Renewal

Prepare yourself for a lengthier-than-normal post. I make a habit of reading Spurgeon's devotional book - 'Morning by Morning' and 'Evening by Evening'. Luckily, I have a hard back book containing both. A bit like having a double Big Mac.

I found this morning's reading quite refreshing to my soul. I thought I would share it. As some of you know - I am a backslider. Quite the backslider. A line from Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing accurately describes my waywardness.

"Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love."

I find myself totally dependent of God's renewing power in my life. This devotion gave me a fresh desire and a fresh gratitude for God's grace and forgiveness...and even though Satan would like me to believe it - All is not lost! The naughty little wandering sheep that I am has been found and recovered. Even though I wander each time He brings me back - He never gives up. Hope this makes some sort of sense.

"Renew a right spirit within me." {#Ps 51:10}
A backslider, if there be a spark of life left in him will groan after restoration. In this renewal the same exercise of grace is required as at our conversion. We needed repentance then; we certainly need it now. We wanted faith that we might come to Christ at first; only the like grace can bring us to Jesus now. We wanted a word from the Most High, a word from the lip of the loving One, to end our fears then; we shall soon discover, when under a sense of present sin, that we need it now.
No man can be renewed without as real and true a manifestation of the Holy Spirit’s energy as he felt at first, because the work is as great, and flesh and blood are as much in the way now as ever they were. Let thy personal weakness, O Christian, be an argument to make thee pray earnestly to thy God for help.
Remember, David when he felt himself to be powerless, did not fold his arms or close his lips, but he hastened to the mercy seat with "renew a right spirit within me." Let not the doctrine that you, unaided, can do nothing, make you sleep; but let it be a goad in your side to drive you with an awful earnestness to Israel’s strong Helper. O that you may have grace to plead with God, as though you pleaded for your very life— "Lord, renew a right spirit within me."
He who sincerely prays to God to do this, will prove his honesty by using the means through which God works. Be much in prayer; live much upon the Word of God; kill the lusts which have driven your Lord from you; be careful to watch over the future uprisings of sin. The Lord has his own appointed ways; sit by the wayside and you will be ready when he passes by. Continue in all those blessed ordinances which will foster and nourish your dying graces; and, knowing that all the power must proceed from him, cease not to cry, "Renew a right spirit within me."

A New Kind of Bare

All this excitement for Halloween wears me out. It also wears my son out. After being dressed up like a bear, he fell asleep for long enough to take some photos of him. Brings a whole new meaning to the term bear skin. Or was that bare skin?

A new kind of family

The dust has settled. It's official. We are parents. Here is the picture to prove it.

Growth

I took this photo the other day. Why is it so easy for a plant to flourish and grow, absorbing any available light and drinking any available moisture. If only I could manage this on a spiritual level - drinking from the Word and absorbing Christ's light. I doubt that any of us look like this on a daily basis, but I hope those times can happen more regularly for me.

Humble Apologies

To a very dear friend and companion. I'm very sorry for the big-prank-that-went-wrong of which I was involved. Although I am the last to publicly and electronically apologize - I am sorry. For those of you who missed out on this crime-against-humanity, I've included some photos of this most disgusting joke. I'm ready to put this behind me - but not before we all revisit the atrocity one more time.

Cool gadget

I think this is pretty space-age. Bluetooth - and so small! What will they think of next?! I think that's cooler than those big clunky, Star Trek looking headsets. Go here to see more pics of this device.

European plan

"You guys'd be speakin' German right now if we didn't save your a** in the war."

You'd be surprised how many times I've heard that from different people since living in jolly old America. My reply to that is - "If it wasn't for us - you guys wouldn't be speaking English in the first place." Anyway. My Dad emailed this to me. I thought it was too good to pass up.

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English
will be the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other possibility. As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5-year phase-in plan that would become known as "Euro-English".
In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of "k". This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter. There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.
In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent "e" in the languag is disgrasful and it should go away. By the 4th yer people wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v".
During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru.

Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas.

Books

I only learned to read this year. So I started to read some books. Tom mentioned a book on his blog. He can read too. After a brief discussion with Tim Keel on Sunday - I found myself holding these books. It's my homework assignment to read all these by this Sunday, otherwise he said he would be very angry with me and hit me with them. Actually - I'm looking forward to reading these books. I've heard a lot about them. I feel a little odd though, because these were the books he used as a reference when he was writing the newly published study guide to the McLaren trilogy. So I have his scrawlings and highlightings on the pages. It's like I'm in his mind. It's like I'm taking over his mind! Secrets! Anyone read any of these books?

Baby

Thought I'd share some pics of the new baby. He's started to smile a bit. He's a good looking boy...or - as Isobel Thompson would say - "cute!" I think this month might have to be 'photo month'. Yes, I might doing some sort of monthly theme on my blog - just so people know what to expect. People can plan their month around it etc. I think it's only fair. So here it is - my first themed month. Photo Month.

Pour some sugar on me

When my alarm sounded this morning those were the first words to come out of my mouth, in song - out loud. For some reason, that song was in my head. Probably from the NASCAR event I was shooting last night. I think it was played at some point.
But something else has taken it's place. If you've seen the new SBC commercial you'll know all about "Phone, TV, DSL". Say it a few times in a rhythmic manner. My wife is a bit obsessed with it. Whenever it comes on, she says "look! look! look at the last guy cleaning his car...he's saying it too!" She did change the words to fit with our baby "Sleep, boobies, poop-my-pants".
Can you make up something as creative as that?

TV Land

I've never really been much of a TV watcher before. But lately, I've found myself watching the shows that I never thought I would find interesting.
Here are my current fave drama/comedy shows (in order of importance).
1. Arrested Development
2. Grey's Anatomy
3. Alias
4. Lost

Of course, there are the timeless always-watch shows - David Letterman and Conan. Both of these shows really cheer me up.

What is your fave TV show...and why?!

Marmalade

As I begin this post I really don't know what I am going to write about. It's been a while since I posted so I suppose I had better get-something-out-there. I've had a horribly busy week that has seen me walk through my front door after 1 am most days. There's no business like show business. Actually, more like show busyness. The KC BBQ Festival (or 'the KC BBQ Festival of Great Britain' as I like to call it. For some reason.) was a good time. I was lucky/unlucky enough to run the hand-held stage camera for Otis Day (Animal House band), the Click Five, Fefe Dobson, Natasha Bedingfield and another band which I can't remember, but they were good. Old, but good.
I was supposed to be covering Better Than Ezra, but they were rained out. During the last song of the Click Five set (at which point I was in the pit getting some wickedly cool shots) the rain came down and the floods came up. Time to pack up. Got done around 12 midnight drenched through.
Stood naked in the empty parking garage changing my clothes, and then looked up to find two CCTV cameras about, oh - 10 ft away. Drove home in my socks (funny place to drive!).
That's all I have to say. Watching the Chiefs game at the moment mildly interested. Still don't have my dish working on the side of the house. Looks like the Jacob's Well site is down too. Can't download the message from this morning. Which reminds me of the drama we had trying to get to church this morning. Left the house at 10:30 am. Church starts at 10:30. Decided about 1 minute from the house to go and have breakfast with my wife and son instead and have a quiet morning. Then, Alec puked all over himself on our way into First Watch. Great. Cleaned him up and went to Panera in Prairie Village (or 'prairie-village-people' as I like to call it. For some reason.) for an early lunch.
Ho hummm - that's my news.