Thunderstorms

I love thunderstorms. I woke up this morning to darkness at 8:00am and found that we were about to be hit by this huge line of storms being blown out of the north. I'm not sure I've seen that much red on the Doppler radar before. I took a video of the clouds with my Palm. So, I'm blogging until the power goes out. I love the autosave feature they put on blogger. I can't lose much that way.

I really enjoy being inside during a thunderstorm and watching the clouds and lightning and hearing the thunder. I'm a big fan of clouds, too. I took several pictures from the plane on the approach to Dallas a couple of weeks ago. It is too exciting. I was a big fan of the movie Twister growing up. There is something about the idea of winds so powerful that they can pull large, heavy objects and throw them several yards or even carry them several miles. I'm in awe of that.

It has been raining almost every day for the last two weeks here. We are well out of our drought. For the month of May, we've gotten almost eight inches of rain, which is like five times as much rain as last year, apparanetly. It has been cloudy and dark for a while, and I've been home most all day during that. I can't say that I've saved much for a rainy day, much less 10 rainy days.

Crusade

Warning - very long post. Even though this is labeled "rant," your comments are welcome if you don't know me personally. Kerry: this may bring back traumatic memories. Mom: feel free to use this in your book, though a more complete version is pending.

This morning I'm remembering my experiences in college ministry. Rewind to fall, 2005. I'm a junior in college. I'd led a community group for a year now and my group had grown to about 12 people. I was an RA in the engineering dorms, so even though I was a music major, my group consisted of mainly engineering students. Talk about an unnatural community. We got along for the most part, but when ever we were not talking about Jesus, they talked about math, science, car engines, computers, classes--they left me out most of their conversations.

My commitments as a leader were to attend the ministry's main event on Thursday nights, hang out with my community group (not bible study--we were better than just a bible study) on Friday nights, lead community group on Monday afternoons, go to leadership meetings on Monday nights, go to Impact (larger group bible study) on Tuesday nights, disciple three guys in my group for one hour each during the week ("raise them up as leaders"), and meet with my staff-discipler for an hour. This ended up being 12-15 hours per week of time commitments. I didn't have much time to practice clarinet.

There were several doctrines that this ministry developed and tested while I was there, both overt and covert. Some I expect they've had since my parents were in it when they were in college. All doctrines stemmed out their desire to take The Great Commission very seriously. OK, here we go:

The doctrine of spiritual multiplication. If we as a ministry were going to reach the whole campus with the Gospel, then we can't we wasting our time adding to our numbers. We must multiply our numbers. Here's how it works. I grew up in the church and recently learned how to share my faith using the 4 Spiritual Laws booklet. I share this with you and two others who accept Christ into their hearts. I begin discipling you three with our five follow-ups which include basic principles of the faith. I then train you on how to use the 4 Spiritual Laws to share your faith. You go out and convert three people whom you disciple and teach how to share their faith. Now, disciples don't necessarily have to be new believers. In fact, they could have known Jesus far longer than me and even served in leadership before coming to college. I still must go through the five follow-ups with them, just to make sure they get it right. No funny business.

Target-area doctrine. This ministry's strategy was to target living areas for evangelism. The pressure was on the area community groups to target the communities in which they lived. This meant that we would do outreaches including giving things away in exchange for people's contact information (so we could follow up later and share our faith with them), do servant evangelism by taking out people's trash, giving out more stuff or throwing parties, go prayer-walking, or just talk to people around campus in "guided conversations" that eventually led to us sharing the Gospel using the 4 Spiritual Laws. Not a single one of these outreaches grew our group in size or depth.

The Great Commission necessitates all to be leaders. If you share your faith, you are "leading" someone to Christ. In a movement like the campus ministry that I was in, no "dead weight" could be afforded. As a leader, I was to put most of my energy into people who would replace me. The big problem is that none of them felt called by God to be leaders. Many of them were introverts and most of them were extremely busy with school. Engineers have a ridiculous amount of work to do for their classes. I would estimate that they have almost twice as much work to do than average students. Sorry about all the "quotes."

