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Showing posts from December, 2007

The Little Drummer Boy Has Gas

Owen, our 2 year old son, was singing a song the other day, that I was not able to recognize for the first while (he is 2 after all - and makes up most of the lyrics), but I really cracked up when he got to the chorus. All I could hear was, "hmmm, hmm, la, la, la, pa rumble bum bum ." Fart jokes are always funny right?

The Inner-City Needs Friends

Lately God has been tugging at my heart and challenging me to make my faith more alive, by loving people. He has specifically challenged me to be more aware of poverty in Winnipeg, he has also been challenging me to do something about it. As I have shared this with people, many have responded and said that they have been receiving a similar challenge from God and I truly believe that God is at work in our Church and that he wants us to respond to the needs that we see (or that we ignore) everyday. This will be a long post, but I wanted to be more specific about how God has been challenging me… This summer, a hand injury gave me a chance to spend more specific time with God, and during that time God began to challenge me with very heavy (not easy) stuff for me. Over the last few years I have often felt the need to challenge our church to be more of a help to people who live in poverty…I often felt that our church has been blessed with many financial blessings and that we could be doin

My Friends Rock

We had a party at our place the other night for the volunteers that I work with. It is always a great time when we get together, but this time was a particularly good one for me. It wasn't that we did something special or had an amazing time it is just that I realized how much I appreciate the people who volunteer their time to work with me. I realize that this is not an easy endeavor (working with me can't be!), I also realize that they sacrifice a lot in order to give to the young people in our church. They also take the time to connect with our kids and that really means a lot to me. I really appreciate the way they encourage me and even hold me accountable on stuff. The people I work with are just great people who care, and are fun to be around. How can I express my appreciation? Word's do not come easily, but emotion does. Thank you to all of you: Matt and Andie Graham Danae Jason and Pamela Jeff Andrea Quinn Lyla Chi Jordan Phil Tanis Wes and Ashley Andre and R

Pepsi Sucks

I, with the help of my friend Stephen (thanks Stephen), was moving my desk to the other corner in my office - to make it more homey :). I had my computer on the desk and a bunch of other stuff. In the process I knocked over a small computer speaker (weighing about 1/8 of a pound), it fell about 3 inches, landed on the side of a Pepsi can. I hear a loud POP! almost like a gunshot, and all of the sudden there is Pepsi everywhere. Because of this experience I have come to the conclusion that PEPSI SUCKS...for two reasons: The taste is terrible - if it actually tasted good it wouldn't have been sitting on my desk in the first place, it would be in my belly. Somebody left this can on my desk months ago, and I haven't taken the time to drink it. Obviously the quality of their cans leaves something to be desired - I know let's put something that can dissolve a nail in a month, put it under pressure in a thin aluminum can...this should be fun

Freaking Cold in our Office

Thursday morning I came into the office to see Debbie sitting at her desk wearing her jacket and gloves. I thought, "I guess she just got here and hasn't taken her jacket off yet." I went into my office, took off my jacket and realized that she had it on for a reason...it was 12 degrees Celsius in there! That's 53 fahrenheit for my metrically challenged friends. The furnace had quit blowing heat over night and had been blowing -25 degree air into our office area for who knows how long. We sat in that office...wearing gloves at our computers all morning before the furnace was fixed at 12:30. I took a picture of myself just to show you how cold it was.

Should I Bring Jesus to the Poor?

I met this young lady who works for an inner city organization that works with children. She has been working there for 10 years. She said one thing in particular that really struck me. She said, "I used to think that when I came to the inner city to work with these kids that I would bring Jesus to them, but when I got here and started working with them, I started to realize that Jesus was already here." It struck me because I think that we middle class people (not just Christians) think that we should go into the inner-city and "rescue" people from their situation. We often feel as though we have all the answers and they have everything wrong. Is it possible that it is the other way around? Is it possible that people who live on the streets...those who don't worry about tomorrow, those who are not obsessed with money or material possessions actually have something to teach us? I think so. So in response to the question, "Should I bring Jesus to the po

Winfield H. Tutte

I went to a convention in St. Louis a few weeks ago. It was a convention for Youth Workers all over North America. There were 3500 other youth workers there, and it was a blast! I went two years ago, and am still inspired by what I saw, heard and learned there. The best part is just making connections. This year I actually got an email that I wrote to be read in the general session, here's the story: Nicky and I were reading through the information that was given to us at the convention that explained what all the seminars were, there were 12 options for every time slot and it made for difficult decisions on where to go and where not to go. One particular presenter caught my eye, his name was Winfield H. Tutte, here's his bio (as quoted from the National Youth Workers Convention 2007 booklet): H. Winfield Tutte "Windiddy," as he's known to his friends, has a PhD, BVD, DVD and YWAM. He's a world-renowned youth worker, writer, speaker, plumber, gymnast, z

I took my mustache on the road!

Before the mustache contest came to a close my lovely wife and I decided we should take my mustache on the road and let it see the world before it met a decidedly sharp and painful end. So we hopped in a rental car and took it to St. Louis A picture of the 3 of us...Nicky, me and my mustache My mustache saw the sights And even met celebrities (that's Jar's of Clay mere metres away from my mustache!) That's David Crowder's back! (You probably don't even know who he is) Here is a picture of David Crowder on the big screen...we (my mustache and I) never got to see him for real from the front. Much of the trip was filled with frivolity, but... Some of it stunk. Sometimes people even made fun of me, and laughed and called me names But overall it was well worth it When it came down to judging the contest I wound up finishing second in the contest to the fellow sitting next to me, but I believe shaving your head bald (did you have to shave? or is it natural?) and growing h