Thursday, November 17, 2005

Blyss

A couple months ago I picked up the new Lifehouse cd, mostly because of the catchy song that was all over the radio, but I have been pleasantly surprised. In fact, I'd say the album is better than their first one, which is still a favorite to this day.

Jason Wade from Lifehouse used to be in a band called Blyss. I have never seen their cd around but one of their songs has surfaced in a couple different circles-- Storm

I suppose I should get back to paper writing...or do something else..

Monday, November 14, 2005

thrashers and watering holes...

I put in a couple shifs at the Gateway this weekend. A couple of leaf games, a whole lot of coffee changing, lockers and the 'white man' made for an interesting time. I really like that place. One of the shift leaders there is a man by the name of Tyler Thrasher. I'd like to give props to him for being one of the best dang supervisors in the world (shout out also to Scott- and a wedge of lemon..!?).

Also, I was at a new church in St. Catherines this past weekend. It was pretty trendy. I don't mean that in a negative way but I did feel like I was on a college campus (except most young couples had a couple of babies in each arm). There was however a good mix of the older crowd which I appreciated. There are four pastors at this church and not one of them is older than 33. What's more, not one of them has theological training, ha (funny how we think that seminaries= closer to God and qualified to tell me what to think about God)...although apparently one guy is doing graduate studies presently at a good school in the states. This church has doubled in size TWICE, in the last three years. They run a full time homeless shelter right out of the building. Two services, good worship and a good message. I think if I was home more often I might go back.

A quote from the service, "rules can never change character"- in a series called Graceland (I told you it was trendy). As hard as I try to surround myself with boundaries to keep myself from sinning, boundaries will not cause me necessarily to sin less or more. Rules can never change character. I heard that in Austrailia a lot of the farmers don't have fences for their livestock. How do they contain them? They put a watering hole around where they want the animals to stay so the animals never wander too far away, even though they could go as far as they want. Maybe we need a little more of that in the church. Maybe if we really believed that Jesus was the living water (apologize for the cheesiness) we would never want to wander away, we wouldn't need rules (read: no alchohol, no drugs, no swearing, no R movies, no smoking, no jeans in church or if you're from a generation ago- no cinemas, no bowling alleys, no card games!...) to try and make us better people. Rules can never change character- we just need to figure out how to stay close to the watering hole...

Well, I need a drink.
(interpret that how you will)