Ok, so this is my first time jumping onboard the Positive Post Tuesday bandwagon.  I've been wanting to join in the positivities for a while and, well, now I am...

 One sad thing I struggle with is that I find myself overly critical of churches at times.  I mean, it's kind of an occupational hazard for me.  I have an undergraduate degree in "church", live for the Church and plan on travelling the world to see the Church expand to unreached peoples of the world.  With all of this running through my mind, I often see how we are failing our communities and our people...and it is all to easy to point fingers (mostly at others, but sometimes myself).

 This is why I have come to dislike board meetings at our church.  I feel like we run through the motions and seldom get somewhere important by the end of the meeting. "Maybe next time" I think to myself.

" So what about those positivities" you ask?

 Well, tonight we got somewhere.  We discussed the future of our church and its role in impacting our communities around us.  We got beyond the run-of-the-mill meeting topics and dreamed.  And, honestly, I needed that.  I needed to see the passion and hearts of our church leaders.  It was a great reminder of the time they have given, the passion they lead with and the concern and hope they have about our church's future.

 I sit here tonight proud to serve at the church I do.  While we may not have it all together or all pointing in the right direction, we do have good hearts and a willingness to follow Christ.  We have leaders who are willing to try something new.  We have trusting leadership in our elders who truly care about our church, the Church and the lost/hurting people in our communities.  I serve alongside a Senior Pastor who has devoted his entire life to this church and this community.  I serve alongside an Executive Pastor who is supportive of new ideas, willing to think outside the box and has an amazing creative talent.  I serve alongside a Youth Pastor that is talented in so many areas, has given hours upon hours of his time to helping our church embrace new technologies for use in worship and has an unbelievable heart for missions and helping young people travel the world for the first time in serving Christ overseas.  I serve alongside an extensive team of volunteers that believe in our mission at our church and our family ministries and give of their time and money to help families experience Christ in a new way.

 I also serve alongside an amazing wife who is 1,000 times better at being a children's pastor than I will ever be.  A patient woman who gives sacrificially towards our ministry and is supportive in my half-baked, crazy ideas that sometimes cross my radar.  She is simply the most amazing, beautiful person I have ever met.

 So, yeah, it's not Thanksgiving yet, but tonight I find myself thankful for the blessings of those around me.  Despite my critical attitude, God has reminded me to look at the other side of the coin.

 And to those of you reading this, thanks for being a part of this small community.  What's God been telling you lately?

So everything we have worked for in the past several months is about here... Meaning, that now all of the emotions, stresses, joys and pains of it all is also here. Last minute prep work, endless lists needing attention, 1.6 billion things to think about: volunteers, A/V cue sheets, last minute light design tweaking, memorize lines, don't forget UpStreet, eat something, don't forget about the bills, make time with Sara...if only for a minute or two, delegate, dictate, plan, prepare, produce, write, read, sleep, print, mail, call, laugh, cry, sick, sleep, eat, prep, read-through, brainstorm, dream, sleep, daydream, imagine, realize, fax, drive, edit, shoot, 4Before, sermon, worship, kids, school, partner, delegate more, explain, cast, pray, read, pray, sleep, dream, pray more, puppy, stage decorations, nurseries, buy, pay, purchase, bills, stress, anger, joy, tired, full-filled, empty, interesting, overwhelmed, under-appreciated, over-appreciated, worthless, dumb, brilliant, worth-while, games, Thailand, missions, lonely, blog (seldom), completion, soundtracks, Once, wife, Olympics, The Office (daily calendar), early, late, new, refreshing, old, same-old, unbelievable, honest... etc. etc. etc.

It's been a crazy summer. Thanks for letting my explain it via commas....

So, once again, it's been a while. Despite the hectic pace that life has been taking over the past few months, I've found nuggets of decent moments. Snuggling with my wife, kickig a rugby ball without pains in my leg, actually cooking a dinner for supper together, watching movies together when time allows, playing with pup (when time allows), and sometimes even sleeping (when time allows).

