Dreams Unlocked

some days i am too lazy to work out.

getting on an elevator with other people is wierd. i do it several times a day because i live in an apt. i live on one of the top floors so there is more chances that i will be riding with other people. its wierd because you are in this enclosed space very close to each other but you pretend like you're alone. you stare at the numbers moving up or down. you stare at the ground. you stare straight ahead. making conersation is wierd too. what are you supossed to say? "Hi" "Hi" going out? yeah, you? yeah ok and then nothing. tomorrow i'm going to stand really close to people on the elvator and see what happens. saw an awesome movie today - "good night, and good luck" - its about the journalist ed murrow who took on joe mccarthy during the "red scare" of the 1950's in america. amazing acting and cinematography. highly recommended.

i don't think i can have too many days like today. here's a run-through: 8:00 roll into the office - do devotions and finish a book on worship -make some calls fill out paperwork 10:00 Adam and Felicia come by for Felicia's moms group - i play with adam for a little bit 10:15 - Dan Watt, the head of church planting for my denomination comes by -we head out - he wants to videotape around the church so we walk up to robson while he tapes different people and buildings -we have coffee at the busiest starbucks in vancouver -he sets up his video camera and tapes an interview with me on first@night - i don't actually know what the video is for -he asks me to speak in december to some church planting trainers from various denominations in bc on the gospel and post-modernism 11:00 - back to the office, work on job descriptions for the various positions associated with first@night 12:00 - dim sum with felicia and adam 1:30 (back at the office now)- bruce kuhn drops by - bruce is...

4:00 - wed. afternoon - i take wednesday afternoons off because i usually lead homegroup or have a meeting. adam is cralwing all around me and over me as i type this. felicia is still napping - she worked last night. here it comes - yesterday felicia lost her wedding band - she either lost it at home or at superstore. needless to say she is quite upset. if you believe in prayer please pray that we find it - it may seem like a little thing but it means a lot to her. tonight i'm going to mark's place - we're going to go over the first 3 chapters of purpose driven life together. it will also be good to get his take on first@night so far. did a lot of admin. type stuff this morning which is good. looks like i'm finally getting somewhere on the web-site. joel - a long lost high-school friend has offered to help us put one up basically for free - which is a real blessing - it was going to cost several hundreds of dollars otherwise. i still have some other costs related to fir...

wow - i actually got an e-mail request to update! wellll - let's see - church went very well on sunday - that is i was quite happy with my sermon. (it was on the call of abraham in gen 12. - how we are inbetween people living between the promise and the reality) today i am trying something new - lifestyle change - i used to work out after work but i find that that is my prime time to play with adam before he goes to sleep so today was my first attempt at working out in the morning. every other time i tried to work out in the morning i would try running, then i would get sick and then quit in discouragement. so for the next month instead i am going to walk uphill on the treadmill for 20-30 minutes every morning from 6:30 - 7:00. today was not bad but i probably have to eat a better breakfast - the alpha bits don't seem to cut it. adam has a cold and is now dripping from both ends - this morning when i picked him up out of his crib he had dried snot all over his face - poor guy! ...

this irritating cold virus keeps threatening to take me down. so far i've been able to keep it at bay with lots of water. today we had a leaders meeting of first@night. it was at greg and laura's who treated us to some delicious belgian waffles - mmmmm i love me some waffles! we got quite a bit done. after, i went into my office to finish off my sermon - church was totally empty. it took me from 2-5 to flesh out the body of the sermon. i'm going to try something new tomorrow. i'm going to preach from off of my laptop - i can see the text quite clearly on this bright screen. i just hope i can scroll down ok - i think i'll use the mouse. then tonight i had a about an hour with everyone before felicia went to work. had a really fun time playing with adam - he just radiates joy. i had thought of taking him to stanley park tomorrow but there are no buses that can fit the stroller on that go there - do we need a car?!?!?!? peace and love from up above y'all.

today i was supossed to go to regent with someone but he never showed up so i went alone. i renewed some library books and bought some other books: a bible for mike, 2 manuals - one for weddings and one for funerals and the canadian book of common prayer. came back and had dim sum with the family. as we were walking back to the office i thought i should buy starbucks for a couple of the people in the office but thought it was too much bother. felicia grabbed onto this idea and told me she would buy. so i called the office and told them all to give us their orders. in actual fact, felicia only wanted to buy coffees for a couple of the really hard working office staff - not every single person in the office. but i hadn't made that clear. so we got an order for 5 lattes, 1 short mocha, 1 vanilla latte with whip, 1 almond latte, 1 soy mocha w. no whip and 1 extra hot mocha w. whip. i walked out of starbucks with 2 trays piled on top of each other with 5 drinks on each - it would have m...

