The Real Reasons Romney Dropped Out

read the article here.

10. There weren’t as many Osmonds as I thought.
9. I got tired of corkscrew landings under sniper fire.
8. As a lifelong hunter, I didn’t want to miss the start of the varmint season.
7. There wasn’t room for two Christian leaders.
6. I was upset that no one had bothered to search my passport files.
5. I needed an excuse to get fat, grow a beard and win the Nobel prize.
4. I took a bad fall at a campaign rally and broke my hair.
3. I wanted to finally take off that dark suit and tie, and kick back in a light-colored suit and tie.
2. Once my wife Ann realized I couldn’t win, my fundraising dried up.
1. There was a miscalculation in our theory: “As Utah goes, so goes the nation.”

All Marketers are Liars – Review

Seth Godin is a marketing genius.  This book is a reminder that Marketing is story telling, and the stories we tell need to be true and authentic.  We can’t tell other people’s stories and if our stories are false we will be found out.

As a church leader, it is imperative that the we tell first off, the Greatest Story, the Gospel.  And it’s not enough to just tell it, we need to live it out.  And then the stories that we tell about transformed lives are our most important assest for spreading the gospel.

There were quite a few quotes that I wrote down in my moleskine that I thought were particularly powerful, and reminded me about everything that is wrong with the health and wealth and prosperity gospels.

I think even though church leaders are not by definition and title, marketers this is still a valuable book and a great reminder that we need to be authentic in our message.  Thank you mister Godin.

Judas, Pilate, Barabbas and Jesus

Today I started to seriously focus on my next Sunday morning sermon, which will be on April 27th.  It’s the first part of Matthew 27 looking at Judas, and Pilate and Barabbas.  there is a lot of crazy powerful stuff in this chunk of Scripture.

I’ve always felt that Judas was one of the most compelling characters in the whole New Testament, and the way he is portrayed in the Jesus Movies is always the most interesting part of the story as every director has their own vision.  (That was a long sentence.)

So I’m excited to get to dive into Judas, but Pilate is really interesting too, and in the midst of it all Jesus really doesn’t say anything in his own defense.  So much to say, but so little time to say it all on a sunday morning.  It’s going to be good times.

Chew on This for the weekend

I was perusing the blog-o-verse today and I came across this thought from Peter Blue, who is a worship leader in Canvas and serves at Cedar Park.  Peter was the worship leader in youth group when I was growing up and he was always a huge encouragement in my life, as well as someone who always made me think.  Today he made me think again.

What good is initial physical evidence if there isn’t any other evidence to follow? “ If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.” What a mighty percussion section we have become.

Chew on that for the weekend.  And read the rest of the post here.

The God Who Smokes – Review

The God Who Smokes is a refreshing look at theology through Timothy Stoner’s personal experiences.  All of theology should apply to life and when you read The God Who Smokes I believe you will see all the various ways that God is talking to and revealing himself to you.

TGWS is a middle road between the fundamentalist and the emergent streams of theology.  If you like Rob Bell but are a little concerned with some of the things he has written or said, Stoner helps you see why and what a more biblical view may be.  If you love Driscoll and Piper but are overwhelmed by their headiness and need for rock solid reason and arguements, then Stoner provides a meaningful way that you can still believe in absolute truth, and still feel comfortable with questions.  Written in the tone of compassion this book was a very refreshing and at times humorous book.

This book really could be several shorter books.  And sometimes it doesn’t quite feel like a cohesive work.  But it’s definitely worth the read.  Particularly Stoner’s theology of the artist.  It reminded me of why I do what I do, I believe that preaching is an art form and God is pleased when I declare his love and grace, or when I teach people about how to live in that love and grace.

Also interesting are Stoner’s perspectives on growing up as a missionary kid oversees, and they way he lived out love before his friend David.  I really recommend this book.

Geeked Out

So I mentioned in my previous post that my geek-o-meter was off the charts.  And now I shall tell you why.

When I was at Northwest University, I knew a young man named Kengo.  Kengo was a Japanese student studying biblical literature, as was I.  I was always in awe of the library that he had created over his 4 years at northwest.  He was a devoted student and his library was giigantic.

After graduation Kengo moved back to Japan and stored his books and other belongings at Don Ross’ house (Kengo attended tNC back in the day too).  He must have planned to ship them over or something, or maybe he wanted to move back to the states some day.  Whatever his plans were he gave up on those and told the Ross and Ushikubo families that they could do whatever they wanted with those books. And they said that I could have them.

So yesterday I hauled 5 boxes of books out of the Ross Basement and today I unloaded them into an undisclosed location.  And now for all the book geeks out there I want to show you want I have inherited.  If you are not interested in books I would recommend you stop now.  Or if you know that you might covet this new collection of mine, turn away.

For those who are still with me:

Unorganized stack of Kengo's Books

Now with a little bit more organization:

Attempted organization

there are probably several hundred dollars of books that I have just inherited, and many of them I have no immediate need for, but someday I’m going to learn Hebrew.

So thank you Kengo, I appreciate your generosity and whenever I read one of these books I will think of and pray for you wherever you are.