So yeah, it's been hectic... But, it's been good. It makes me appreciate what time I do have away from "work life" ... The question is, to those of you who work in the church, how to you balance a hectic 'work" life with trying to have a normal home life?

Your thoughts?

I can't believe June is already gone. Like, where did it go?

We had a pretty decent weekend. There wasn't a ton of work needing done (although I did find plenty to do Friday night and Saturday to keep me up late). Sunday was a relaxing afternoon spent in my Dad's pool and playing cornhole, all while getting sunburnt.

With less than two months to go on this Family Ministry remodel, I'm starting to get a bit more flustered. The physical stage and set construction is coming along...but more slowly than I would have liked. The sound equipment is here and strewn about my office and hallway. Drywallers are coming Friday, in a half hour I'm heading back to the church to work on running electrical lines for stage, sound, and house lighting.

But, more scary than the physical space (that stuff can get done with several all-nighters and lot of coffee) is the fact that we need to more than double our current volunteer base. The next 5 weeks will be spent preaching on volunteerism, sharing vision with people, appreciating our current volunteers, and asking for people to take their next step in serving. That is scary. I know God is in this project... But, I also know what it's been like in the past trying to find the man/woman-power needed in the several ministies around the church.

And, to leave you with one link, I signed up for Planning Center Online. I've been eye-balling the service for sometime (ever since spending time at North Point) but Adam finally talked me into it via Twitter. It seems crazy powerful and definitely beats the pants off of Excel tables in scheduling volunteers. But there has been quite a bit of work in getting people added to the database, getting all the groups/ministries organized correctly and in getting templates set up for each of those ministries. Once that is done, I can see it being a smooth sail and the perfect answer to our scheduling frustrations for over 250 people.

Here's to being organized!

I don't know what it is about Mondays. I can't seem to get/keep my head on straight. Today was another one of those days. Nothing too over-the-top happened today. We started VBS. I drove a van to go pick up kids in the community who's parents couldn't bring them. I fretted about upgrading $15K worth of AV equipment in our sanctuary. I came home and relaxed...

But, somewhere in there came stress...the Monday stress... It started with VBS...and has yet to come to an end.

What is it about Monday's?

I work at a church that has 4 full-time staff, inluding myself... which, for our area, is a large church. We don't often find ourselves with the blessing of time, man/woman power or fresh creativity to pull off consistently good video work from week-to-week. Don't get me wrong, we do our best...and we have produced some great stuff, but, we're no North Point, Cross Point or Granger Community Church. We're Olive Branch Church.

We've often gone to Sermonspice.com to help in our video production area. Their list is ever-growing with new media that a church can use to engage it's audience, lead into a sermon or set the tone for a Sunday morning. We wouldn't have gotten to where we are without it. I'm a Director of Family Ministries afterall...there is only so much set-up, tear-down, After Effects, editing, cutting and pasting that one can do...on top of helping families take their next step in Christ.

So, while this doesn't have much to do with and Chaos I've Created, it will hopefully help the one or two of you who come here and are looking for a creative way to engage your church through video without hiring 6 full-time Service Planning creatives...

Check it out... ...Let me know what you think...

I just returned home from late night hospital visit.  One of our young mothers has been through some crap lately.  A few months ago her husband moves out on her...only to move in with a fifteen year old girl and her mom...

Well, tonight I get a phone call telling me that that young mother had to take her baby boy to the hospital because he had a seizure and had stopped breathing... and, away I went.  He is ok for now, thank God.  It seems a viral infection caused his fever to spike...which in turn caused the seizure...which in turn caused him to stop breathing.  Her rescue breaths may very well have saved her baby boy's life.

Sara and I don't have children yet.  But I can't imagine looking my young son or daughter in the face, seeing their blue lips and realize that they aren't breathing...  I just can't imagine it.  I don't know what I would do...other than flip out or panic...  or freeze or spring to action.  I don't know what I'd do...

