I promised myself and others when I started this blog that I would try to keep it upbeat and funny. Try not to get to serious with myself and keep things light. I made that promise so that if you are having a crappy day or if you need a pick me up I would hopefully be able to fulfill that need. Well today I want to do it differently, I want you to feel empowered, I want you to feel like you have something to live for and I want you to realize that life is precious. This is a blog that I read regularly, I'm talking Raisin Bran, Metamucil regular. I never miss and go on it every day. There are very few blogs that I visit regularly but this one I NEVER miss a day and you shouldn't either. So here it is: from Carrie's Bit
Just read it! Nuf Said
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Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Monday, November 17, 2008
A little about me!
I know I promised that I would tell you or reveal a little about me as the days, weeks months went along on this blog. Well today isn't going to be one of those days! Just kidding I wanted to give you some insight in what I'm doing and what I want to do. As you may or may not know I'm the assistant pastor at Bikers Church and I'm truly blessed to be leading/serving such a great bunch and to be honest with you I don't know if I could ever serve somewhere else. I would if I'm called to it but my preference would be to stay there.
Something else you might not know about me, I love sport related movies (mostly football) but any kind of sport movie ALWAYS peeks my interest. Some of my favorites include: Invincible, The Longest Yard, Remember the Titans, Facing the Giants, Gridiron Gang, Something for Joey, The Program, Any Given Sunday and the best football movie of all time Rudy. Don't get me wrong I don't discriminate with other sports, boxing movies are good I love all the Rocky movies, Ali with Will Smith was excellent. I even enjoy a good hockey movie like Slap Shot, Miracle and the best cheesiest hockey movie of all time Youngblood with Rob Lowe, Patrick Swayze and if you pay close attention you might notice Keanu Reeves in nets.
All this to say I love sports movies. Do you have a favorite sports movie or do you have a comment about any of the ones that I mentioned above. I would really love to hear from you.
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Something else you might not know about me, I love sport related movies (mostly football) but any kind of sport movie ALWAYS peeks my interest. Some of my favorites include: Invincible, The Longest Yard, Remember the Titans, Facing the Giants, Gridiron Gang, Something for Joey, The Program, Any Given Sunday and the best football movie of all time Rudy. Don't get me wrong I don't discriminate with other sports, boxing movies are good I love all the Rocky movies, Ali with Will Smith was excellent. I even enjoy a good hockey movie like Slap Shot, Miracle and the best cheesiest hockey movie of all time Youngblood with Rob Lowe, Patrick Swayze and if you pay close attention you might notice Keanu Reeves in nets.
All this to say I love sports movies. Do you have a favorite sports movie or do you have a comment about any of the ones that I mentioned above. I would really love to hear from you.
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Friday, November 14, 2008
Another Day Another Experience
Today it feels like I spent the whole day putting out fires and dealing with personal issues. It seems that when people know what I do or at least what I'm studying to do it's an open ticket to say and ask anything. Usually I don't mind but sometimes when it hits too close to home or when it gets personal the time and place might be inappropriate. Don't get me wrong I love helping people, I love serving God and when I can do both at the same time everything feels right. So helping a co-worker just seems natural but as I said sometimes the time and place that is chosen can really make me feel uncomfortable and uneasy. I don't like to get into huge theological debates in public with people that don't want to hear both sides, or people that just want to debate to hear themselves talk. I don't like being put against the ropes and thrown blanket statements and asked to "defend" myself or "defend" all of Christianity and then the person walks away after the general statements were made. I don't mind having a conversation with someone where we can exchange ideas and opinions but blanket statements thrown out to embarrass and shame believers I don't have the time or patience to deal with that at work. Don't get me wrong I have nothing against the person, and I actually prayed for this person after the conversation was done I just don't like being blind sided and backed in a corner.
I find it funny (in a very sarcastic way) that I can't talk about religion at work, or share my belief but it is OK to be confronted by someone with non-religious beliefs and get asked to defend myself, my church, my beliefs and my God. It's OK to bash Christianity at work but it's frowned upon and prevented to tell anyone that I'm a Christ follower or an assistant pastor! Oh well what's a guy to do? You know what someone should do, show patience, understanding, compassion and love for the attacker because God is a mighty God and He can defend himself. What you have to do is be prepared to answer questions once the confrontation is done. You see as soon as the person left and everything calmed down I had 4 people come up to me and ask how I kept my cool and that they wanted to speak with me about personal problems and ask me if God can actually help them.
Thank you God for the opportunities, thank you for trusting me but mostly Thank you God for calling me to serve You.
My advice to you is listen for His voice, be willing to do what it takes and be ready when He calls you, because it can happen at any time.
