25 Random Things About Me

Apparently, this "25 Random Things About Me" thing is going around Facebook. Well, now that my wife has posted 25 random things about herself, I feel like I can't let her "one-up" me and so I'm going to try my hand at this.

1. I was on the TV show "Romper Room" for one week as a 5-year-old. I came home with a variety of gifts: A stuffed Winnie the Pooh, a giant container of chocolate milk mix, and other stuff I can't remember.

2. My first car was a 1976 Chevy Nova with no air conditioning and vinyl seats. Quite comfy, as you can imagine, in southern California.

3. There are certain movies that, no matter how many times I've seen them, if they are on TV, I watch them and can't turn them off. Hoosiers, Enemy of the State, and Rocky IV are just 3 of them.

4. I wanted to be a medical doctor when I first went to college.

5. The season finale of Season 3 of "24" was filmed at my high school. It's the scene where Jack Bauer has to cut off Chase's hand in order to free him from the bomb.

6. Spider-Man is clearly the greatest Superhero of all-time. He would defeat Superman, Batman, or any other pretender to his throne.

7. Speaking of Spider Man, I used to dress up as him when I was a child.

8. I spent 24 hours in jail when I was in college.

9. My two 2 favorite actors of all-time: Jimmy Stewart and Gene Hackman.

10. There are 3 particular foods that I cannot stand: Mayonnaise, gravy, and sausage. In fact, gravy has never passed my lips.

11. I cannot stand protruding ear hairs or nose hairs. One of my favorite small gifts was the combination ear hair/nose hair trimmer that my wife gave me. To this day, I cannot understand why people are not more vigilant with protruding hair.

12. I was part of a group of guys who burned a girl's teddy bear when we were in college. We had kidnapped the teddy bear and held it hostage for a free dinner. When the girls never paid up, we torched the bear.

13. My parents owned a little grocery store when I was 12 years old.

14. I've been snow skiing once in my life, when I was 21 years old. I was so bad that the girl operating the chair lift would stop the lift when she saw me coming up, because she didn't want to see me wipe out getting off.

15. When I was 16 years old, I played a round of golf with 7-year-old Eldrick Woods (now known as "Tiger"). He beat me by 2 shots.

16. I have always changed the oil in my cars.

17. I don't drink hot beverages.

18. When I was in Kindergarten, I pretended that my belt buckle was a camera and I would take pictures of all the little girls.

19. I was a business major for 2 weeks as a freshman in college. I was so disinterested in my first business class that my friend and I would sneak out during opening prayer.

20. The hair on my head grows exceedingly fast. My wife has to cut my hair at least every 3 weeks.

21. My favorite baseball player of all-time is Nolan Ryan.

22. I am now a full-blown Mac addict.

23. My left foot is a whole size larger than my right foot. It makes shoe-buying a real hassle.

24. I have smoked one time in my entire life. When I was 9 years old, my dad gave me a puff on his pipe, which immediately made me sick. That was my entire career as a smoker.

25. I know the "numbers" from ABC's "Lost" by heart. If you do as well, you'll be able to figure out which 5 of these random things are false.

Upcoming Adult Sunday School Class

Beginning Sunday, February 8th, the adult Sunday school class will be watching Michael Horton's DVD "Christless Christianity."

You can view a portion of one of the lectures here:

A Real Blessing

It has been my privilege to serve the same church for the last 6+ years.  The church was planted in October 2002 with about 40-45 people and by the grace of the Lord, we have grown today to almost 170 people who would call our church their home.  Now I know that there is no such thing as a perfect church, but there are a couple of things that happened this week that reminded me that there is not a better congregation in the URC.  And both of them have something to do with food...

First, there were 3 ladies in our church who gave birth within a week of each other.  Typically, we try to line up meals for these families to ease the burden somewhat as they adjust to the newest member of their family.  Part of me wondered how possible it was going to be to get meals lined up for all of these families.  Silly me.  I never should have wondered.

For the first family (who gave birth on Tuesday of last week), we placed a sign-up sheet on the back table on Sunday and by the end of the day, all seven slots had been taken.

For the second family (who gave birth on Sunday), an email was sent out on Monday.  Within 3 hours, all the slots had been taken.

