Auburn went back to the conference play today and we went to see the 1:00 pm start in Auburn against Vanderbilt. Perhaps a game Auburn should have won but in the end Auburn came up short. It was all offense on both sides today with no one playing a tight defense. As always Deb and I enjoyed the game but as I sit here and watch the Florida vs Tennessee basketball game with a packed house, I would like to see the same thing down here in Auburn. It isn’t an ACC thing and SEC doesn’t have basketball teams, they have plenty of good teams, Auburn just hasn’t won games in a few years now and not many come out to support the team on a consistent basis.
For Deb and I that isn’t what the games are really about. It is about spending time together and getting away from the normal routine of work and distractions to enjoy something together. Out of all the sporting events that take place at Auburn, Basketball is probably Deborah’s favorite. It is indoors, she can bring her knitting, and no one generally dumps a rum and coke on your camera or throws up their lunch a few seats next to you (both happened at the football games this past season).
Nope, the games are usually quiet, plenty of seats, not a crowded area, generally no commercial time-outs, tickets are CHEAP, and the games only last 2 hours at most. Of course, we actually hope that changes when the new area opens in 2011, but either way, we will still try to go to the basketball games when the weather outside gets cold. Here are a few photos I took at the game today. Click on the images below to see the larger size.
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Today was supposed to be a day off but it was so cold outside today that I ended up just looking at code all day long (which was better than going outside). So I took my friday feet photo today of what I had planned on doing today, sitting back and reading a book. That didn’t happen but I was able to get moving on a few blogs and website development projects (the shoes in the pic are just for effect since each week I am wearing the same shoes).
I am in the middle of reading two books right now, Tribes and Unleashing The Idea Virus, both written by Seth Godin (his blog). Some how I ended up reading both of these books at the same time. Unleashing The Idea Virus was written first and Tribes is making more sense after reading some of Idea Virus. I will be posting a review of one or both once I get through reading them, but so far they are both excellent.
I am about to finish my first two full months at the church and now I am really starting to get into the grit of my position. Once the new website is launched over the next week or two it will really be a start to what I hope is going to be a strong Internet presence in the months and years to come for the church. I am really excited about how it is starting to come together, and today I spent a good bit of time getting to know the code a little better.
After looking at coding for about 12 hours Deb and I went out to eat at a (very) local restraunt called Good ‘Ol Boys. Tomorrow the Auburn Basketball team takes on Vandy in the next SEC matchup for the Tigers. Doesn’t look like it is going to be any warmer, some are actually calling for snow on Monday night, yikes.
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The Internet can be many things to many people. Can it be the drug of choice today or is that to harsh a term to describe what we as a society have done with the Internet?
Most of the time we have a negative connotation associated with a “drug”, but drugs can be just as positive as negative, especially when one company has promoted their product as the “wonder drug” of all time. One legal definition puts it like this:
Some governments define the term drug by law. In the United States, the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act definition of “drug” includes “articles intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease in man or other animals” and “articles (other than food) intended to affect the structure or any function of the body of man or other animals.
This is one of those random blog posts I couldn’t decide if I wanted to dive into or not, but I am going to do it anyway. I started writing this several weeks ago but it culminated this week with a conversation I had with the worship leader (photo shown above) here and moved into the finer point of Calvinism (if only we actually had time to just sit and discuss these things). And that is… what is the Internet doing to fellowship and how does it change how we read Hebrews 10:25 (in context) that says: “25 Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another€”and all the more as you see the Day approaching.”
If you are reading my blog and are not a Believer, then insert “social skills or socializing” in place of fellowship, but for the rest of us, what does it mean to move our worship and other networking (i.e. fellowship) to the Internet? This is what I envision when we combine the greatness of the Internet with the Bride of Christ. Something totally awesome if I can still use that phrase, but how careful are we to not be slowly creating a generation of Internet only Believers that don’t know how to, want to, or even care anything about fellowship?
The ultimate online church campus right now is lifechurch.tv but this week I was really excited to watch the initial launch of the iCampus for NewSpring as posted on ChurchCrunch (read NewSpring Church Launches iCampus BETA). I was so excited to see NewSpring launch a full blown service that I could sit here in my office and watch Sunday evening from a church in Greenville I have never been to (but will in about a month) and feel like I was part of the service, but was I really part of the service?
The questions that ran through my mind when talking to other about where the church is going through technology goes something like this:
- What about those Believers who really don’t like to fellowship in the first place, or worse, highly dislike it? To say “they should” is what I would equate to saying a gay Christian just shouldn’t be gay (from Anne’s post Why is being gay a sin?). Can we look at the issue seriously and not just say “because the Bible said so”. I know that, but that often doesn’t change a person’s behavior or attitude.
- How do we fulfill Hebrews 10:25 online? Can we fulfill Hebrews 10:25 through only online means?
- Can we effectively fellowship with others online? I have gotten to know quite a few people online I have never met in person?
- What about those church-a-phobics (that would be the opposite of church-a-holics)? How do you get people in the building when they highly dislike (hate) the thought of “going to church” but will engage online?
