminary update – Next week begins my cohort’s last year. I’m definitely not in school mode yet but will work on getting there. I’ve loved almost everything about our experience at Biblical and but I am looking forward to finishing up too. Last week we received an email telling us that Alan Hirsch is going to be our commencement speaker which is very, very cool.
Student Ministry Update – I’m looking forward to our new year beginning. The reoccurring theme is going to be “Christ and the Other”. Among the things that I want to teach on is the topic of identity, calling, spiritual gifts, etc. Honestly, I was pretty spiritually gifted tested out and I have always felt that we made too big of a deal of these “inventory tests”. At the same time, I find them to be insightful if you do not commit your entire mentality around their results. So we’ll see what happens. I also wan to talk about “the Other”. It seems to me that one of our blind spots is that we’re not very active in reaching out. I know it’s not just about bringing friends to church but being the presence of Christ wherever we go, but there should be a bit more connection between the two. One of the best things out of Dan Kimball’s They Like Jesus but Not the Church is the idea of the Christian Bubble. Our students have always been aware of the idea but it seems they have a deeper understanding of it now so I’d like to build on that.
Looking Forward to- Rev Gen – It’s a decent size Christian music festival in Jersey over Labor Day Weekend. We take our youth group every year and it’s always been a decent event. There’s always multiple stages and a lot of our kids hang out at the Philly Stage to hear As I Lay Dying, Flyleaf, Devil Wears Prada, etc. while the NY Stage would have Sixpence, Toby Mac and Newsboys. Most know that I am not the biggest appreciator of Christian music but I do like a lot of the bands this year, especially Jars of Clay. Looking forward to hearing Switchfoot’s new stuff, seeing Foreman perform his solo stuff on the acoustic stage and can’t to hear Derek Webb again One of my regrets is that I never bought any a Prayer of Jabez t-shirt. I would love to stand in the front row singing along wearing that. If you know Derek’s story, you could appreciate the irony.
i will be at Rev Gen both days