Talk at you later
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I find it funny (in a very sarcastic way) that I can't talk about religion at work, or share my belief but it is OK to be confronted by someone with non-religious beliefs and get asked to defend myself, my church, my beliefs and my God. It's OK to bash Christianity at work but it's frowned upon and prevented to tell anyone that I'm a Christ follower or an assistant pastor! Oh well what's a guy to do? You know what someone should do, show patience, understanding, compassion and love for the attacker because God is a mighty God and He can defend himself. What you have to do is be prepared to answer questions once the confrontation is done. You see as soon as the person left and everything calmed down I had 4 people come up to me and ask how I kept my cool and that they wanted to speak with me about personal problems and ask me if God can actually help them.
Thank you God for the opportunities, thank you for trusting me but mostly Thank you God for calling me to serve You.
My advice to you is listen for His voice, be willing to do what it takes and be ready when He calls you, because it can happen at any time.
Talk at you later
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Thursday, November 13, 2008
Back in the swing of things
Wow what a great time and what a conference! The speakers were amazing and the youth that we took with us did an awesome job. They really impressed me and changed my attitude towards youth ministry. You see when I started this journey I said to myself there are only 2 areas that I would not work in and the first was youth! Well God has a sense of humor and He loves it when we say we won't do something because it's not in us. He will find a way to get you to see it His way eventually!
I know that youth ministry is hard and I know that it won't always be perfect but that's what will make it fun. And that's why this may be a perfect fit, I can be hard to get along with and trust me I'm far from perfect, VERY FAR from perfect. Maybe if I trust God and let go He might just guide me in the right direction. He tends to do that when you let Him.
So I'll keep you posted on my future plans and thoughts as I continue to contemplate some heavy questions.
Talk at you later
Marty
I know that youth ministry is hard and I know that it won't always be perfect but that's what will make it fun. And that's why this may be a perfect fit, I can be hard to get along with and trust me I'm far from perfect, VERY FAR from perfect. Maybe if I trust God and let go He might just guide me in the right direction. He tends to do that when you let Him.
So I'll keep you posted on my future plans and thoughts as I continue to contemplate some heavy questions.
Talk at you later
Marty
Saturday, November 8, 2008
Resonate 08 day 2
Hey everybody getting close to the end of day 2 and the end of the conference. Really looking forward to coming home and being with my wife and kids I really missed them this weekend. Got a lot done covered a lot of topics and heard some great ideas. The youth that came with us seem to have had a good time (I hope) and will take something back that hopefully will help them with their leadership skills.
I'm really proud of the guys and girl that came with us they did an awesome job, kept an open mind and were willing to participate in everything we asked them to participate in.
Got to go for now will talk to you soon
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I'm really proud of the guys and girl that came with us they did an awesome job, kept an open mind and were willing to participate in everything we asked them to participate in.
Got to go for now will talk to you soon
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Resonate 08
Hey everybody I'm writing to you from the beautiful downtown Metropolis of Belleville. I'm at Resonate 08 it is an annual leadership conference for youth pastors and youth leaders. For those of you who don't know, I have decided to take on a more active role in taking care and trying to bring back our youth program. So I figured that if I'm going to this I'm going to do it right. I'm one of those people that if I commit to something I do it completely with 1oo% conviction or I don't do it all. It takes me time to agree or to commit but when I do I give it my all! So this conference was the first step in my transformation.
I have to admit I was a little sceptical and apprehensive at first. I didn't know what to expect or what I was getting into because this was my first youth conference ever. I have to admit that the first day was really fun. The speakers were good and the choices of topics were quite varied and very relevant. But you know what really got me, it was the passion and conviction of some of the youth that is here! Some of these young adults really have IT (reference to Craig Groeschel's book) while others are still struggling but are really open minded to change. I am learning more from watching the interactions between the different groups than I have in the different seminars and to me that's what's important. It doesn't have to be what 1 person says or what 1 course can do for you I personally think it is the whole experience and what you take from it and what God is telling you to do. Too many people come to the conferences and think they are SUPER SPIRITUAL because they attend ALL the speakers conferences but miss the oppurtunities to actually minister and LEARN. They tend to miss what God is telling them to do because they are too busy!
But I'll be honest with you the thing that I have appreciated the most in this whole weekend was the fact that not only was this my first time at a youth conference but it was also the first for a couple of the youth from our church! These 2 guys (which will remain nameless at their request) have been nothing but perfect gentlemen! They have been extremely polite and open to everything that was requested from them. They have gone to most of the presentations and stayed until the end and they have actually chosen to attend some of the meetings. They were like me very skeptical and reluctant at first. Don't get me wrong they're not at the same point as some of the guys and girls that are here but the fact that they are here is phenomenal! I have known 1 of them for years and the other for almost a year now but have never really made the effort to get to know them until now and for that I'm trully sorry. Parents of these 2 boys you should be really proud of them!!!!
