cheesecake and wii

Last night the Mortons and the Baucoms got together to play wii and eat becki’s cheesecakes. It was great. The morton’s had never played the wii before – and we had a blast. Becki beat me at boxing… i lost at tennis against Jennifer, and Phil beat everyone at bowling. But the night of David failures was made better by cheesecake. Every Season Cheesecake catered the event with a Blueberry lemon swirl cheesecake and a Red-Velvet cheesecake. Both were especially delicious – and the majority vote was that the blueberrylemonswirl was the favorite. We took pictures for the Every Season Cheesecake’s website (coming soon) and enjoyed spending time with friends and good conversation.

The moral of the story? if you want some awesome cheesecakes, just email everyseasoncheesecakes@yahoo.com.

the ill-tempered klavier

so, i’ve recently been introduced to an artist called BEN SHIVE. I didn’t think i would like the music, at first, because it has an odd sound…but the more i listen, the more i love it. His sound seems like a mix of the Beatles, beach boys and coldplay.

His first and only solo release, the ill-tempered klavier, it fantastic. go and listen to it. if you don’t like it, don’t tell me. if you do, then tell me.

 

X24-7

I started a Bible study that meets on Saturday nights  at my house for my High School Juniors and Seniors. this was for two reasons: to give them their own ‘thing’ away from the younger youth, and to train up student leaders. The study gets it’s name from Exodus 24:7. Look it up. apply it to your life: 24/7

It’s going really well, and i think i might be enjoying it more than them. We only have 6 juniors and seniors. We usually drink coffee. Lately we’ve been going through a study called ‘It Came From Within’ by Andy Stanly. It’s really great.

I don’t really have anything more to say about it. Here are some pictures from the other night. The photos are a little grainy – very low resolution. They were shot on a 35m camera and developed at Walgreens….so…that explains the quality. I hadn’t used my 35m in a while and i had to use up the film in the camera.

the boys all on the couch…

the shoe of choice

mmhh. coffee good

this is drew. say ‘hi’ drew

samuel playing my great grandmother’s guitar, Stella

lost…

so, my favorite television show is back on.  LOST. 

if you don’t know the basic idea/plot of the show, here it is: a plane crashes on a crazy island….and weird things happen. Some of the survivors want to get rescued off the island, some dont.  There are story arcs with each character…which makes the show rich and worth watching.

I started watching the show during my senior year of college with my roommate Dan.

For all lost fans, i think this is going to be one of the better seasons. They seem to have gotten back to the roots of the show.

If you are a fan of the show, i would love to hear your thoughts on this season so far, and more.

If you are not a fan, go and watch the first 4 seasons and then come talk to me.

i love my kid

My kid. she’s awesome!

God is a God of LIFE

No, not the boardgame LIFE where you spin the wheel and try to succeed in life by making as much money as you can and finally ending at the great mansion. It’s a fun game – but God is bigger than that.

Yesterday was Sanctity of Life Sunday. Honestly, i never keep up with these things and always find out when i arrive at church – so yesterday was sort of a surprise.  I wasn’t totally taken off guard, because the Church of God down the street did something really awesome this year. They put little white crosses in their yard – 50 little white crosses – each one representing 1million abortions since the 1970’s. It’s a beautiful site, and i hope they leave it up today, so i can get a picture.

But, it got me thinking about this Sanctity of  Life idea. What does it mean? Sanctity comes from the latin word Sanctus, meaning holy. so, it’s Holiness of Life day.

Is life holy? You bet it is.  Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”

We were made in the image of God – we are Image bearers of God. If God is holy, and he breathed life into us, and created us as representations of him, then we are holy – life is holy. When God gave the 10 commandments, he said not to make any idols – any images – that would represent him. He said, don’t make sculpture and statues of me, because nothing would properly represent me and you would only end up worshiping the object and not me. The only place in the Bible where it mentions that God approves of a created representation of himself is when he created MANKIND and said it was GOOD.

so…when we hurt ourselves or others, we are hurting the image of God – and essentially – hurting God.  So, if we are all image bearers of God, then we all have to be VERY CAREFUL before we do anything that might harm someone else. That doesn’t just apply to abortion, but also murder, suicide, war, fights, arguements, gossip….all across the board.

We worry about our rights, but if we are crucified with Christ, then we no longer live or have rights, but it is Christ who lives in us. We are dead to ourselves and bondservants to HIM. How do we have the right (being the created ones) to harm the image of the Creator?

i hope that you will see how holy life is – and that you are an image bearer  am of the Creator.

I am going to go and get a picture of those crosses. It will be up here by the end of the day.

white crosses

Eagerly anticipating

So, i’ve been sticking around the church today, eagerly anticipating the electrician. He’s supposed to fix the lights, etc for the youth room.  I’m listening to the music for our christmas program. it makes me feel cool… 

days of summer

So, here are some pictures from this summer. some are from July 4th, the butterfly picture is from the zoo.

outcast

For some reason, the word ‘outcast’ has shown up in a lot of what i’ve read today. It’s weird. Anyway, here are some more pictures. Hope you enjoy.