Resolutions

Happy New Year! Well almost anyway. Today I am finding myself a little taken back that we are well into the second decade of the 21st century. 00-09 went by rather quick and here we are about to wrap up 2010. If you are like most people the flipping over of the calendar can make you feel both reflective of the previous year and hopeful for the year to come.

Season of Reason

Christmas is over. Well it's mostly over, we still have all the clean up to deal with. On a superficial level we let some chores slide over the past few days, so there is a bit of a back log of laundry and dishes to work through. But there is also the dreaded cleaning up of the Christmas decorations. Oh well they need to come down sooner or later.

When Your Christmas Is Neither White Nor Merry

We all have some idea of what Christmas ought to look like. On a basic level there needs to be a fresh batch of flawless white snow, a well cooked meal prepared, eggnog, rosy red cheeks, (either because of the snow or eggnog this one has really have been clear to me) and lots of nicely wrapped presents under a well decorated tree. On a more personal level Christmas is also supposed to be a time of family togetherness, good cheer and a lot of joy. We all know this is what Christmas is supposed to look like. If your Christmas will look like this I have nothing left to say to you; other than Merry Christmas!

My Christmas will not look like this, and if yours will not either we have more to talk about.

The Christmas Videos Are Upon Us

Over the past few weeks I have watched a few really good Christmas videos. I thought about writing up little comments after each one, but I'll let the videos speak for themselves. They either made me laugh, or made me think. Either way I think they are worth sharing. And here they are;

1) The Digital Story of Nativity

2) Retooning the Nativity 

 

3) A Social Network Christmas

4) Jesus and Santa

5) Santa Went Down to Georgia

See you tomorrow for my normal blog update.

Helpless In Hospitals

There are a number of things that come with the vocation of being a pastor that I think I am good at. There are also a number of things that come with the vocation of being pastor that I am not good at. I am not very good at hospital visits. As a child hospitals frightened me. As an adult I am not frightened by them but I still rather not be in them.

The Problem With Greed: Goodbye Auntie, Hello Money

So I am a bit late in posting today. I have two reasons really. 1 I was working on this Sunday's sermon most of the day, and 2 I wanted to wait until after an event this afternoon to post.

We had a funeral today. An older congregation member passed away Saturday night and the service was today. Our senior pastor took care of the details. So when I saw him on Tuesday I asked what type of help I could be.

The Baptism I Wish I Had Given

On Sunday we had two baptism's at church. Both teen boys. I baptized the first and the second was baptized by his grandfather, a retired pastor and member of our church. It was a good day.  After all it is always great to see people, especially teens make this decision.

Additional Disciplines, For When You've Prayed Enough

A great suggestion was given to me on Tuesday after I posted my last blog. Pastor John, from the other West End Baptist thought that I ought to post some of the many non-prayer type disciplines. Which I shall now do.

When I think of spiritual disciplines I tend to think first of the prayer type ones that I posted. Which is an error on my part. It probably shows that I am beginning to limit my thinking about how to be spiritual much in the same way many of us have limited our thinking of worship to mean music. Like music is part of worship, prayer is part of the spiritual disciplines not the other way around.

Discipline Is Not A Four Letter Word

On Thursday I posted about the Lectio Divina . In that post I also mentioned that I would post up a list of other spiritual disciplines. This is that post.

I had originally planned on simply linking an existing database of spiritual disciplines. When I tried looking for one on Thursday I was not successful. I am sure somewhere out in the Google universe one exists, but after thirty minutes I grew tired of looking.

Rest Your Soul

Well it is December, and since November 1st Christmas as been in the air in most shopping malls. It seems where ever I go these days I am inundated with holiday cheer. Even my coffee cups have taken on a more festive theme of late. I guess Christmas really is a coming to town.