My New Year’s Resolution
Dec 31, 2008 Uncategorized
Since it is New Year’s Eve, I thought I’d share with you my New Year’s Resolution, because it affects you too.
First, a little backstory.
I love blogging. I love reading blogs. I like the snapshot it gives you into someone’s life–the things they care about, the things they believe, etc. I spend a good chunk of everyday on blogs.
I have also fallen in love with Twitter and Facebook. All the things that seem to be missing from my blog (and the blogs of many other people I read) are right there on those platforms: a quick give and take with others, dumb little life updates, etc. I feel more connected with the people I chat with there than anyone on my blog.
BTW, to all of you out there who “don’t get Twitter,” watch this short video:
I did a little Roll Call a couple days ago and two things were very consistent across the hundreds of responses:
1) You guys like how “random” my site is. You say it’s “not a typical pastor’s site” and I take that as a compliment.
2) You wish I would talk more about theology and my personal spiritual journey in addition to the other stuff.
These two things confirm my New Year’s Resolution. Here it is:
This year, I am going to try to make my blog more about what I am chewing on, thinking about, learning, etc. I’m going to try to do this for a few reasons. The big one is for this place to become a “journal” of sorts for me. A place for me to really work through stuff in my personal and church life. Right now, I do this a bit but I am going to try to intentionalize it more.
I’m still going to post about stupid stuff I find around the internets, because I want this site to be a good reflection of who I am. Yes, that means a good healthy dose of Apple and Jack Bauer love. However, I will post a higher percentage of those things on Twitter instead of the blog (which in turn will update my Facebook status with said stupid stuff).
We’ll see how this little experiment goes. Maybe it will be great, maybe it will suck. Who knows?
Happy New Year!
Hoverboard
Dec 30, 2008 Uncategorized
I know what you’re thinking!
“I wish I knew how to make my own hoverboard!”
Well, your wish is my command!
The Church of Greater Lansing Project Update
Dec 30, 2008 Uncategorized
On Christmas Eve, Riverview teamed up with about 25 churches to raise money to help the Lansing Food Bank. Our goal was to raise $40,000 between the churches to “Stomp out Hunger” in the Lansing area for the month of January.
At Riverview, we raised $20,378.68, which is absolutely mind-boggling! I couldn’t be more proud of our church! I will have the grand total from all the churches very soon and I will post that number on Twitter.
I think this whole thing is amazing. How awesome to see the churches in the Lansing area working together on such a cool project.
Now it’s time for the grunt work. On January 18th, we’ll be delivering food to 2000 families. We need your help, so please mark your calendars. Here are the logistics:
Eastern High School Jenison Field House - 220 N Pennsylvania Ave Lansing, MI
1:45pm – 5:30pm - please be there 1:45pm…apparently all churches aren’t “ish.”
We’ll be giving you more details during the services the next couple weekends.
I Think My Wife’s a Calvinist
Dec 29, 2008 Uncategorized
OK, I spit my coffee out listening to this.
Gotta love theological humor.
Roll Call
Dec 28, 2008 Uncategorized
As we wrap up the year, I present you with my annual roll call. This year it’s a little more important because I am chewing on making some changes to my online habits, including this blog.
Please take a minute to answer the following questions. This year I am doing this anonymously so you can be super honest about what you think.
Thanks.
You really are the wind beneath my wings.
Merry Christmas!
Dec 25, 2008 Uncategorized
Christmas Eve
Dec 24, 2008 Uncategorized
When I was a kid, I used to love going to the Christmas Eve Service at church. Every year it was the same deal:
- Our pastor would sing a solo rendition of “O Holy Night”
- Someone would do a reading from Luke’s account of Jesus’ birth
- We would sing some Christmas Carols
- We would see extended church family members we hadn’t seen in a year
- We would light candles and turn off all the lights while we sang “Silent Night”
While I’m not always the biggest fan of tradition for the sake of tradition, I do see the value in times like these.
Tonight (at 4ish and 6ish), we’ll be holding our Christmas Eve Services at Riv. No, I won’t be singing a solo and we won’t be lighting candles (we did that once and our facility guy almost made me personally clean up all the wax). But the rest of the service will have some of these familiar memories for many of us.
It reminds me of a quote from Samuel Johnson I’ll be sharing tonight:
“People more frequently require to be reminded, than to be instructed.”
Come join us tonight and be reminded.
The Text
Dec 23, 2008 Uncategorized
As a thank you to all of you who faithfully read my blog, I’m going to give you the inside scoop on something cool we’re doing at Riv starting on January 1.
I’m announcing it at the XMAS Eve services tomorrow, but you heard it here first!
Monday iPhone App Review - Calendar Programs
Dec 22, 2008 iPhone Ap Review
One of my favorite things about my iPhone is the ability for me to access lots of stuff that previously had been trapped on my MacBook. One of those things is my calendar.
