Chapel & Ecclesiastes

Sometime towards the end of this past summer I decided that my times of speaking in chapel this year would revolve around teaching through a specific book of scripture. As I looked through scripture and sought the Lord's wisdom on the issue I eventually decided to teach through Ecclesiastes. So far we have gotten to chapter four over the course of 5 weeks spread throughout the past few months.

I also thought it would be cool for me to share summaries of the various themes and ideas from the book that we have been studying in our chapel times. So I guess this is really just a preview post for what we will call Wednesday Wisdom.

Fun side note: My buddy Jeff and I had a unique opportunity to contribute to a blog that is hosted out of NYC. Jeff and one of his friends were having dinner one night and began discussing Scientology. When his buddy found out about his fascination with the "religion" he asked if Jeff would be interested in crafting a blog post dealing with the subject. Jeff and I spent an afternoon working on it and the blog actually published it.

Here's a link:

http://mockingbirdnyc.blogspot.com/2009/10/scientology-appeal-is-not-so-strange.html

Fw: Christians and the Internet

Oh the wonderful world of the internet. In a matter of seconds you can find anything you want to read about or see. Obviously, this can be either amazingly beneficial or detremental to a person. Over the past few years I have become increasingly fascinated with technology and how it affects us as people, especially those of us who are Christians.

While distrusting the world and its "lies", most Christians tend to believe what they hear or read if it comes from another person who claims the name of Christ. This is not a bad thing but can get us into trouble, especially when it comes to the internet. Call me a cynic that has been overly influenced by my postmodern surroundings, but I never really trust anything on the internet. This is especially true if it comes from (A) a blog, (B) a website that is unaffiliated with a reputable organization, or (C) an email forward. Now I realize the irony of my previous statement and I'm sure you do as well. Feel free to not listen to or believe anything on this blog. It's mostly just pictures of my kids and you'll have a bit of a problem trying to prove that they don't exist. I'm just saying that we need to take things on the internet, including this blog, with a grain of salt.

Anyway, back to the Christian life and responsible use of the internet and email. Don't be gullible! Various websites and email forwards will frequently use misinformation to get believers to support or protest something in large numbers. Do some homework when you get an eamil from someone claiming that X group or organization is trying to petition the White House to mandate that all manger scenes contain Santa Claus instead of Jesus. Double check when someone posts a "story" without any citations or verifiability.

My heart for this is not to make fun of anyone who sends email forwards or believes most of what they hear or see. As someone who has been duped by stuff like this I simply want Christians to be lovers of truth. Jesus said that we would know the truth and that it would make us free. Unfortunatley there are many people in this world, even Christians, who would rather contrive something to help further an agenda than to live in the light of Christ's truth. Be careful who and what you believe on the internet. Don't fall victim to the Christian version of Nigerian scams.

Here are a few websites you can use to help verify emails you get or stories you read on blogs.
http://www.snopes.com/
http://www.truthorfiction.com/

If you've read an email forward claiming that these sites have an evil liberal agenda you can check out http://www.factcheck.org/

Kürbisfest (Pumpkin Festival)

Pumpkins. You know them. You love them. Could there be anything better than walking around a small town that is surrounded by pumpkin patches and takes Halloween a bit too seriously? I submit to you that there could not. So, last Saturday we headed out of Vienna with our friends Jeremy and Kristi and went to a pumpkin festival.

Here was the poster for the event. Scary huh? The one thing I noticed was that apparently they don't take much care in carving their pumpkins, maybe because they carve so many. The sloppy nature of their work runs contrary to everything I learned from my father about pumpkin carving. Therefore, I viewed all of their jack-o-lanterns with disdainful condescension, knowing that dad and I could've done much, much better.

Ah paganism, you just thought it died out with the Druids. Well, it's apparently still alive and well in upper Austria. I happened upon this oddity while eating my cinnamon and sugar encrusted almonds. Ironic, because we all know that nothing goes better with paganism than sweet, fresh roasted almonds. I stared at this thing for awhile in utter disbelief...I was also waiting to see if the raven would say "nevermore".

Anyways, a good time was had by all. We ate some good food and even had cappuccino with pumpkin in it that was surprisingly good. Hurrah for pumpkins and the festivals that celebrate their important countributions to humanity.

Pumpkin Pabulum

EEWWWW! Dad how could you make me do this??

Well all the pics are reversed in order... just to throw you off...or maybe it's because I forgot to enter them other way.
But this was our pumpkin carving evening. We got roasted pumpkin seeds and pumpkin puree from it!
Not to mention a nice little light in our living room in the evenings :)

Preaching

I'm not sure why God keeps giving me opportunities to share and preach the same ideas. I guess it's all ok because He's the one that gives the opportunities and inspires the scriptures that I've been teaching.

So I had the chance to preach yesterday at our church, The International Chapel of Vienna (http://www.viennachapel.org/). Our Pastor James, who despite being a Chelsea fan is a great guy, asked a few of us in the church to be on a preaching team that meets regularly throughout the year. We disuss the section of scripture he will be teaching from each week (currently 1 Peter).

