Transformers

Right about now I'm feeling pretty vindicated in my anticipation of the Transformers movie.  I've pretty much been waiting on this since childhood, and for a summer action movie involving giant fighting robots, I think it's pretty dang good.  It's probably not going to change your life, but it entertains with some pretty sweet eye candy.  

not so critical!

I think it's hard for lot's of people, maybe particularly for folks in ministry, but it is so easy for me to slip into a mode of being over critical.  

I mean that for self-criticalness as well.  Like yesterday.  After preaching, I felt two competing needs.  The first was the desire to value what had happened, the good that was done, the presence of the word of God in the church through the sermon and  the act of preaching.  I really want to recognize and value that.  Competing with that, though, is the need to develop and become a better preacher, which I think involves a level of self-critique.  I know there are odds and ends of my technique, things that I could do to improve my level of skill in delivering the word.  

So these two things compete, and I really try to balance them.  It's really difficult, though.  

Home?

Has anybody noticed the shift in the way people talk about the places where they abide, their homes?  I've always referred to it as the place where I live but now, it's also common for people to talk about where they Stay.  Here's an example at urban dictionary.    I think this concept makes me kind of sad.  

Intern Team

I was just thinking this morning about how the trio of interns working with us this summer is really gelling into a wonderful team.  We've had so many great interns over the past few years, people willing to dedicate some serious time to loving on the kids in our youth ministry at PV.  

with three, they are beginning to outnumber the staff, and the energy these kids are bringing to the table really is pretty awesome.  

Good work, guys!  

Pollicious

Today they're using one of my polls at Pollicious.  Check it out!  

1408

Holy Crap.  

For whatever reason, Rampton and I decided to blow the free night tonight by letting Stephen King scare the crap out of us.  We went to see 1408, which is from a  King short story.  I love King's work, and really went on a tear trying to read a bunch of it over the last couple of years.  I've never read this bit of terror, though.  

It builds like crazy, and disarms you, then throttles you.  It's cruel, subtle, strong, and uses all kinds of trickery to bait you into its traps.  Even when it telegraphs them, you can't help but be pulled in.   

I hate movies like that.

But, for those of you that like them, this is worth a try.  I think it's pretty well done, and John Cusack makes it happen.  He carries the whole thing on his back, since most of time it's just him freaking himself out in this room.  

Gave me the willies.  

Powerpoint Church

Garr Reynolds wrote this blog entry about this article in the washington post this last week.  

I think there are some very similar questions to be raised about how Powerpoint is used in the church. Generally speaking, we use it poorly, in my opinion. I think much of what is said in the above could be used for us, if we substitute "sermon" or "lesson" for "presentation".

I still am guilty of much of this, but I've really tried to move towards a different style of using powerpoint, one that lets it support the content I'm working with, instead of duplicating it, replacing it, or dominating it in the development stage.  Powerpoint does those things when we forget that the slides don't do the teaching, they're meant to reinforce or provide emphasis to the content that is coming directly from the person.  One good rule of thumb to make sure that we're on the right track might be counterintuitive, but if our PPTs can be read through and our message comprehended without the oral communication that should come with it, then that probably means that we're letting it do to much of the talking.  If that's true, then we should expect that people will just read the slides, instead of listening.  On the other hand, if our slides are designed to enhance what we're saying orally, then they are really going to be minimal and poignant.  

Less is definitely more!  

Sickly

Today I spent most of the day on my couch, nursing a cold. I was pushed to avoid folks by the news this morning from the other side of the bed that my wife had caught whatever bug I've been hosting. So, we had a date to the Doc together. It was really sweet.

My throat still feels really scratchy, but besides that it's kind of a wimpy cold. I wasn't even really tired, so we just watched movies most of the day, and practiced not giving our illnesses to others.

anybody out there with a sore throat that wants to blame it on the Hovaters? I wouldn't be too surprised. We've been around a lot of folks the last couple of days!