place of nathan.

The following in an excerpt (a complete ‘chapter,’ actually) from Seth Godin’s Small is the New Big:

Today’s New York Times reports that the Radiant Church in Surprise, Arizona spends $16,000 a year on Krispy Kreme doughnuts.
The health risks aside, this is smart marketing. (And is there anything wrong with a church doing marketing? Churches have always done marketing.)
Marketing doesn’t mean advertising.

What are you doing to aid your church in marketing? Even a smile is marketing. Do you smile?
ADDENDUM: not smiling is marketing, too!

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An amazing story comes out of Britain’s Got Talent, which wrapped up this week. Paul Potts, a mobile phone salesman from South Wales, turned out to be the eventual winner. But his talent is somewhat surprising.

Watch the looks on the judge’s faces when he states what his talent it, ‘Oh great, this is going to blow.’ But then watch it change as he performs his talent.

When you watch the look on Paul Potts’ face, you see a very humble man who is unsure of himself. He looks as though he is expecting the judges to yell at him and tell him he blows. But you have to see this–it is absolutely amazing.

Different versions of Potts’ performances on Britain’s Got Talent have been viewed on YouTube more than SEVEN MILLION times. Something truly amazing is here:

You know what the crazy thing is? I’ve always sworn off opera music. There are only two kinds of music in this world I don’t like, opera and country–and then, this comes along and actually rocks my world. I’m looking forward to his forthcoming album so i can buy it and keep this guy with me.

Lessons I will take from Paul Potts:
1. Just because I think I don’t like something, it doesn’t mean my mind is sold on it, even if i think otherwise. Something remarkable like this changes people’s perceptions. Remarkablity is an amazing thing.
2. Harsh critics can sometimes be your strongest supports when you are truly remarkable.
3. One’s day job has absolutely nothing to do with one’s talents or abilities.
4. Sometimes, the hardest part of achieving success is overcoming our own insecurities. And when you do, it makes it so much better than we ever imagined!

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This weekend New Hope will launch a five-week series looking at a few different Risk Takers in the Bible.

Pretty cool series idea, i think. We are looking at the risks these people took, and why they took them, and then applying it to where we are today. We ask the question, Is it safe to be a Risk Taker? and what about the opposite: Is it a risk to be safe?

Those questions take a bit to grasp and are pretty deep, but you can handle it–It is nice to be safe where we feel secure, but in the long run of things, is that short-term safety actually a risk?

Interesting topic. I’m looking forward to it.

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Have you ever noticed some people like to communicate via E-mail (or Instant Messaging), and others don’t?

There are even some people who i E-mail to communicate with, and they always only call me back–never E-mail back.
There are other people who if you leave a voice mail to call you back, they will send you an E-mail instead.

That got me thinking–people like to communicate on their own terms. Which, made me wonder, do we communicate to God on our terms? And the bigger question–do we want God to only communicate back to us on our terms?

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Several years ago, I was at a town board meeting, where the board voted to raise rates some 70% over three years. One woman, who had well-water incoming, but town sewer, was not happy. Here is one thing she said:

My water is much more pure than the water you add things to make it pure.

I actually laughed out loud when she said that. They both used the same source, but one added things to reduce toxins. The other didn’t add anything. Which one was more pure?

(This line EDITed for clarity:)One’s perception of purity is relative.

I think often our walk with Christ is like that–Christians have a tendency to judge other Christians (who use the same source) against themselves.

What do you think about that statement?

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Matt Keller has taught me a lot in the past 15 years. He was two years older than me in high school, and was a great example. He founded the DeKalb Bible Club, and I got to watch his leadership develop. He’s always been a natural leader and just naturally, people seem to follow him.
He has a growing, rocking church in Fort Meyers, Fla., (Next Level Church) and just this weekend NLC announced their new Executive Pastor, Scott Drummond, who is also very cool. I haven’t known Scott for nearly as long, but do know he is a very cool and talented guy as well!

Matt started a blog about a month ago. I encourage you to stop by and check out his bloggish thoughts.

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While I was going to college, I worked at a local lawn mower shop (Harmony Outdoor) for about three and a half years, i think. I did all kinds of things–sharpened lawn mower blades and chainsaw chains, cleaned up after the technicians, washed equipment, assembled equipment and even sold equipment–just about anything which didn’t require some true training, i did.

But one thing I learned at Harmony really didn’t have anything to do with lawn mowers. It really didn’t have anything to do with anything at the shop.