We go through books of the Bible verse by verse, but cover ground a bit quicker than some other churches. One positive of this type of study is that you get a very managable picture of the themes throughout a book of scripture without getting bogged down in intricate, exegetical details. One of the negatives, however, is that some themes that need to be expanded on may not get the full time they need. As a result, James decided that he will preach the book verse by verse and, when certain topics or subjects arise that need to be further expanded, he wanted a few of us from the preaching team to tackle those issues. I thought this was really cool because it gives the Pastor a break every month or two and makes sure he is also under the teaching of the Word.

So yesterday I got to expand on the idea of being an elect exile (a major idea discussed in 1 Peter). I'll post a rought outline and some thoughts on the text later on.

How Big Am I?

When a little boy is curious about how big he really is, it is natural to measure himself with his Daddy's pants! I mean, he is supposed to look to his Daddy as the standard. We want them to grow up and be like their Dads, so we might as well use them as the measuring stick!

We now know that he is not as big and will need some time to grow into those pants. It was a very educating experiment for him....

*** I should note that Ian fit into one side of Daddy's pant legs... but no picture was taken :(

Senior Class Rib Party

When the Lord has made you prosper and you say "I would like some meat," then you may eat as much of it as you want.

-Deuteronomy 12:20

That verse is slightly paraphrased and massively out of context (just call me Joel Osteen), but what a great verse for a BBQ! We had a great class party on Saturday for our Seniors and enjoyed eating ribs. It was really the only food we had. Just ribs and ribs and more ribs. I really didn't even know you could eat meat for 4 hours and not die. It ruled.

Here are a few more pictures of the afternoon. These were taken by the students and we'll put a few more up when we get them off of our camera.

Publications Project

Thomas was asked to write an article for a "publication" the middle school creative writing class was putting together. Here is what he contributed.

THE HIGH-TECH HEART

In the movie Contact Matthew McConaughey portrays Palmer Joss, a former priest studying the effects of technology on third world cultures. Later on in the film while being interviewed on the TV show Larry King Live he asks the question, “Has science and progress made us happier?” This is a profound statement from the mouth of a fictional character. With all of the high-tech gadgets available in the modern, industrialized world, have we become better people?

There can be no doubt that when we study history we see that technology has brought about progress and improved society. In the 16^th century, Europe emerged from the Dark Ages and entered a new period of learning with the invention of the printing press. This technological advance allowed books and other forms of writing to be copied quickly and widely distributed. This led to an increase in the desire for, and necessity of, literacy. This intellectual and educational progress fed the Scientific Revolution as well as the Enlightenment. One of the most important contributors to the time period was Denis Diderot, who compiled and edited The Encyclopedia. Diderot, however, sensed where the increase in printed materials could lead and remarked that a “time will come when it will be almost as difficult to learn anything from books as from the direct study of the whole universe.” He continued, noting that eventually “the world of learning—our world—will drown in books.”

While it would be difficult to say that our world is drowning in books, the world of 2009 could certainly be accused of drowning in information. According to some estimates, in recent years the amount of information available to the average individual in a modern society has doubled almost every two years. This vast amount of information that is only a click away has led to an increase in the amount of trivial information that people encounter and a decrease in the amount of time that people spend analyzing the value of that information. With this loss of focus in how we analyze what is put before us, we have a tendency to either accept whatever we read or see, or to become overwhelmed and apathetic. Either choice produces negative consequences that effect who we become as people.

The modern technologies that are available to us, cell phones, laptops, iPhones, iPods, and the like have all become integral parts of our lives. The question is have they encouraged us to grow as human beings? Sadly, most of the technologies discourage rather than encourage important things such as community. As recently as the latter part of the 20^th century people rode on public transportation either in silence or in casual conversation. Now everyone has their ears plugged with buds from their mp3 players. One of the most popular places for people to gather for community is a coffee shop. Hilariously, if you go into a coffee shop what you find are lonely people seeking community by putting their earphones in and working silently on their computers.

In the first chapter of Genesis we are told that man was made in the image of God. This included the ability of man to be creative and improve his conditions. Unfortunately, man chose to sin in Genesis 3 and this brought about problems with this technological progress. Advances in technology have certainly made things better, but man’s tendencies frequently lead him to worship these advances rather than the God who inspired them (Rom. 1:25). This leads to negative consequences for people and slowing of their growth in relationship with both God and each other. Until people slow down and analyze the impact of technology on their lives, they will continue to be troubled by the unfulfilled longings of their high-tech hearts.

---

Quotations taken from the book Habits of the High-Tech Heart by Quentin J. Schultze.

Photography by Thad

The one above is from a movie and the expression he captured was priceless.


This one just made me laugh. How funny that he was able to capture his brother catching some air!

And let's not forget the self protrait.

I think he found the camera laying around and thought it his "right" to take some photos of his world at that time. Very Dangerous!

David Crowder Band - How He Loves

Pray for our School
for our family
for our children
for God's provision
for joy in whatever circumstance we are in

pray that we would learn to love so that we can walk in manner worthy of Christ, so that He can establish our hearts in holiness before God
~1 Thess. 3:12-13

God's Provision seen in Rhubarb?