Got to go for now talk at you later
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I have to admit I was a little sceptical and apprehensive at first. I didn't know what to expect or what I was getting into because this was my first youth conference ever. I have to admit that the first day was really fun. The speakers were good and the choices of topics were quite varied and very relevant. But you know what really got me, it was the passion and conviction of some of the youth that is here! Some of these young adults really have IT (reference to Craig Groeschel's book) while others are still struggling but are really open minded to change. I am learning more from watching the interactions between the different groups than I have in the different seminars and to me that's what's important. It doesn't have to be what 1 person says or what 1 course can do for you I personally think it is the whole experience and what you take from it and what God is telling you to do. Too many people come to the conferences and think they are SUPER SPIRITUAL because they attend ALL the speakers conferences but miss the oppurtunities to actually minister and LEARN. They tend to miss what God is telling them to do because they are too busy!
But I'll be honest with you the thing that I have appreciated the most in this whole weekend was the fact that not only was this my first time at a youth conference but it was also the first for a couple of the youth from our church! These 2 guys (which will remain nameless at their request) have been nothing but perfect gentlemen! They have been extremely polite and open to everything that was requested from them. They have gone to most of the presentations and stayed until the end and they have actually chosen to attend some of the meetings. They were like me very skeptical and reluctant at first. Don't get me wrong they're not at the same point as some of the guys and girls that are here but the fact that they are here is phenomenal! I have known 1 of them for years and the other for almost a year now but have never really made the effort to get to know them until now and for that I'm trully sorry. Parents of these 2 boys you should be really proud of them!!!!
Got to go for now talk at you later
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Monday, November 3, 2008
Disposable society
Hey everybody, just wanted to share something. Did you ever notice how we don't fix stuff anymore? It seems like all we do is just buy new stuff. Now I don't know if it's because we want new toys or we are just trying to compete with Jones' or maybe it's because it costs just as much if not more to fix than to replace but we just don't fix stuff anymore. Does anyone know how to fix a TV anymore? The worst part in all this is it doesn't matter how much you spend for the stuff it will break within the year!!!!
This has been bugging me since last week and I really got a kick in the butt yesterday. I bought a brand new pair of Harley Davidson motorcycle boots last year. I paid over $200.00 for them so I figured they would last me at least 3 to 4 years! WRONG! After about 16 months the soul is falling apart. So instead of buying a new pair I went to a shoe repair guy to get a new soul put on. The dude wants to charge me over $70.00 for new souls. He tells me that the problem with shoes these days is that they are made poorly and the new souls would last me at least 5 to 6 years. I'm like cool that's a good deal however he then tells me that the leather will probably fall apart anyway! Nice guy just a really bad salesman. So back to square one! Do I buy new boots or new souls???
I also have a 32" Sony Trinitron that the tube is going on it. I love that TV but it keeps shutting itself off. I called a repair person that wants to charge me $175.00 just to look at it without even fixing it. I could buy a new tube TV for that price. So again I have a decision to make do I want to fix the thing that I love or just buy something new for a couple of years.
Let's get serious people, you want to reduce your carbon footprint, you want to reduce reuse and recycle let's force these companies to make stuff that last, let's fix the stuff we do have and let's find a way to be content with the stuff we own.
As for me I going to get new souls on my boots and fix my Trinitron to give it another chance and prevent it from ending up in a landfill somewhere!!!!!
Talk at you later
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This has been bugging me since last week and I really got a kick in the butt yesterday. I bought a brand new pair of Harley Davidson motorcycle boots last year. I paid over $200.00 for them so I figured they would last me at least 3 to 4 years! WRONG! After about 16 months the soul is falling apart. So instead of buying a new pair I went to a shoe repair guy to get a new soul put on. The dude wants to charge me over $70.00 for new souls. He tells me that the problem with shoes these days is that they are made poorly and the new souls would last me at least 5 to 6 years. I'm like cool that's a good deal however he then tells me that the leather will probably fall apart anyway! Nice guy just a really bad salesman. So back to square one! Do I buy new boots or new souls???
I also have a 32" Sony Trinitron that the tube is going on it. I love that TV but it keeps shutting itself off. I called a repair person that wants to charge me $175.00 just to look at it without even fixing it. I could buy a new tube TV for that price. So again I have a decision to make do I want to fix the thing that I love or just buy something new for a couple of years.
Let's get serious people, you want to reduce your carbon footprint, you want to reduce reuse and recycle let's force these companies to make stuff that last, let's fix the stuff we do have and let's find a way to be content with the stuff we own.
As for me I going to get new souls on my boots and fix my Trinitron to give it another chance and prevent it from ending up in a landfill somewhere!!!!!
Talk at you later
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