The FAT doctrine. This ministry believed that, in order to be qualified for leadership, you had to be FAT: Faithful, Available, and Teachable. I met their standards, but these engineers weren't that available, and they required a lot of explanation in order to buy into biblical principles. They were analytical thinkers. The ministry's staff member who supervised and discipled me determined that none of the members in my group were FAT. Therefore, we must work all the harder on community outreach to get people involved who were FAT. My whole group was "dead weight" to the movement.

The Chart of Influence. In order to show how much and how far God was reaching (or to bolster their own confidence and success-complexes), the ministry's staff members all had to chart their influence. My discipler showed me his chart the day after my junior solo clarinet recital. It had the people who had discipled him on the left, him in the left/center, the people he was discipling on the right/center, and the people we were discipling on the far right. I remember seeing the other four people he was discipling with three people connected to each of them, and three little arrows pointing from my name to blank spaces. No one from my group had time to meet with me very often, so I couldn't help him out. It was then that he determined that none of my group members were FAT.

The conference doctrine. I remember the director of this ministry telling us in a leadership meeting that, "given the choice between attending Denver Christmas Conference or attending a whole semester's worth of bible study, I would choose DCC." In other words, conferences were extremely important to him. As a leader, I was to spend much of my time trying to convince my group members to attend the next conference. We even spent part of our leadership meetings trying to strategize on how we could get people to go. We were supposed to tell our group members not to think, "why should I go to Denver Christmas Conference," but "why shouldn't I go?" We always were to say, "it'll change your life." If that didn't work, then were were suppose to ask our group members every time we met, even if they'd already said no. If that didn't work, then we prayed profusely for them by name to go to this conference. I'm pretty sure the region's campus directors competed for how many people they could get to attend from their respective campuses.

A progression to full-time ministry. This ministry often stressed the importance of their own activities over all others, even those which were school-related. Rationalization: "What are you going to remember 10 years from now: some grade you got on a paper your freshmen year in college, or all of the friends you made and things you got to see God do?" Because how could anything satisfy more than God? So get involved.

Using names I substituted for the real ones, here is the progression:You start college and come to a main event meeting in this ministry. You hear about Weekend-Long Fall Retreat (WLFR). You go to Weekend-Long Fall Retreat and have a great time, meet new friends, and hear at least ten times about Week-Long Winter Conference (WLWC). You and your friends get into a bible study and hear about Week-Long Winter Conference all semester and about how much fun it will be and how much God will change your life, so you go. Week-Long Winter Conference is like a huge college party for God with two rock concerts per day, a dance, games, outreach, and a whole day about Summer-Long Evangelism Project (SLEP). You raise support all spring to go on SLEP, and you find that Summer-Long Evangelism Project is like your normal spiritual walk, but on steroids and in a totally sheltered environment. All summer long, you hear about taking the Gospel back to your campus, and committing a year of your life to go on Post-College Year-Long Over Seas Mission (PCYLOSM). Since you spent all of your time being involved in this campus ministry during college, you probably didn't do as well in academics or lost your original goal for college that all of your parent's money went towards. So you go on PCYLOSM. Here, in post-Soviet Paganistan, you have a great experience starting a campus ministry which will be a partner to your campus, so others from your campus can go on Summer-Long Evangelism Project there. If you are successful, then it is often suggested that you become Full-Time Staff Member (FTSM) for your ministry, so you can begin to pressure freshmen to go on Weekend-Long Fall Retreat.

As you can probably tell, it didn't end well with me and this ministry. Maybe I'll write that story another time.

Football field as stage

This morning I'm eating my imitation marshmallow cereal, creating Drum and Bugle Corps DVDs to save disc space, and thinking about past experiences in ministry. More about the ministry experience in a separate post, I'm thinking.