And for the third family (delivery via c-section last Thursday), an email was sent out late Monday night.  By Tuesday morning at 10 a.m. all the slots were taken.

And it was not only that all the slots were taken, but there were at least 5 ladies that I had to say "no" to because they wanted to take a meal on a day that was already signed up for.  What an incredible blessing...to have a congregation that is so willing to help one another!

But then there was the second thing:  Twice a month, on Wednesday nights, we have what's called "Family Night."  We start with a meal at 6:00 p.m., then followed by Boys' and Girls' clubs, as well as Elder/Deacon training (on the second Wednesday of the month).  A couple of things:  The ladies who put these meals together (headed up by one particular lady in our congregation) do such a wonderful job.  Two weeks ago, it was these incredible egg dishes.  Tonight, it was some fine Sloppy Joes and some really good potato casseroles.  And not only do they put this meal on for all of us, but they do it with joy.  What a great example of servanthood!

But that's not all.  As I was leaving tonight, one of the members in our church was carrying some tools with him.  When I asked him what he was doing, he said, "Well, I noticed that some of the church chairs are losing their little plastic feet.  I'm going to replace them."  Now no one asked him to do this.  He simply took the initiative because he had noticed something that needed fixing.And this is a man who has a full work schedule.

Those are just a few of the many examples that I could give of why I am so thankful to be able to serve this congregation!

This Sunday (February 1st)

Morning Service

Songs

#114 (Blue hymnal)

#273 (Blue hymnal)

#284 (Blue hymnal)

#420 (Red hymnal)

#5 (Red hymnal)

Sermon

Numbers 26:1-4:  "The Next Generation"

Evening Service

Songs

#311 (Blue hymnal)

#218 (Blue hymnal)

#168 (Red hymnal)

#7 (Red hymnal)

Sermon

2 Corinthians 1:3-7:  "The God of All Comfort"

My Tuesday

Throughout the years, I have been asked all kinds of questions about the ministry:  "How long does it take you each week to prepare 2 sermons?"  "What do you do with the rest of your time?"  "Where do you do most of your work--your house or Starbucks?"  "How can you drink Diet Coke for breakfast?" etc.  Well, I thought I'd share some of the details of a day that had a lot of variety to it.  

8:30-9:15:  Watch some of the inauguration

Whether you agree with our new President on the issues or not, this was an historical moment.  I've never been one to watch Presidential inaugurations, but I did want to watch some of this one.  I got to see Aretha Franklin with a giant bow in her hair, Nancy Pelosi with a permanent grin on her face, and Rick Warren in a suit.  By the way, how come Rick didn't wear a Hawaiian shirt to the inauguration.  It's good enough for worship in the presence of almighty God.

9:15:  Reply to an email about upcoming classis meeting

As stated clerk of our classis, I have to deal with a lot of correspondence from other churches.  And since we have a classis meeting coming up in March (and an agenda has to be out in the next 10 days), a lot of my time is going to be given to working on this.

9:30:  Receive a phone call from a member that his wife has given birth

In the last 3 weeks, we have had 2 baptisms in our congregation.  In addition, there will be another 8 baptisms in our church in the next 5 months.  Well, one of these soon-to-be-baptized babies was born yesterday.

9:40:  Send out email to congregation, informing them that another birth has taken place in our congregation

We like to celebrate new births as a church and so I sent out an email asking everyone to give thanks for a safe delivery and healthy baby.

9:45:  Finalize my sermon texts for the week

Typically, I am preaching through books of the Bible and so it doesn't take a great deal of time for me to figure out my sermon texts for the week.  For example, I'm in the book of Numbers in the morning and so I know that I'll be preaching Numbers 25 this Sunday.  However, I just finished the book of Romans in the evening this past Sunday.  So now the question is, "Where do I go next?"  After some time contemplating the matter, I decide (since we will be celebrating the Lord's Supper in 2 weeks) to preach a sermon on the sacrament of the Lord's Supper this Sunday night.

10:15:  Pick my songs for the week and send them to one of our pianists and our bulletin coordinator

I'm not the most musical person on the face of earth (played trombone for 3 weeks in the 4th grade before the class gave the teacher a nervous breakdown, thus ending my musical career).  Because of that, picking songs each week is not one of my favorite things to do.  However, it's something I take seriously, since I don't want us singing songs that are either (A) unsingable; (B) don't fit with the theme of the sermon.  It typically takes me anywhere from 30-60 minutes to choose my songs for the week.  After I select them, I email them to the appropriate individuals.