Ever since I got my iPhone, I have tried to find the perfect way to interact with my calendar and I still haven’t found it. The problem is I have to balance all of these:
- I like iCal a lot better than Google Calendar when I am at my computer
- I like Calendar a lot better than Google Calendar when I am on my iPhone
- Kim (my assistant) uses a PC, so she does all my scheduling on Google Calendar
I have used Spanning Sync for quite some time and love it. It connects my iCal with my Google Calendars rather seamlessly. Unfortunately, if Kim changes my schedule on Google Calendar, I won’t get the change on my computer or iPhone until I sync things with the cable. Yuck.
So, my first shot out of the box was to use NuevaSync. Very cool concept, really. It is a virtual Microsoft Exchange Server, which means it should be able to Sync changes on your Google Calendar with your phone. This it does very well…in one direction. When Kim changes something on Google Calendar, the change is almost immediate on my phone. The problem is it is very flakey in the other direction: when I add a new calendar item in the iPhone, 90% of the time it never shows on Google Calendar. Grr… I was double booking appointments all the time.
That’s why I was thrilled when Google Calendar said they were playing nice with iCal now. Well, kinda. The calendars sync perfectly but you can’t add anything to your schedule with your iPhone. That lasted about 2 hours.
So now I’m back to square one. Spanning Sync is the best option out there, but it’s still not perfect.
The Church of Greater Lansing Project
Dec 18, 2008 Uncategorized
On Christmas Eve, Riv is going to team up with 20 or so area churches to do something really cool!
But I get ahead of myself…
Due to the economic crisis in Michigan, a 32% increased need has been reported by Lansing Food Banks in the past month. In outlying areas (where a lot of our people live), first time families requesting help is up by 18%. Many food banks are unable to meet demands and are turning families away.
Here’s the cool part: Lansing Mayor Bernero has asked pastors in the Lansing area to get involved in this crisis. Phil, the Lead Pastor at Trinity Church called me last week to see if we wanted to help. I told him to sign us up, because this cause reminded me of this verse:
2 Corinthians 8:14
Right now you have plenty and can help those who are in need. Later, they will have plenty and can share with you when you need it.
Many of us are still in a season of plenty. This is our opportunity to help those who are in need. We are going to collect an offering on Christmas Eve that is dedicated to feeding the needy in Lansing. We are purchasing semi-trucks of food from the Greater Lansing Food Bank and will receive food boxes to feed an entire family for a week or an individual for 4 weeks.
Our goal is to “Stomp out Hunger” for the month of January (which is traditionally a real tough month and this year will be worse). To do this, we need to feed 2,000 families. Our goal for this project is to raise $40,000 between all the churches.
I think this is totally doable. Please be praying about what you may be able to do to help on Christmas Eve. Also, we are going to need volunteers to help deliver food to the 2000 families in January. More info on that will be coming soon.
Wal-Mart Love
Dec 15, 2008 Uncategorized
I know it’s cool with you kids to hate Wal-Mart and all, but I thought this was interesting (via CARPE DIEM):
According to Forbes, Wal-Mart was the most generous corporation in America in 2007, giving away $301 million in cash gifts to the Children’s Miracle Network, Feeding America, The Salvation Army, the American Red Cross, the United Way of America, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. Wal-Mart was almost twice as generous as the most profitable company in the world, Exxon, which gave “only” $173 million in 2007, and was #3 in the Forbes ranking.
Art Open House at Riv
Dec 12, 2008 Uncategorized
Kristie has put the finishing touches on Riv’s first full art installation in our new Corridor Gallery. It’s so cool to see we have so many talented artists around Riv.
If you have a chance tonight, head over to the Holt Venue between 7:00ish and 9:00ish to check it out. We’re hosting a little Open House and of course there will be coffee and munchies.
Just don’t spill them on the art.
Reading on the Cheap
Dec 11, 2008 Uncategorized
Thanks to Brad for this quote:
“The man who never reads will never be read;
he who never quotes will never be quoted.
He who will not use the thoughts of other men’s brains,
proves that he has no brains of his own.”-Charles H. Spurgeon
I love to read, but I don’t get to read as much as I want. My favorite books are theology books, practical leadership books (both Christian and secular), and novels. Unfortunately, when I am in a teaching season I don’t have time to read which totally bums me out.
So I pile the books up. You can see my current pile in my office tour. Then, when I am not teaching I try to rock through as many books as I can. I also try to knock them out on planes when I am traveling.
Lots of people have asked me, “how do you afford all those books?” Well, Riv has a small book budget (but it’s not that big and I am real cheap). So here’s my system for reading, without spending a ton of money.
1) Check the library. It’s surprising how many books you can find in that magical place. For those of you in the Lansing area, go to CADL’s website first to save yourself the drive if the book you want is not in.
2) If the book is not in the library, but it’s short or you just want to skim it, go to Barnes and Noble and read it in the store.