You know... God always provides and sometimes it's not what you expect. The other day I was looking at a friends cookbook and saw a recipe for Rhubarb pie and I mentioned that I'd never had Rhubarb before. "The garden is full of it right now, why don't you go and get some" was the reply. I didn't even know she grew rhubarb! But there you have it, ten stalks of fresh rhubarb for free!
So, I set out to make a rhubarb pie and found that I rather enjoyed it!

It has a very tangy flavor and needs lots of sugar in my opinion to make it balance out. But I recommend having a big scoop of Ice Cream with it and you'll love it... I promise!

By the way, that was my first attempt at a lattice pie top. It was very fun and turned out lovely or so I thought.

Interesting fact: The leaves of a rhubarb plant are very poisonous..... hmmm, who knew?

Senior Class Sponsors

Welcome to the jungle...err...the "buy in bulk", Sam's/CostCo type store here in Vienna. Thankfully this place is only right down the street from the school because I will be spending large amounts of time here over the course of the next few months.
Mollie and I are cosponsors of the Senior class with three other teachers. One of the responsibilities of the Senior class is to run a small store at the school. The funds from this store go to the Senior class trip. Yesterday, one of the other sponsors and I went on a mission to stock the store. It took us almost two hours to buy everything and then take it into the basement at VCS to stock the store.
I think we bought too much stuff considering this is what we had left over after we stocked the store. At least we won't have to make another store run anytime soon. I'll try and get some pics of the store in action once school officially starts.

Registration Day

Yesterday all of the kids were required to come to the school to register for classes and to pick up their schedules. It was great to spend time laughing and joking with all of them as well as finding out about their summers. The morning was a crazy time with kids seeing each other for the first time since school let out and teachers frantically trying to finish up lesson plans and course outlines.

Here are a few of our "new" middle schoolers. These girls will be sixth graders and are so excited that they're no longer elementary students. Pictures like this are why I love VCS. In this pic alone you have Central America, South East Asia, and North America all represented. What an awesome opportunity to teach here!

We made crayon discs so that Ian could grip the crayon better to color. It's fun and easy to do! Why don't you try it?

Here are the crayons we peeled the paper off of and then broke into pieces and placed in the muffin tin. You can play around and make different color combinations...whatever floats your boat!
Then place in the oven at 200 degrees for 9-11 minutes.
Don't let the crayons get to a boiling state....not good :) Just until they are melted will do.

Here they are melted and ready to cool down. Takes about an hour or less for them to get hard and ready to pop out. If they don't automatically pull away from the sides, turn over the tin and hit the back of each one to make it fall out.

And here are our lovely pieces of art. Just right for a chubby 2 yr old fingers :)
Have fun!

Home Again

Well, you know you've finally made it home after a 10 1/2 hr drive to Chicago, 8 hour flight to Stockholm, 3 hour layover and arrival in Vienna at 12:30 pm and of course when you don't have to be paranoid that your kid is ruining someone else kitchen seats. Sure go ahead and play with the flour boys..... I don't even care this time! :)

We made it to our home and we are still trying to get adjusted to the time zone here. The boys are so glad to be home. Thad couldn't wait to see all his "new" toys. They sure missed everything and everyone here.

thanks for praying for our travels!

Preacher Man

So I got to preach at my home church this Sunday. I really enjoyed it and was massively encouraged by many members of the church. Here is a link to the audio and outline.

http://www.riverwood.org/Sunday%20Services.html

Give it a listen and shoot me some feed back (only if it's good...don't tell me I'm going to burn or anything).

We should also be heading back to Vienna around this time next week. We'll post some updates on the summer once we get back to our home and have a bit of time to unwind.

We're tired...but having fun!!!!

Well, we've been in MS for about 3 weeks now having spent one week in D.C. We're having a blast to say the least, but we're finding out it's exhausting too. This is a tired boy a couple of weeks before we left Vienna. I guess he started out tired.

We went from sleeping at home on the couch

To sleeping on the plane

To sleeping in the car!

Thanks for your prayers and encouragement as we spend our summer here. We've already had great fellowship with many of you and we're looking forward to what the rest of the summer holds.

We're coming Home!

We fly out at 11:45 Vienna time Tomorrow morning, Tuesday the 12th. Please pray for safe travels and calm, peaceful little boys. We'll be staying with my sister, Brittany, and her husband in D.C. for a week. After that, we'll arrive in MS on the 18th and be with family there until early August when, at that point, we will head up to Chicago and then fly back to Vienna from there.

We hope to see many of you while we're home and look forward to plugging into our church and serving there while we have the chance.

Thank you for your prayers as we travel and we'll see some of you very soon!

Baptism at the Danube

Last Sunday, our church here in Vienna had a time of fellowship and baptisms. We were in the Alte Donau, a lake that has been created from what used to be part of the Danube. Thomas was asked by the Pastor to be involved and show how the school and church are partners in ministry here in Vienna. What a joyous time!

Birthday Party

he turned 4! he's so excited and had such a fun party...

sorry the pics are small.. I'm retarded and too lazy to fix it :)