I think I should come out and admit that I am a bit of a Drum Corps addict. Ever since I saw my first show at Mile High Stadium in the summer of 2000, I was hooked. A Drum and Bugle Corps is very similar to a marching band, but there are several differences. There are no woodwinds (flutes, clarinets, saxophones) and no trombones, the corps is limited to something like 124 total participants under the age of 21, including usually 64-72 brass players, 14 marching percussionists, 12 pit percussionists, and the rest as color guard (flag, rifle and saber twirlers). A drum corps does not serve any athletics like football or basketball and is not affiliated with a school - they are independent and parent-booster supported.

In fact, Drum Corps are an athletic sport of its own: its season takes place in the summer time where, following almost a month's worth of all-day rehearsals, they tour all around the country and the world competing at football stadiums. The average drum corps will perform 25-35 shows during the summer. Being a clarinetist, I never felt it would be a good idea to play brass all summer, so I never participated. I regret that decision to this day. As a band-director-to-be it would have been a great experience for me.

Hymn

I was just listening to Minnesota Public Radio and heard a piece by Alan Hovhaness (1911-2000) who I later found out was a little-known American composer whose influences include Ralph Vaughan-Williams and eastern music as well. He was actually quite prolific - he wrote 67 symphonies and in all over 400 works. I'm sad that I haven't heard of him until now. This video depicts celestial bodies spinning to Hovhaness' String Quartet No. 2, Mvt. III: Hymn. This music gives me chills. If you like this, get a copy of Hovhaness' Symphony No. 2: "Mysterious Mountain." Now that piece is cool.

Where I am with God

It is my assignment this week for CR to write out where I am with God so that it may be compared with where I am with God in 22 weeks when the 12-step program is over. I thought I'd share this with you and you can offer any insight or encouragement if you want to.

For the most part, what I know to be true about God and the way I feel about him are extremely different and often conflicting. For example, it makes sense to me that God is a loving, merciful, tender God who has counted the hairs on my head and wants his light to shine in every area of my life. But the way I feel about God is that he is some kind of control-monger who just wants to own me and use me. I feel like he just wants me to know how powerful he is and how little my actions affect him, right or wrong. I feel like he just wants to have his way regardless of what I think or feel. When I feel far from him, I think, "how is it that my wife can spend lots of time and energy pursuing Christ and I can spend almost none, and we can still feel the same amount of discouragement?"

In general, I feel mad and resentful toward God because I think of him the way I think of most of the Christian leaders in my life growing up: as invulnerable perfectionists, power-hungry, controlling, manipulative, efficient and success/purpose-driven. Like these leaders, I feel like God is always trying to put the blame on me and just wants me to sit in my pain as long as possible sometimes.

As a result, I haven't spent time much in solitary prayer (my wife and I pray often together) and I have almost no desire to read the bible, and have never developed a habit of doing so. I should mention that I contributed to these feelings with my own pride, laziness, selfishness, lack of faith and trust in God. I haven't helped that situation by trying to escape for so long and deny that this is an issue whatsoever.

I do have hope that God will heal me of my bitterness from past church experiences and make me whole again. There are evidences of his love every day and I want to hold on to and look for those. I want to believe fully that God is good and that his way is better, and that no matter what hurts occur in the body of Christ, that he is big enough to heal those bitter wounds. I want to believe that he is worth my time and energy and love.

Addicted to media

Did you know that you can embed all of your favorite videos on your blog? This is too exciting.

lot on my mind

Summer has been hitting me over the head lately. No commitments other than finding a job. I have unofficially been offered a part-time job at Office Depot that pays $8.50/hour. I will probably take it if, by the end of the week, nothing comes up that offers higher pay and more hours. It feels good that my work wasn't in vein, though. I started the process with Office Depot like 5 weeks ago. Money might still be an issue through the summer, so pray that God will provide and I don't have to delay my schooling.

