Archive for April, 2008

Time… what to do with it?

April 21, 2008 · Filed under Uncategorized

So, If you have been keeping up with my blog, you know that I am now blogging from a new location. I am looking out on the northernmost waters of the Chesapeake Bay at Sandy Cove Bible Conference Center. I made the long trip up from Nashville on Friday, and more importantly, so did my car… PRAISE GOD!!!

I moved all of my seasonal belongings that fit into my car into my new home, a motel room with a single bed and a nightstand. (I am hoping to expand the amount of furniture to include a dresser and maybe a desk, if I am well-behaved.) It has running water, and is close to everything. Room and Board are included in my pay, so it is a blessing to have a “free” place to stay. Although, I told a friend that I felt like Will Ferrell in Elf when I laid in that tiny single bed.

It is weird to be back here. I have been gone for about 10 years, which is a significant amount of time. There are some familiar faces. There are some familiar faces that don’t find mine familiar, which can be humbling, but who said humility is a bad thing. The most common occurance is that when I walk around the grounds and go along as a please, as if I own the place, people keep questioning me… “can we help you? do you need help getting somewhere? do you know where you are going? are you new here?” I haven’t figured out how to answer these questions. I am not “new” here, but I haven’t been here in a long time. Add to the confusion, I am starting in a position that will not be my job for the summer… haha… I am the king of confusing, eh?

The overwhelming realization that I am facing this morning is, what do you do with your time? Obviously, I have internet access (i.e. this post) and I have a television that gets a few channels in fuzzy… but not in my room… what I have the most of is… time… pictures and words do a terrible injustice to how beautiful this place is… and I have already found “my spot” for where I like to read, and it is pretty incredible… but, I would encourage you to conduct a little experiment in your own life and get away from the noise in your life… don’t turn on the tv, radio, computer, for a few hours and figure out what it is that you do with your time… right now, I know that I need to be listening, so I have spent a good amount of my time reading, and walking and praying… sounds corny, but, it has been one of the healthiest choices I have ever made….

I have been woodshedding an idea that I will write about more as the summer goes on, but this is the first in a series of questions/challenges that feeds into the big picture of the thought I am developing. (how was that for vague? ha)

For those of you who literally prayed me into the parking lot here, I can’t thank you enough…. Be blessed… and Rock on!

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The Big Outside the Box Thinker – Major Announcement

April 10, 2008 · Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged , , , ,

I have been in a state of transition in my life over the last 3 months. I have been struggling to figure out what is “next.” If you are human, you have been there, and who knows you might be there now.

I have been in between careers. (unemployed) I know with a greater authority than ever before what it is that I want to be involved in and doing. I really want to be more closely involved with ministry. I have been involved in the music industry for a long time. I have realized what I really like about it is the people. With all the changes that are happening in the music business, I am less and less interested in the business and more and more concerned with the people.

I have been in a battle to find some kind of job. (Now, I am “that guy” to my friends, and I didn’t exhaust every one of my options. I know that I could have probably landed a waiting tables gig, or kinkos, or some other minimum wage job.) I could not find something that fit into what I really wanted to do, or a job that would supplement me sufficiently to do what I really want to do on the side.

Through the vehicle of Facebook, I came back into conversation and friendships with many friends from my past. I think that social networking has the potential to be a very dangerous place, and I will be the first to admit that I spend too much time there, but, it is NOT inherently evil.

I started into a conversation with one of my friends about job opportunities. I ended up applying, interviewing and being offered a position that I am very excited about. I am going to be the Summer Staff Ministry Leader at Sandy Cove Conference Center. Here is the catch, Sandy Cove is in North East, MD (that is the name of the town and not just a direction)

Some of you who have known me for a very long time, know that Sandy Cove is a big part of my life growing up. Sandy Hill, the camp that Sandy Cove used to own was where I went to camp as a kid and where I came to know Christ, so it holds one of the most dear spots in my heart.

When I was 16 years old, I started working at Sandy Cove. I have described in the past to people that Sandy Cove is like Dirty Dancing without the dirty dancing. It is a family retreat center where the staff lives on the grounds of the conference center. It is one of the most beautiful places on earth and it sits at the northernmost waters of the Chesapeake Bay. I worked there for 8 summers and 1 full year. My friends that I made there are some of my closest life friends.

In my situation, I don’t know when I would ever have the opportunity to take a seasonal position like this again in my life. I am looking at this like a sabbatical. I need to go away and prepare my heart for the ministry I want to accomplish here in Nashville.