11:00:  Reply to email from individual who is looking to begin a Bible study and possibly plant a church in our state

There is a potential Bible study starting about 3 hours from here and the individual who is heading it up wanted to get my input on something.

11:10:  Email sermon info (texts and titles) and announcements to our bulletin coordinator

Our bulletin coordinator does a great job of getting the bulletin together every week and so I try to get everything to her early in the week.

11:20:  Begin initial preparation of morning sermon

Realizing that I don't have a lot of time before I need to go to the hospital (to visit the family who has just had the baby), I start reading through Numbers 25, looking for key points/themes.

12:00:  Eat lunch

Cheese sandwich and Diet Coke!

12:30:  Head to hospital (30 minutes south) to visit the family who has just had a baby

I always enjoy this.  It's always a blessing to be able to share in the joy of a family who has just been blessed with a new child.  In the past, I would take a balloon to the family, but about a year ago, I changed my practice.  Now I take Starbucks drinks.  After all, what good is a balloon?  So I stop at Starbucks, pick up the couple's drinks of choice and head to the hospital.  Unfortunately, this particular hospital doesn't have "clergy parking" so I drive around awhile and finally find a parking spot in the street.

3:00:  Return home from hospital

While driving home, I call one of my colleagues and catch up with him for about 15 minutes.

3:10:  Reply to email about potential Bible study/church plant in our state

The gentleman who is hoping to get something started south of here would like to worship with us in a couple of weeks and pick our brains about church planting.

3:15:  Reply to email about classis meeting in March

As I said, lots of correspondence to deal with as the stated clerk.  By the way, if you're reading this:  Thanks to my friend and colleague who nominated me to this position :)

3:20:  Email deacons about meals for family who has just had a baby

Our deacons are always great about getting meals lined up for families who have just had a baby.

3:30:  Back to working on morning sermon

I spend the next 2 hours working on my morning sermon.  Still a long, long way from being done.

5:30:  Dinner with family

Sushi!  The sushi that I have is eel and avocado.  Very good!

6:40:  Leave for 7:00 pre-marital counseling session with couple in church

I have a 7:00 pm appointment with a couple in our church who is getting married in April.  This is our third of six meetings.

8:00:  Arrive back home

A very full and diverse day.

This Sunday (January 25th)

Morning Service

Songs

#190 (Blue hymnal)

#524 (Red hymnal)

#264 (Blue hymnal)

#355 (Blue hymnal)

#299 (Blue hymnal)

Sermon

Numbers 25:  "The End of the Spear"

Evening Service

Songs

#65 (Red hymnal)

#212 (Blue hymnal)

#351 (Blue hymnal)

#307 (Blue hymnal)

Sermon

John 6:22-59:  "Spiritual Nourishment"

This Sunday (January 18th)

Morning Service

Songs

#76 (Red hymnal)

#455 (Red hymnal)

#36 (Blue hymnal)

#84 (Blue hymnal)

#472 (Blue hymnal)

Sermon

Numbers 23:1-6:  "We Belong to God"

Evening Service

Songs

#103 (Red hymnal)

#217 (Blue hymnal)

#204 (Blue hymnal)

Sermon

Romans 16:25-27:  "A Fitting Conclusion"

New URC Church Plant

Grace Church, a new URC church plant in the South Portland Metro area, just held their first worship services this past Sunday with 35 people in attendance.  This work is being planted by Immanuel's Reformed Church in Salem, Oregon.  Please pray for this new work, that the Lord would establish a Reformed church in the Portland area.  The website for this church plant may be found here.

This Sunday (January 11th)

Morning Service

Songs

#219 (Blue hymnal)

#261 (Red hymnal)

#170 (Blue hymnal)

#51 (Red hymnal)

#7 (Red hymnal)

Sermon

Numbers 22:  "Blessed by the Lord"

Evening Service

Songs

#337 (Blue hymnal)

#311 (Red hymnal)

#124 (Blue hymnal)

#280 (Blue hymnal)

Sermon

Romans 16:17-20:  "A Warning Against Schismatics"