Google Earth and its 3D Warehouse have been of great interest in the past couple weeks. They have this tool called Google SketchUp which can model almost any 3D object with little effort. The program is so intuitive and easy to use, I wish I'd had it as a kid. I might be on a totally different career path by now if that were the case. I say that because I love 3D modeling. I've always loved sketching 3D houses, castles, or other objects and I figured most modeling programs would require a class to master.

After a week of going through tutorials and learning how to use Adobe Photoshop CS again, I modeled my own apartment building. Its pretty exciting, though a couple of the textures don't load correctly in Google Earth. I don't know exactly how to troubleshoot it, so I'll leave it as-is. It didn't take me long to realize that if my career in music education turns out to be a flop, then doing something with computers, especially building them or using software like SketchUpPhotoshop would be a lot of fun for me. I realize it is just as competitive of a career.

On the subject of technology, Dawn and I just burned our first DVD! It is pretty awesome. With Windows Vista's DVD creator, we made our own menu with its own music, and burned four downloaded episodes from The Office: Season 3. Pretty amazing, and it saves a lot of disc space. We love The Office. It has very believable stories and characters. I'm sure that the writers created these characters from people they actually knew or their friends knew. It seems that reality is so much more funny than fantasy could ever be.

Finally, a friend of mine from church suggested that all of my thoughts and bitterness toward God might be helped if I meditate or read about Jesus. When I think of Jesus, I remember how kind and caring he is, going after the poor and oppressed and shunning the rich and self-righteous. I don't think of someone who is a control monger that wants to be Lord over every part of me. I don't think of Jesus as a man who will do what ever he wants without regard to my thoughts or feelings. I think I can love Jesus.

Family

Well, here I am all doped-up on dramamene on the flight back to Dallas. Last weekend I visited Springfield, Illinois via St. Louis to go to my cousin Chelsea's wedding. My dad flew in from Denver and we rented a car and drove out for a day. I have extremely cool cousins who love the Lord and turned out really great, despite my uncle who was probably not a very good father. Or older brother, for that matter. All four of them seem like genuine, honest, fun-loving, mature adults.

It was because of may dad and my uncle's bad relationship that I didn't get to see my cousins very often. It is really a shame, because I think we would have gotten along very well. I told my oldest cousin, Chad, that I would love to get to know he and his wife more and make up for some lost time in childhood. I found out that she has family in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area, so they are in town fairly often. I hope we'll get to spend some time with them again.

I've admired Dawn's family because they are still quite involved in eachother's lives. There is a considerable amount of drama, but mostly they just enjoy spending time together even though they are separated by several states in some cases. When someone dies or gets married, the whole family rallies to support those affected. Right now, in fact, my parents-in-law are out in Kansas to go to Grandpa's birthday party, install new central air-conditioning systems in one sister's house, and build a deck for another sister. I think that's cool.

I've often wondered what it will be like to raise children in the same city as my parents and sister. I'm excited for when that time comes. Until then, its back to looking for a summer job.

Music and God

I believe in Jesus
I believe He is the Son of God
I believe He died and rose again
I believe He paid for us all

And I believe He's here now
Standing in our midst
Here with the power to heal now
And the grace to forgive

This song was published in 1987 by Mercy Publishing, who published most of the worship songs that I grew up on. I woke up this morning with it in my head. In fact, I often wake up with certain worship songs going through my head, and there is really no reason why. I haven't heard this song is years and years.

Maybe it is God's way of speaking to me in the morning; his way of giving me a chance to spend time with him and to remember him. I'm convinced that my best avenue of communing with God is through music. As my clarinet teacher, Daryl Coad, said, "As much as I like Christian worship music, nothing speaks to me about God more than a good Mozart or Brahms symphony."