- What intentional steps do we take to move from online fellowship to discipleship? Are we being intentional about the steps we take to pull people to our online venues in the name of Christ?
These are just a few, but serious questions to me, and quite personal. I have asked myself these and many other questions for many many years and I will continue to try to find where technology fits into God’s kingdom. It is not just something the church can ignore, or misuse. In some respects, it is the future of the Church. Thoughts?
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It usually gets to be about this time of year when I start dreaming about being some place warmer where the days are not 50-60* and gloomy (yes I know if you live anywhere farther north than the deep south 50 is not cold, but it is to us). One of our favorite spots to go this time of year is the Florida Keys. We have made more than a dozen trips down there over the years but a few years ago we did something different and road our motorcycles from Auburn Alabama to Key West Florida.
You may be saying big deal, who cares, but if you have never ridden a bike, or haven’t ridden more than about 50 miles at a time on a bike, it was a pretty big deal to us. It is about 850 miles from here to there, and by car, usually takes us two days if we stop in Orlando. That means long driving time in short light, and cold. It was a great trip, and goal achieved, but one of the best and most memorable trips we have taken down to the keys (other than this one). We didn’t make it all the way to Orlando the first night, and we only made it to Islamorada the second night, so it was a whole lot of very sore riding by the time we made it to Key West, but a memory I wouldn’t trade for anything.
So there are a few shots done with a point-n-shoot a few years ago, one while I was riding next to Deb while she was on her Honda Shadow VLX 600. I was riding a Honda Nighthawk 750 at the time and loved to take pics of Deb while she was riding (of course). We took many trips on these two motorcycles but this one trip to the Florida Keys was one of our favorite, and in one of our favorite spots in the country.
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Today we went to see the #6 Auburn Tigers vs #10 Tennessee Vols basketball game, which drew an all time record crowd of 12,067 fans. This was the largest crowd to see a basketball game in Beard-Eaves Memorial Coliseum ever in its current configuration. Listed as a maximum as a 10,500 feet arena, it was certainly the largest crowd I have ever seen at a basketball game here in Auburn, and oh, did I mention, it was the woman’s basketball team.
This was actually the first woman’s basketball game we had been to in all the years of going to games, and at a time when the men’s basketball team is lucky to have a crowd of 5,000 show up, the woman played a fantastic game, shot well, made free throws, and overall totally impressed the over 12,000 people that showed up for the game.
At the beginning of the game that had a moment of silence for Kay Yow, the North Carolina State’s Hall of Fame women’s basketball coach who won more than 700 games died on Saturday of breast cancer at the age of 66. The first photo was of one of the woman holding up the warmup shirt they all wore today that said Kay Yow. It was a great game that left the Auburn Tigers still undefeated for the season with a 84-68 win.
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So today I went to see Defiance the Movie. This was the story about the Bielski partisans a group of Polish Jews that came together for common protection and to oppose the German occupation of their homeland. I won’t give the story line away here in this post but it reminds me that those in my generation can not even begin to comprehend sacrifice, pain, and suffering that took place in the world in the early 1940′s in WWII.
I had never heard of or read anything about or known anything about the Bielski partisans group before today. A group that lived in the German forest for several years until the war ended. Most of us who live in the free world will never have to understand or deal with loss like these people. Never have to make decisions they had to make. Here are a few pics from the movie (all images of course are copyright of Paramount / Vantage VIP).
Regardless of the movie’s historical accuracy compared to the theatrical take, it made me more aware of what happened around 1941-1943 and promted me to look up information about the Bielski family and how they survived.
Often, at least in the U.S., we take our freedom for granted. We successfully transferred political power last week from President Bush to President Obama. No one was executed, no one was exiled, and whatever the problems we face in this country, we are still free.
Free to learn
Free to make our own decisions
Free to speak
Free to travel where we choose
Free to disagree
Free to write our own opinion
Free to create
Free to marry who we choose
Free to vote
Free to worship how we choose
Freely created,
Equal in God’s sight.
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This was an extremely busy week again but today is finally Friday and time for Friday Feet. Today we drove out to Chewacla State Park to ride our bikes on the trails (paved that is). Is you live near Auburn this is a great gem right out of town, has a nice river, waterfall, and fishing lake. Along with a very nice route around the river, there is a bike trail just at the entrance of the park which is a popular running and biking spot. It was nice to get some exercise outside now that we are deep into winter, but it ended up being about 70* today and made for a nice bike ride.
We stopped at the lake to sit on the swing, which made for my Friday feet post today. I was able to work a little panning technique into the shoot today with Deb on the swing. I love the effect of motion but it isn’t all that easy to pull off and make it look half way decent. You can do this in a number of different situations, I just forget to give it a try sometimes.
No body else has jumped on the Friday Feet bandwagon yet, but I have found that it has forced me to look at different ways to do this weekly (short) shoot. It isn’t that each Friday has to be something spectacular, it just keeps me thinking about how to keep creating original ideas. It helps to have a nice mild day in winter.
