It's Thanksgiving Charlie Brown

Well it has been a while since my last post. I guess I should post on my travels. I took the long trek down to Oxford for like a week and a half. It was fun, but a little too long to be there. There was always enough to do in Oxford to occupy my time when I lived there but now not so much. I had a great time going to see Harry Potter at 12:01 am. The movie is amazing, everyone should go see it. We went to the Grove, Saturday, it was great to see our friend, Mike, up and about after his life threatening illness. We decided not to go to the game as it was too cold. That was when the festivities began. After a very sad attempt by Noel at reliving glory days at Chili's, we stopped at El Charro's for margaritas and sombreros, then it was back to Andrea's cause Noel threw up in Courtney's truck. Noel cleaned it up sorta and then we played hide Courtney entirely too long, but it was funny. Last stop some guy's house where Mike was and stayed there a long time and watched 16 year olds hit on Noel. Andrew and I retired, but the girls decided they were not ready to give it up. So they went to one of Courtney's friend's place and stayed there waaaaaaaay too long, to the point that Drew and I were called to come rescue the girls from the weird guys. That was by far the most excitement of the week. Soooo much drama.

Trae is ummm exactly what you would expect when you take a 6 year old to see Harry Potter. The funniest thing was he kept asking me when the goblin was going to show up. It took me like 2/3 of the movie to realize he thought it was the Goblin of Fire. So the rest of the movie was trying to explain what a goblet is. It was a trip. Thanksgiving was cool. Got up early, ate alot, had two dinners to go to, and saw Gale waaaaayyy too much. She was strangely nice to me, but im not fooled. I ended up moving furniture rather than going to Starkpatch, which turned out to be a good move since Ole Miss decided to be MSU's only SEC win of the season. Give me a break guys. Then the long trek back home. I'm glad to be back though. I enjoy my routine, it helps fight boredom. It is nasty here though, and apparently I missed a whole day of snow while I was gone. Oh well I'm sure there are lots more where that came from. My neighbors decorated the outside of our duplex for Christmas so they are making my side look sad right now, but this Saturday, I will decorate and it will look amazing. All in all, it was great seeing Andrea and her family and well everyone. I guess that's it but I'm gonna try to do movie trivia....anyone got a good day for me to do it on?

Hail to the Chef....... Great Googlymoogly

Ok. So this doesn't count as a post I know. I promise to do one in the next few days, but this was on a friend's page and I thought it was kind of interesting.


1. Go to Google
2. Type in the word "failure"
3. Hit the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button instead of "Search"
4. Tell all of the cool people before Google fixes it...

Stained Glass Masquerade

"There is no privacy that cannot be penetrated, no secret can be kept in a civilized world. Society is a masked ball where everyone hides his real character, and reveals it by hiding."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Is there anyone that fails

Is there anyone that falls

Am I the only one in church today feelin’ so small
Cause when I take a look around

Everybody seems so strong

I know they’ll soon discover

That I don’t belong
So I tuck it all away

like everything’s okay

If I make them all believe it

maybe I’ll believe it too
So with a painted grin

I play the part again

So everyone will see me the way that I see them

Are we happy plastic people

Under shiny plastic steeples

With walls around our weakness

and smiles to hide our pain

But if the invitation’s open

To every heart that has been broken

Maybe then we close the curtain

On our stained glass masquerade

Is there anyone who’s been there

Are there any hands to raise

Am I the only one who’s traded

In the altar for a stage
The performance is convincing

And we know every line by heart

Only when on one is watching

Can we really fall apart
But would it set me free

If I dared to let you see

The truth behind the person

That you imagine me to be
Would your arms be open

Or would you walk away

Would the love of Jesus

Be enough to make you stay

Are we happy plastic people

Under shiny plastic steeples

With walls around our weakness

and smiles to hide our pain

But if the invitation’s open

To every heart that has been broken

Maybe then we close the curtain

On our stained glass masquerade

Wow!!! Emerson and Casting Crowns in the same post. What a combination. Those are two bodies of work that have been rattling around in my head lately. Of course, this isn't the first time a Casting Crowns song has had this effect on me. I felt the same way when "If We Are the Body" came out, telling anyone who would listen that this song described the state of the church and we needed to band together to change it. As you probably realize, not much was done about my revelation guided by the band. Other than a few other Christians agreeing with me, it was pretty much business as usual.

Well, they have done it again. "Stained Glass Masquerade" is an amazing gut check for the church as a whole. I love the line, " Am I the only one who's traded in the altar for a stage. The performance is convincing, we know every line by heart." Some people close to me have joked with me that my family motto is "illusion is truth", growing up with two very successful marketing and business people for parents, I learned at an early age people don't want to know your problems. They want you to tell them what they want to hear and let that be it. If all that is true, no wonder I feel so comfortable at church. We don't truly worship anymore. We put on an amazing and entertaining production every Sunday in the hopes of selling Christianity to more people to boost numbers to increase the intake of offerings. Willie Butler talked of this during the summer at Fuge PCB. He told a story of being at a church he was to speak at and asked one of the deacons when they wanted him to get up. The deacon responded you're Baptist aren't you? Then you know when to get up there. And he was right. Most of us could set our watches by our church services.

The productions are nice, and very comfortable. But they arent very effective. If they were, we wouldn't see the decline like there has never been before in the amount of people converting to Christianity. See one of the problems of the production mentality is it leaves no part for the everyday Christian witness. Since we have not been cast to a part, we should be quiet not rock the boat. Let millions of dollars of research and polling work their magic and bring in the masses. What fools we all are. I got into a discussion with one of my pastors the other day about more and more pastors having business degrees. He quoted multimillion dollar budgets to be managed and without the proper knowledge they could be lost. I responded to him without a message of Truth we are all already lost.

That's what I miss the most of Fuge. That's what everyone always misses of Fuge. Worship. It's not perfect, but it's as close as we ever get. For however brief of a time we get to sit and bask with hundreds of fellow christians in our Master's Glory. Then those of us there all summer go back to our church productions and feel frustrated, because not only have you lost the true worship so desperately soaked up all summer, you feel you have lost your voice to do anything about it.

Jesus is coming look busy. Do unto others before they do unto you. Love your neighbor if they love you first. These were once punch lines. Now if we were honest they could be written into the New American Patriotic Translation of the First Baptist Church of Starbucks. Give it a cool cover or make it into a magazine or turn it into a podcast. Let's start the First Church of iPod. Reach millions with minimal costs. That's great, but what message are we sending? Where's your altar? Do you know your lines?

****************SMILE you're on Jesus cam!!****************

PS 1000 pts if you can tell me what show I got the Emerson quote from