Pray for this young gal, her marriage that is all but disintegrated, and her baby boy...  they've all had a rough night.  Also, pray for the Mills family as they find their newest child in Neonatal Intensice Care and also pray for the Qualls family as their first child is now born and Greg's face is all "airbagged"...

Peace. 

So, listening to Weekend America yesterday on NPR, Sara and I heard a discussion about this website that allows one to email a message/documents to a list of 60-some people after all Christians have been raptured and leave this earth! What the?!

Ok, first off, no wonder the world looks down on Christians like they do. This just doesn't do much for me... First off, the subscription cost is $40/year. So, it's not that I don't love my non/un-Christian friends...but I don't think SPAM mailing them post rapture is going to persuade them.

Also, does God really need my help after the rapture to speak to people from heaven? I mean, won't they get the picture? We're all gone...this crap's for real! My SPAM mail surely won't help much...

I guess I just can't believe that this is really a service people are paying to use. The only benefit that I can see is that once we are raptured and gone, rather than have the government collect all my assests (because I can imagine most of Capital Hill still being around come rapture time...sorry, I digress...), I could use this You've Been Left Behind service and send all of my banking information/stock portfolio (all encrypted according to the webiste) to some heathen out there to use... Now there's a thought...

So, what are your thoughts? How does this rub you? Good news, bad news, or no news?

It has been crazy around here.  I barely have time to rest...let alone type.  But, I need to anyways.  If for no other reason, I need to be faithful to my three RSS feed subscribers...I would want you guys to delete me due to inactivity.  So, let me bring you up to date...all twitter-like:

•  We've been working for  nearly half a year for what we're about to do Sunday at the church (KidStuf for the first time).
• My driver's license has evidently been suspended for three months without my knowing about it (Insurance/BMV mix-up).
• We produced a 4Before :: KidStuf Edition in which I got to put a pie in a clowns face (May have ruined a portion of our green screen).
• I finished reading my 19th book since October.  That's really good for me  (Starting another one tonight).
• In this next week we're hoping to raise $80,000 for our Family Ministry renovation happening this Fall (New kid's theater and remodel).
• I spent nearly $6,000 on microphones today (Got them early for Sunday's production).
• I'm really tired (My mind has been foggy for about a week and a half).
• I'm really excited (So much happening and lots of faith-stepping).
• I actually get to take next Monday off (Memorial Day.
• On New Year's Day and Christmas Eve I had to work (both are calendered day's off).
• I want to do something on my day off (But I'm afraid rest may be our only option...too tired to go anywhere or do anything).
• I love my wife (I've got to see her do what she loves and is great at this week when she was designing, painting, etc).
• I backed into my wife's car last week (It sat in the driveway...not hidden...out in the open...as I was late for a meeting at the church).
• She pulled her car handle off sitting at Home Depot (She was not happy with me backing into her car).
• I'm rambling (But it feels good to have the time to ramble).

We'll definitely snag some video and pics from this Sunday's production.  It'll be fun...

 Peace.

This week's Creative Chaos entry has to do with a 3D model I built in 3D Studio Max. I "finished" the project about a month and a half ago (although I seldom see projects I start as "finished"...there is always something more I'd like to do on them).

As we were looking to ramp up a new children's/family ministry we realized that lot of changes would need to take place. Adult Sunday school would have to be restructured to allow our adults to serve and also to be a part of KidStuf with their children....trying to take away as many conflicts as possible. No excuses not to be there with your kids, Parents!

Anyways, with all these changes I wanted a way to portray what could come of a few classrooms, a bit of money, and a whole lot of love. So, I decided to whip a 3D model of the space to show people. The idea that "a picture is worth a thousand words" really stuck in my head. And, some 130 hours later I had a few images, an animated 3D walktrough, and packets to hand out to our leaders and volunteers as we worked through the details.

I'm pretty proud of the results; although, like I said early, there is more I'd like to do. Here are some images that I came up with...totally to scale and mostly accurate. Take the sound mixer for example...it's the model budgeted for... details, details....

Click images to see larger versions...