today i was supossed to focus entirely on my sermon but the best laid plans of mice and men gang oft astay. in the morning the director of campus ministries for bc for ivcf stopped by the office to chat with our sr. pastor. so i invited him in for a chat as well. and then i just have the regular administrative things to catch up with, had lunch w. fle and the boy and DENNY'S SUCKS !!!! we waited for 10 minutes after being seated and no waiter.waitress approached our table. finally i got up and asked if anyone has our table - i ws told someone will be right with you. after 5 minutes we marched out of there - had to settle for paninis at iga. then back to the office - got some reading and preliminary note taking but still feel woefully under prepared for sunday - pray for me!!! i've calculated that i will need between 1000-1500 for a web-site and some printing stuff and a sandwich board for the church. i don't have that kind of money in our budget. whad do i do?

i lead a home group on wed. nights so i take wed. afternoons off - i have found the perfect wed. afternoon activity. first i grab lunch at some nice resturant near the church and then i catch the top rated "rotten tomatoes" movie - today was "history of violence" directed by cronenburg. it was a decent enough popcorn movie - good action and drama. the ending wa skinda wierd - no one talked for like 5 minutes. pouring rain today - typical fall day in van. way behind on sermon - have to pound it out tomorrow - abraham baby!

so today was my day off but i was still at the church at 8:00 to hand in the offering which was quite large thanks to some heavy hitters. i went in and talked with tom cowan, our sr. pastor about last night. i usually check in with him at least once a week to tell him what's going on at first@night. then i walked over to the starbucks across form the church - i was there for 90 minutes! a new record - read my bible and 2 chapters from worship evangelism by sally morgenthaler - fantastic book. then i wandered through hmv and sears. i bought some incense because i thought it would be cool to have incense on sunday nights. within 2 minutes of lighting it i had a blinding headache and had to kill the smoke before i died - so no on the incense. then the family went to metrotown - this big mall in burnaby. i bought some cool timberland shoes. we also did our grcocery shopping at superstore there. now i'm going to return "unleashed" - very cool jet li movie - i recommend it...

had our 5th service tonight. it was good - good worship. the speaker jonathan bird spoke on urban mission. i think it resonated with some people but may have been a bit too academic for others. jonathan is a good guy and is doing good work in studying the city. had a crazy busy day though 9 - attend first service with mark and mike (m and m) 10:30 - man the first@night booth after the service 10:45 - walk in the pouring rain to a restuarant in yaletown to have brunch with m and m. - had a good chat about faith. i really like mark - he is really honest about where he is at. actually both m and m are quite sincere as they venture into this whole "faith" thing 12:00 - return dvd, head back to man the booth again 1:30 - pick up groceries for flea 2:00 - eat soup and then read 4:30 - pick up new dvd for later tonight, i don't have any money so craig (the owner) tells me to pay when i return it - haha sucker! i'm going to sell it (no i'm not) 5:00 - in my office, read m...

i am alone with the boy - flea is at work. he is talking VERY VERY Loudly as he moves stuff around in my office. beautiful weather today - went to the office with felicia and the boy to make a display board which describes first@night. felicia did a very good job - she's good at that kind of stuff. then i went looking for a blazer - i want one i can wear iwth jeans. there is a lot of corduroy and velvet (!) out there. i settled on a nice grey zip up sweater from the gap. i'm still saving up for my bono jeans in san diego. i had a great feeling of contenment today. i have my dream job, an awesome wife , a little boy who gives me more joy then anything else. it reminds me of the psalm that bono used to read before streets on th elevation tour: "what can i give back to god for all the blessings he's poured out on me? i will offer an offering, a toast to god. i will do it with his people" (or something like that)

yesterday - worked at the office saw a korean movie at the film festival - which i fell asleep in cuz it was so boring -back at the office -home for 1 hr. -ivcf reunion at ubc- nice to see everyone again, the ministry reports were pretty dull thought -milestones in kitsalano - supper at 10:00 today - back to the office for some more work -shopping - sweater or blazer reading - tale of 2 cities -worship evangelism -worship, community and the triune god of grace -renovation of the heart music - no direction home - bob dylan arcade fire not a cloud in the sky today.

