Random thoughts:

If you can't get into your house because of the crap you own, you have a problem.

If you have 15 cars and one runs, you have a problem.

Did you know that sometimes it can take three people to make one phone call?

Did you know some people will try to high jack every idea you have?

Some people do not like, "Lead, Follow, or Get Out Of The Way".

If you are speding $1000 to fix up a car worth $600, you are losing money.

Friends and family that provides support for you are more valuable than all the crap in the world.

I was thinking about music on my way into work this morning. Here are my favorite songs by genres.

Worship Song:
Yahweh, Vineyard Music or Days of Elijah, Robin Mark

Christian Rock:
Puppet, Thousand Foot Krutch

Chirstian Hard Rock:
My Heart String Come Undone, Demon Hunter

Contemorary Christian:
More than Enough, Barlow Girls

Current Country:
So Much Cooler Online, Brad Paisley

Current Hard Rock:
10,000 Fists, Disturbed

Current Pop:
Umbrella, Rhianna

Dance:
Better Off Alone, Alice DJ

Techno:
Better, Faster, Stronger; Daft Punk

80's Pop (female):
Warrior, Scandal

80's Pop (male):
Dire Straits, Walk of Life

80's Rock:
Shook Me All Night Long, ACDC

90's Rock:
Unforgiven, Metallica

90's Pop:
Love Shack, B-52's

90's Rap:
Gin and Juice, Snoop and Dr Dre. "'coming from the 9 duce"

And Lastly anything by Bon Jovi before 2000 could be on this list.

There are lots of people who use church like a shrink. We will call them Piranha's. They come, feast on the flock, and go home. For those people I would like to explain the following: THE CHURCH IS NOT HERE TO LET YOU DEVOUR US. In the church, and this make shock some people, there are real people. Real people with real feelings and real lives. When you do a drive-by feasting on one of these people, they will also then have a real response. They will have feelings generated from that experience. YOU ARE NOT ENTITLED TO DO DRIVE-BY's IN CHURCH.

You are entitled to have relationships at church. You are entitled to make friends and deal with people. This is a foreign concept for some people, so let me explain. You can start a conversation with someone and find out about them. This means that you do not always talk about your "horrible" life, but you honestly care about the other person who is listening.

Why might I have to say "honestly care"? Because there are lots of Piranha's circling at church. They are looking for a caring person to take a bite out of, so they can feel better. The problem with Piranha's is that they leave a gaping hole in their prey. The caring person, will then have to go home and lick their wounds for the week.

There are two ways to correct this:
1. Not care.
This is fairly easy, but seems stupid for a church.

2. Have each other's back.
This is a much better option.

Once a Piranha has been identified, alert the others.
There are people that are good at dealing with piranhas, because they have skin like a tank. The piranha can unload on this person, and the piranha will get exhausted and swim away.

The main reason that I am talking about this is, the love of my life came to me in tears because of this Piranha.
A Piranha has been after her repeatedly. It came to my attention, after she finally told me she was ready to never come back, that I needed to deal with this. I take great offense to people who openly will attack my wife. Especially people I have helped.

For you to go after her, is just like attacking me. I will not take anyone going after her. I know why you do it. My wife is an easier target. She has been hurt many times before, and it is easier for you and your parasitic ways to effect her. But know this, you are no longer my problem. Once you attacked her, that removed you from my list. You will now have to go find someone else to "help" you. Good luck with that, since now the other weaker fish have been told about the Piranha in our mist.

Hi everyone. It's been a while since the last post and just wanted to update some things.

My sister has decided to stay in Florida. My parents told her the gravy train had left the station and she decided that it was not so good to come home. :) She is coming for a visit next motnhs so we will see if the gravy train stays parked. :|

Church has been going great. Growing like mad, and loving every minute. I will post again later today about that.

The Wife and I went up to my parents place in Two Harbors, MN. It was relaxing. Nice to get away, but missed everyone, so really . . . .

Some Times He Calms the Storm. This has been a very powerful song in my life. Right now I am finding myself walking through my own storm again. This time it's on 2 fronts.

Sara and I have been at each other lately. She has been running on the edge for a while and she finally has slipped. Sara is very different person than I am. This is obvious for most people who know us. I am a go go go person. I can run on nothing for a lot longer than she can. She is not an incredibly social person either. I love to be on the go and doing stuff and she needs her quiet time to regroup. We decided today to no longer have life groups at our house for the time being. We just need a break.
We having been running full throttle for over 2 years with Journey and occasionally I need reminding that we need rest also.

I called my mom today to ask for prayer today. She dropped the bomb on me that my sister is pregnant and she and her boyfriend are moving back to Minnesota. This makes me go postal. I don't know what to do. My parents sometimes look to me for help and advise. We are having a family meeting tonight to talk about it. My sister is looking for my parents to support her and her bad decisions. I'm afraid that if they take her in, they will not be happy and I will not be able to see them again. Now I am sure someone is reading this and calling me a hypocrite. I can see that. Perhaps i am. Here's the thing though. My sister moved to Florida to be with her boyfriend after meeting him once. She came back and told my parents she was moving and getting married. If my parents take her back with her new muffin in the oven and her boyfriend, they will just be leached off of until she moves on to a new thing. I know also this is not my problem.

If they do accept her back I will just have to distance myself from my parents. I can not look at my sister with any care anymore.
She has always been this way. It's always been about her. She found out when she was younger that she could get attention by saying I raped her. So I had to be grilled by social services and got rejected by my pastor and everyone else that was important to me at that time. She talked to people about that that she knew were important to me just to spite me. It goes on and on from there all the things she has done.


I will beg that anyone who reads this prays for my family. Please pray for my mom and dad, (Ted and Jane) and my brother (Jon). My brother is going to go freaking postal when he finds out. Please also pray for my smaller family (Sara and I). With all eyes on us, there is a lot of pressure.

Locked, Cocked, and Ready to rock! This last Sunday was freeking amazing. The doors were blown off the church this weekend. We had so much energy and so many new people that came, it was amazing. If we can keep that level up, the next few months are going to be crazy. I hope we can keep up.

It's been kinda challenging for Sara and I lately. We have been having on and off relationship issues we get to work through. If you all could pray for us that would be great. Some of the stuff is just me being dumb, but there are deeper issues we are dealing with.

THis will just be a drive by posting. We went to Eagle Brook this weekend. Everyone I know who works with other people (all of us) shoudl check out their current sermon series, "Life at Work". The last message was very good and I will re-listen to it today. Probably everyday this week.