harlot for a trend

readin through the first part of Jeremiah and i find myself wishing i had picked a different book to start readin through...

the accusations against Israel are harsh...'for on every high hill and under every green tree you have lain down as a harlot'.  preach on that, i dare ya.  i read it and i hear the indictments that YHWH passes down on Israel and i wonder what hills and trees have been my chosen place to lay down...football was a definite hill at one point, but i feel like these days sometimes that hill is the latest trend, or latest trend that says its against trends but within a matter of weeks, months it becomes the trend so now i am not about that trend but am now about the next non-trend trend.  i become wrapped up in non-essentials that slowly draw me away from Christ...even within Christendom, we do this, we find the cool thing, be it missional, emergent, non-denominational, traditions, rediscovering ancients rituals...these begin to become something we would die for when the only thing we should die for is the Christ who died for us.

sorry, again its a bit ranty...but seriously, i want to not act compassionately because thats the cool thing, but to truly be compassionate...i want to not do it differently because it makes me look good, but because God would have it be different...i want to not be wrapped up in actions and appearances, but be wrapped up in Christ...

...on a sporty note, 4 on 4 overtime hockey in the Olympics was incredible...NHL take note.  even with the Canadians winning, that was great hockey...plus sid the kid scored the game winner, so, yeah, Go Pens.  and i think eli is ready to play hockey or the ufc...kids got a chin, he head-butted mandy's knee and laughed...crazy

may the God who saves us be the God over our everyday, every moment, and every breath.

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shambah bumblah...

been a few weeks since i last wrote words for people to read, all with the assumption people want to read what i write...i say that because now, everytime i get on here, or change my status on facebook i think of the new Sprint commercial where they list the number of people doing different things...

...one of those things is the number of people who just updated their twitter and they have all the birds chirping 'me, me, me, me'(35 seconds)...a nice quick social commentary that i got the drift on...of course, i think blogging, since its not an everyday thing for me anyway, is different then opening my mobile facebook on my phone just so i can type about how Evgeni Malkin is frustrating me at his timidness (third paragraph...i clicked here for the image, and the paragraph fit) and how Alexander Ovechkin's bad helmet club face (i miss ya dad) keeps appearing on my screen...

anyway, wanted to share a few things, this whole new start process is tough...we never know who's going to come to whatever we do, we never know who is going to follow through on meeting us for dinner, coffee, movie, or a non-alcoholic beer at a bar...well, i drink the NAs...its forever frustrating, i met with another guy who is going through the same process here and is experiencing the same frustrations.  both of us desperately are praying for me workers, we are praying for people who love God and desire to love people, Lord, hear our prayer...

...well, we've started having BBQs on Sundays and invite our entire phonebook/facebook/email contacts who live close, we've actually had a really good turnout, and have begun to see things take shape we desire to see happen.  we really desire to have those we've connected with, begin to connect with each other, we desire to see community be built...and daggone its happening, albeit at what feels like a snails pace, but its happening.  we are looking for get our garage finished so that we can have a larger meeting space for those wonderfully wet Portland nights...

...i believe God is faithful, i believe i need to be more faithful...i've begun to ask myself if my ability to see God's faithfulness is directly related to my ability to be faithful, these BBQs continue to be a product of prayer and pro-activeness, while some of our other things; that we desire but haven't earnestly, that i havent earnestly, EARNESTLY prayed for haven't come to fruition...

anyway, a whole lot of ranting about this, that and a whole lot of nothing :).  check out my facebook photo section for pics of the BBQs...hopefully we'll continue to remember to take the pictures...

...may Your Kingdom come...

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