Yesterday was one of my greatest days in ministry. A new guy came to first@night on sunday. I chatted with him briefly and we agreed to meet on Wednesday. So we sat down in the bright sterile environment of a nearby Tim Horton's. My new friend relayed his story - he has moved form believing in a higher power, to believing in a God, to believing in a personal God. There is a gospel presentation at the front of the Bible i had bought for him. i went over it with him and he said he was ready to follow jesus. We prayed together and my new friend was now my new brother in Christ! Amazing Grace! Pray for him. Amen.

last night i slept for 10 and a half hours! i guess thats what happnes when you go strong for a whole weekend. am still feeling quite tired and fatigued. i'm not preaching this sunday which is a nice break. but there are still many other things that grab at my time. this morning at the pastor's meeting i was just overwhlemed by the needs in our congregation - so many hurting people. i am currently reading bonhoeffer's life together which is an excellent resource when exploring this whole concept of community. peace.

tonight first@night was awesome. there were a lot of people including a lot of first time visitors. i met a couple of people who wanted to get together after to talk about Christianity. As i preached i also felt a really strong annointing of the Holy spirit. i can never tell when this is going to happen but i felt really impassioned as I preached. but again i feel exhausted - will sleep in tomorrow and am going to another film festival movie on monday and another on tuesday too. happy thanksgiving. sn

this is arcade fire on the cover of time magazine. i saw them in concert last night. it was unreal. it was part rock conert and part performance art. they have about 7 people in the band that play the french horn, double bass, drums, keyboards, guitar and bass. and they all switch off instruments. they played an eerie version os state trooper by bruce springsteen and then they destroyed a guitar. i went alone which was kinda wierd - but it was still worth it. got my sermon done - i came up with an interesting observation about noah's ark. i made an analogy of the ark and our faith. everytime we read our bible or pray or do something that moves us closer to god we hel build our ark. and then when the winds and waters of life come, we can step into the ark (our faith) and god will guide us until we reach dry land again. feel like i am coming down w. something - got a sore throat - hope it doesn't last - i have church tomorrow and then we have our big thanksgiving dinner w. some f...

typical winter day in van - rain and wind. at the office i started to get an allergic reaction to something - it devolved into a full blown, congested cold. so i bailed form work early and slept for an hour. still feeling sick but will be ok tomorrow. sermon prep today - meeting w. a guy from city in focus who will be speaking at first@night next sunday. he's got an excellent presenation on urban issues - he will present an edited form of it to us. i have a confession to make - don't tell my wife (she never reads this thing). i bought 2 boston cream donuts from tim hortons - one for me and one for her - thought it would be a nice surprise for her. i came home and she was sleep. and well, one thing led to another and let's just say there is no evidence of any donuts being in our apt. today. pray for me.

jamie made a good point - read his comment to my last post - very insightful. i was probably too simplistic in my assessment of the troubled man's condition. well, after 2 days of excitement the only excitement today was of a road crew drilling into the alley right outside the window in my office. at 9:00 i felt i was going to get homicidal if i stayed there any longer so i packed up some books and headed to starbucks to finish research for my sermon. then it was home for lunch. jeanette came over - she's this awesome woman who is like a mentor to me. she came for lunch and prayed for us. then i did some more work and rolled around with adam. it was nice to spend some longer time with him. tomorrow - write the sermon.

i thought yesterday was exciting! today a lunatic comes in to the office and threatens to hurt and kill everyone unless we help him. i get pulled from my interesting commentary on genesis and am face to face with a guy who is yelling at me that he is about to hurt someone. i tell him to sit down and that he can't talk like that. finally i convince him to walk to the hospital next door with me. we get there and i tell him to sit down. i go over and talk to the nurse and explain the situation. she talks to him and looks up his chart. he has attempted suicide in the past and been prescribed atavan. she agrees to get him some atavan. he gets admitted but its going to be about an hour. so we go for a walk and i try to calm him down some more. finally we go back to the hospital. i explain to him that we want to help him at the church but he can't talk to people the way he was before. he agrees. i pray with him and then tell him i have to go back to work. i return to my commentary at ...

i'm blogging earlier because i have a class tonight and will probably be too tired to post later. you can say a lot of things about the life of a pastor but one thing you can not say is that it is boring. take this morning for example. at about 11:00 i am doing my regular office type stuff, returning e-mails, preparing my next sermon when the phone rings. this call plunged me into an intersting tale that involves the Ontario Provincial Police and the US border patrol. Ic an't say too much but it looks like my week just got way more interesting. So in between sermon prep. and meeting with congregants you get the usual dose of excitement. Last night's service was the best one so far. Spencer's worship was just unreal - he is probably the most gifted worship leader I have ever seen. There was just a really good vibe in the room. PTL!

didn't go to the morning service today and it felt awesome. nice to have some lazy time before i have to preach and lead in the evening. i think i'll go to sunday morning every other week. RIDERS WON RIDERS WON!!!!! i am so happy - wish i had been at the game. i am going for sure to the one in nov. and i want to go to the grey cup too. nothing profound today.