Very important that you hear this: I AM NOT PLANNING ON MOVING! God would have to make it abundantly clear to me that it was His plan for that to happen. I am keeping my apartment and fully plan on returning to Nashville soon after Labor Day.

The latest news to this is that finding a temporary job for one month until I was supposed to move up to Maryland has proved to be equally tough. I have been trying to stay very trusting that God would provide for me. Yesterday He did. It just shocked me how He did it. My friend from Sandy Cove called and he has an immediate need and offered me work as soon as I could get there.

With that being said, I will be leaving Nashville next week. Either Friday or Saturday April 18th or 19th I will load up my car and drive 750 miles north east to North East, MD.

I wasn’t really mentally prepared for this to happen so suddenly, but I am not in a position to question it.

There is an illustration I have heard several times about a guy whose house gets flooded and he is standing on his roof and prays for God to provide him a way out. As he is praying there is a boat that comes by and beckons him to get in. The guy tells him to move along that he is praying and God is going to save him. Then a helicopter hovers over and tries to rescue him, and he again chases them off declaring that God is going to save him. The floodwaters rise and engulf the man, and he gets to heaven and is quite upset that God didn’t save him. He questions God saying, “Why didn’t you answer my prayers?” and God says “I sent a boat, and a helicopter, what more do you want from me?”

I identify with this story. I have been praying diligently for the opportunity to work and yesterday I found out that one of my last-resort job offers here in Nashville fell through. I got off the phone very frustrated with God. “Why won’t you answer my prayers?” Within hours my phone rings with the offer of work, but not in the pretty little package I expected it to come in. I am getting in the boat.

Despite being in the middle of the woods on the Chesapeake Bay, I am assuming I will still have the ability to contact the outside world, and hopefully maintain my blogs.

I would covet your prayers that all of the details of making this quick move work out well… specifically that my car makes the trip, and that the financial burdens that I am in will be relieved.

I thank God for being bigger than my problems… always.

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Sorry

April 4, 2008 · Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged , , ,

I just got done trying to write a post for today, and by the time I finished I realized that I had disproved the theory I was trying to support. It had to do with the tree of the knowledge of good and evil having some kind of correlation with subjective truth and relativism. But, I think I was trying to fit something into the scriptures that wasn’t there. So, sorry, but no real post other than this declaration that there is no post. hahaha…

Predators are in the Playoffs and so I know that God loves me and is good.

Write at you soon…

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Holes- food for thought or fodder

April 2, 2008 · Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged , , , ,

So, I don’t know if it was the great philosopher and theologian Tiffany Arbuckle, or maybe it might have been St. Augustine, I am not sure. There is a common phrase that talks about how each of us have a God-shaped hole in our hearts and only he can fill that hole.

It got me to thinking as I was talking through a different and specific heart condition with a friend yesterday, are there many holes in our hearts?

Is there a relationship hole? Is there and intimacy hole? Is there a career hole? Is there a love hole?

And if there are; are there specific shapes that will fit this perfectly?

I guess I might just simply trying to prove my own point, but I feel like it is a good wordplay visual. I know that in my life I often try to fill some of the holes that hurt the most when exposed with things that don’t exactly fit, and I know that is wrong.

Let me jump out on a limb here, maybe we are supposed to allow our holes to be exposed, and our hurt to show??? what if??? if the need weren’t hidden or being filled by something that isn’t the solution???

just some food for thought today…

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Overdue update posting

April 1, 2008 · Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged , , , , ,

I will admit that my blog has always been a bit self-serving. I am still a little blown away that anyone reads it. It is as close as I have ever come to journaling. I started this blog to “practice” writing and to see what this whole internet revolution was about. At the point where I realized that people actually interact and care enough to regularly read my blog, I was blown away.

I try to keep up the blog for the discipline of writing regularly, but I haven’t been great. I posted my last post about waiting on answers, and I have received the answers, but haven’t had the time to post since, so I apologize.

I actually got really great news on both of my waiting to hear back situations. I was offered two jobs, that I thought would work together, they were both seasonal. But, alas, they didn’t. So, I had to turn one of them down. But, I got the job that I really was excited about.

Here is the weird part: I get this amazing blessing of God giving me what I want, and what do I do? I turn around and start freaking out about all the details that I feel like God can’t figure out, or better yet hasn’t figured out yet.

The night after finding the good news about the job, but the wrinkle of the seasonal positions not working, I had my bible study and it was on “faith.” IRONY (sung)

You can read from the bible study here.

With the perspective of a week’s time, I know that God is bigger than ALL of my problems… go figure… I can’t wait to have the character and faith like Abraham.

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