I agree with Mr. Coad. Playing great repertoire on the clarinet that God provided using the talent that he gave feels pretty great. I often feel most at peace when in rehearsal or while practicing or when listening to classical music. All of the stress of theology and the worry about my struggles and my lack of desire and faith towards God melts away when I get to experience him through music. That gives me a lot of hope that I'm in the right profession.

new direction

I want to let you know that this blog may become much more personal and messy than in the past. I need a place to get my honest/raw thoughts down on paper, and I can't seem to do it when no one else will know about it or will care. Here are a couple of ground rules from here on if you are a reader:

1. Any post with the label of "rant" is taken out of the regular context of my life and was written without a whole lot of premeditation. Don't take it as representative of the way I am all of the time, because these posts will probably be fairly negative and unbalanced.

2. Please only comment on the really personal posts if you know me well. If this blog turns out not to be safe, I simply won't post.

3. Please keep in mind that you can not change me, but only God can. Therefore, feel free to encourage me or give your opinion or other comments, but your prayer is also appreciated.

I'll try to keep the blog as balanced as possible so you don't think that I am a complete mess. However, in a lot of ways I am a complete mess. Thank God for His mercy.

I love you guys. Thanks for reading.

Celebrate Recovery List

I'm going to Celebrate Recovery at my church on Thursday night and I wanted to make a list, or maybe just rant about what I am going to say in the group. It is really important for me to get these things off of my chest and out into the open in a safe environment like CR. I feel like this process has been the beginnings of healing for me, so here we go:

1. I avoid and escape from pain at all costs. I am really good at it, too. This is how I've spent most of my life, certainly since I was 10 years old. I began by doing impressions of cartoon characters or funny movie characters, always putting on a different face. I then moved to video games when I was about 12 or 13 and have not stopped using that method. As a 14/15 year old, I began a pornography addiction that was extremely effective as well. In the past year, I've seen lots of victory in that area, though it still tempts me.

2. I escape my pain by talking about and focusing on other people's pain, especially the people who are closest to me. I then try to control them and force them to feel better, as if I could. Dawn, my wife, gets the brunt of most of this. And for her, it is easy to see her pain because she is not as skilled at avoiding it. Yesterday, I was busy on the computer escaping my pain (not very well, actually) when she made an important call to her mother that she was worried about. She thought that her mother might judge her despite the fact that she could identify with Dawn's situation and was very loving and accepting recently. I was not worried about it, so I didn't help her or encourage her or talk through it with her. I just wanted to be proven right, and that was much more important to me than loving Dawn. I am really ashamed of how much pride I have.

3. Last night, I realized that I don't even need video games or porn to escape. I'd bet that anything short of locking myself up in a windowless, padded room in a straight jacket wouldn't be enough to keep me from escaping. Sometimes, when I'm in a bad mood or feeling discontent, I just focus on something else and wait for the pain to go away. I also escape by playing music or calling someone on the phone.

4. My conclusion is that if I go anywhere but to God for healing and restoration, then the pain will always come back. I have a 13-year track record of going to other things than Him, so this is going to take a lot of work.

5. In a related matter, I do not encourage my wife to spend time with God anymore because when she does, I feel a lot of shame. I feel this because I don't have that same desire to spend time with Him. And I have shame about that. But I'm angry at God. I easily forget how much He loves me and cares for me, and how awesome and worthy of my praise He is. Mostly I just see him as prideful and stubborn; as a control monger. I've taken my view of the Campus Crusade leadership of two years ago and projected it on God. In some ways, I've given up pursuing God's will in my life because I tend to think that God is going to do what ever the hell He wants without regard for my feelings, attitudes, and requests. I resent that. I don't feel like I matter to God.

6. I have shame about the things I think about God. How could I think such aweful things about the God who delivered me from a pornography addiction or the God who gave me such an amazing wife or the God who has blessed me with talent and a love for music or the God who CREATED music to begin with?!? The bible says that all of the good things in my life are from God. What makes me think I can resent Him? Lord, forgive me.