Frank Hoffman was one of two technicians when i started at Harmony. We worked together for almost three years, i think? Frank was a tall guy, originally from New Jersey. He liked to tell stories about life in Jersey. I liked to listen.
Frank was good at what he did–fix things. I had heard rumors that Frank was one of the top technicians in the nation, and I never saw any reason to doubt it. He was very good. Very good indeed.
Frank loved to teach. Frank taught me about combustion engines. He would then quiz me intermittently (going from seven-year old memories here): Q: Who developed the modern 4-stroke engine? A: Nicholas Otto. What are the three requirements for a combustion engine? A: Air, Spark, Gas.
Frank simply loved to teach. If i ever asked him a question, he took him time to describe to me the answer–not just the answer in the shortest possible time, but the reason for the answer.

You see, Frank understood that I would keep asking the same questions over and over again, unless I had the knowledge to figure it out on my own. He would describe a system, explain why a certain part existed, why we recommend a certain practice. He knew his stuff inside and out–But he didn’t simply have the book knowledge, he was able to understand why the concepts were true in the first place, and was able to then pass that understanding on to me.

The lesson is this: I wouldn’t have remembered anything if Frank just gave me book knowledge, but instead, he gave me a fundamental understanding of the foundations.
What are we passing on to the people we’re mentoring?

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So…who’s the next big thing as a conservative presidential candidate, Ron Paul or Fred Thompson? (who both, incidently recently rolled out new Web sites.)

Paul is certainly the only classical conservative in the race, but does he even stand a chance of winning the Republican primary? Probably not.

Who’s the next best thing to a true classical conservative? Other than myself (I am not eligible to be President due to my age), is it Fred Thompson? He’s got the face recognition, and his Michael Moore approach was certainly very cool, and he got a lot of free online clout due to his handling of that Moore guy.

Ron Paul or Fred Thompson? what say you?

NOTE: This is not an endorsement of any Presidential candidate. I’m still exploring the candidates…

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What does John 17:15 tell us about the church’s role in culture? Anything we can learn here?

I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. (ESV)

if you wonder who ‘they’ refers to, it is found in John 17:6, “The people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.” (ESV, read whole context here)

Should the church be a separate sub-culture or not?

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If you are still using Internet Explorer (IE) to browse the Web, i would urge you to consider upgrading to a better browsing experience.

Firefox.

Firefox is standards-compliant, which means a site which is properly designed to standards always displays properly in Firefox. IE is not, meaning a properly designed site might display properly, but it might not (usually doesn’t).

IE has so many security holes and flaws, and the majority of users never even run an update. It’s a mess.
IE 7 fixed a lot, brought it into the Web 2.0 era, but it is still not a standards-compliant browser.

Firefox has powerful Add-ons which add great features. Here are some of the essential Add-ons I use regularly:
Adblock: Filters ads from web-pages (yeah! it learns as it goes, which is very nice)
Flashblock: Prevents all flash from displaying unless they have been approved (lots of ads are now flash, which Adblock doesn’t block)
IE Tab: Allows website which are poorly designed (not standards-compliant) to display in Firefox via an IE engine. This works well for running WindowsUpdate and OfficeUpdate.
Link Alert: Changes the cursor to indicate the target of a link.
PDF download: allows you to choose what to do with a PDF file, and makes firefox and PDFs much faster.
Web Developer: The essential web development tool. Only needed if you are involved in development, though.

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Last night something crazy happened. Fire happened.

Emily and I were out for our run, and as we were walking our cool-down past the church property, we were watching them bail the field. They had a big, black Dually truck pulling a long trailer, and a bobcat was loading the large round bails onto the trailer.
I heard a whistle and looked over, and the guy in the truck stuck in head out the window and was saying something, i don’t know what. Next time I looked back, I noticed the truck hood was open. Odd, i thought. As we continued to walk toward home, our neighbor Randy the Fireman pulled out very quickly, fire lights a-flashing. ‘It’s Tuesday night, I think it’s their night to practice.’ I told my wife.
About that time, we needed to cross the road. As i was carefully checking traffic, i looked right, and there was fire…
It took some brain processing, but i put two and two together…There was a hill between the truck and us, so it was hard to see what exactly was on fire. Soon i verified the truck was on fire!

Then, the truck was driving away.

What? Yes, there were 6-foot flames (my guess from 400 yards out) blazing out of the truck, but it was moving!
Then, i noticed they were pushing it with the bobcat. They probably didn’t want to catch all those bails on the trailer on fire, and that was probably a very good idea.

That’s about all for now, but wanted to leave you with a thought: fire happens.

Have you ever had a run-in with fire?
btw, the photo in this entry is not an actual photo of the truck, in case you were wondering.

EDIT: the guy whose truck caught on fire was just in. He said the air conditioner motor caught on fire, and the two guys working were not able to put out it out. The motor melted plastic which then dripped on the carpet, and once the carpet started on fire, there was no way to stop it. He said there was literally nothing left inside the truck, only metal. No seats. no plastic consoles, nothing. The guys working when the fire broke out were able to get his briefcase out, which he was very thankful for, as it contained several checkbooks and checks. Anyway, just wanted to give an update…

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