3) Next, go to PaperBackSwap.com. This is one of my favorite sites. Basically, for every book you send someone, you can pick any book from any member to have sent to you. The average book takes $2.50 to mail, so you are basically buying books for that price. If I can find the book there, I do. With 2.6 million books available, I can often find what I want.
4) Finally, order books from Amazon.com. They always have a little discount on all books and you can score free shipping if you spend over $25. I have a wishlist there with books I want to read but are not essential reads right now. Then, whenever there is a book I need, I add a book or two from the wishlist to take my total over $25.00. At that point, the shipping is free. This makes them almost as cheap as buying them used from Amazon’s used service.
I have kicked around the idea of getting an Amazon Kindle, but I can’t quite justify the start-up costs. Once the new ones come out, I may explore that option because I like the idea of getting books for $9.99.
And that is how I read as much as I do on the cheap. Any other tips from you readers out there?
Want a Free 1GB Flash Drive?
Dec 10, 2008 Uncategorized
OK, here’s the deal. I lost the above pictured USB 1GB Flash Drive for over a month.
I finally gave up hope and bought myself a 4GB replacement. And then that very day, I found it.
Dang.
I was going to keep it, then I thought, “am I really going to use 2 drives?” The answer is “no.”
So, here’s the deal. If you need one, you can have it. And I mean free…I won’t even charge you postage. I will mail it to you today.
Here’s the fine-print:
- Offer only good to people living in the United States. I don’t want to pay to ship it overseas.
- You have to actually need it. That means you don’t already have a flash drive, but would like one. You’re on the honor system here.
- The first person to post a comment on this post wins. Make sure you use your real email address because I need to email you to get your mailing address.
That’s it.
Merry Christmas.
My Flight Tomorrow
Dec 10, 2008 Uncategorized
I’m flying out for a quick one day trip tomorrow. Wonder if my flight will be like this one.
2 Thoughts on 2 Customer Service Moments
Dec 9, 2008 Uncategorized
I had two different experiences last week in the arena of Customer Service.
The first was terrible. It was with our church’s Health Insurance company. Basically, I have faxed the same receipts and paperwork to them twice and they still say they have not received it. This is after I was told on the phone last February that everything was all set. So, I called them to see if I could clear it up (again). The auto-attendant told me to punch a number. I did and the response was “that number is invalid.”
I did this three times. No go. So I hit “0,” assuming I would get an operator. Nope. “That number is invalid.”
So I have listen to the entire message, which ends by telling me to hit “*” to talk to an operator. Weird, but I do it.
I am finally connected with someone who tells me that the website has wrong information about my account but it can’t be cleared up until I fax the information in (again).
Basically, I wasted a long time (and my assistant wasted more time faxing stuff because the fax number they gave me didn’t work). And as of Saturday, it still wasn’t cleared up because they mailed me a form-letter that made that very clear.
Grrr…
The second customer service experience I encountered was awesome. It was with DailyMugshot.com. They basically sent me a note to see if there was a reason I wasn’t using their service anymore. It was a simple email, that concluded with “let us know if you have any feedback on our service.” Awesome, I am always happy to oblige — I emailed them with a technical problem I was having.
The founder of the site emailed me back personally with a solution to my problem 6 minutes later. 6 minutes! That was shorter than the time it took me to navigate the phone system of the insurance company.
I am now happily using this service again.
Why do I tell these long stories?
Because I immediately thought of two completely different applications.
1) How we do our jobs matters. I can’t help but remember Paul’s admonition to slaves:
Titus 2:9-10 Slaves must always obey their masters and do their best to please them. They must not talk back or steal, but must show themselves to be entirely trustworthy and good. Then they will make the teaching about God our Savior attractive in every way.
If you are a Christ-follower, how you do your job (even if it is being a slave) reflects on how people see Jesus.
2) As our church grows, we must seek to have the same responsiveness as when we were a small start-up church.
It gets harder and harder to do this. I get tons of email from people inside and outside of the church. My Facebook and MySpace accounts keep me cooking. It’s tough to stay on top of it all! But I must find ways to do so. I may not be able to respond the same way I did in the past, but I can do my best to create systems that help. I have to watch out, lest these systems become a hinderance (like the Customer Service of the Insurance Company).
Birthday Love
Dec 8, 2008 Uncategorized
Yup. It’s true. It’s my birthday. I’m 37 today and that makes me feel pretty old.
But I’m also feeling loved. I’ve received lots of birthday greetings via email, text message, and voicemail. But the big one is Facebook. Now I know that most people only remembered my birthday because Facebook told them, but that doesn’t change the feeling of love.
Thanks all. Now I have to stop reading birthday greetings and go back to work.
Oh Christmas Tree
Dec 4, 2008 Uncategorized
I love this picture Grace took at the Christmas tree farm last week.
