betterthanblank

Sunday after church - went to In-n-Out with Chuck, our technical director. Miles tagged along and tried his hand at directing.

At lunch, Miles learned the fine art of dipping french fries in chocolate shake.

Monday, was at the mall & saw this sign, had flashbacks & cold sweats, began salivating, then realized, “oh yeah, I don’t have a 360″.

Macy and I got hungry while Jen was trying on clothes so we went to Mrs. Fields for some fresh chocolate chip cookies. Macy liked them.

Monday we went to Costco on our monthly daipers, wipes, paper towles, tp, and other odds & ends trip. And as luck had it, we got probably the closest parking space there. And I don’t know about your Costco, but there is NEVER a parking place within a half-mile of the store!

So it was strange enough that we got a front row parking place, but when we got back to the Burb, behold another front row space!

Tuesday we went to Lowe’s to check on some tile for our building and ran into Jamianne - Karl’s wife. She’s a faithful Lowe’s employee!

Wednesday night I got to try my hand at Halo 3. Yeah, it pretty much blew my mind.

Today I setup the Matrox Triplehead 2Go and had a 3 monitor desktop 3,072 x 768 (I need it higher, but my side monitors can’t take any higher resolution). From left to right: 15″ MacBook Pro, 15″ screen, 21″ screen, 15″ screen - those are hooked up to my PC.

How was your week?

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Well it’s Thursday night - that means rehearsal. For some reason, I don’t feel like going tonight. It was so nice having last week off…

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Tonight I am having “ministry frustrations”. Do you ever just find yourself in a situation at your job where you are just like, ‘why is this happening’? I’m having one of those moments tonight. Without going into nasty details, basically it’s someone making a mountain out of a molehill (in my opinion - so of course it’s right). It’s just that I think, our jobs are already so complicated and overwhelming, when we add interpersonal conflict, it doesn’t just multiply the stress, it squares it. And when you are in full time, or even part time ministry, stress is something we all need less of. I just don’t get it. But apparently God has a purpose for this in my life, probably to teach me again to eat crow, humble pie, stay teachable, not get proud, not hold on to my area of oversight too tightly, to listen better, to be slow to anger, to be patient, to be loving, to stick to my convictions, to uphold the vision of the church, to not settle for mediocrity, to not allow gossip to get a foothold, to not allow dissension to enter the ranks, to be more like Christ. Not fun, but worth it.One thing I’ve learned is that almost 99% of the time, staff conflict arises because people assign motives to comments, emails, decision, emotions, looks, rumors, plans, etc. Assigning motive, it means you think you know why someone said something, did something, typed something, or was rumored to do any of those. Assigning motive does not allow the other person a fair chance to share their heart. Assigning motive causes you to immediately have a bad attitude towards someone. Assigning motive is not fair because only God knows a persons heart. Assigning motive is dangerous because it tends to create “sides”.

I’ve tried my best to catch myself when I begin to assign motive. I try and tell myself to believe the best - especially about my staff. We are all on the same team, with the same goal, the same vision, the same love, the same God. I try and tell myself, there must be a good reason why they “___________” whatever they did. This helps me stay positive and keeps bitterness out of my life.

Don’t let ministry taint your view of people. God loves everyone, how about you?

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Well it’s September 25th and I didn’t get Halo 3 or DCB Remedy…

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This from REV! Magazine (sept/oct 2007):

Hiring and Equipping a ‘Champion’

• Establish a non-paid or paid role
• Create a ministry description of the role
• Find a person who’s passionate about connecting others into service
• Look for equipping leadership characters
• Resource: www.churchvolunteercentral.com

How to Champion Equips Others

• Build a team around giftedness
• Give people authority
• Listen more, speak less
• Consistently affirm people

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Life has been happening so fast that I failed to blog about Miles’ 5 year old birthday. It was on the 18th. We went to the pizza place down the street and he had a handful of little friends, along with their parents there. He is so blessed because his grandparents and aunts & uncles live real close (except “Uncle James” who lives in Virginia). There’s one thing about Miles; he is loved. Anyway, he had a great time with all his friends and family, eating pizza, playing video games, opening tons of presents, and eating cake.

He has a new fixation with Transformers, and no, he hasn’t seen the movie yet). But he got about 10 or so new Transformers for his birthday, he was stoked to say the least. So that night, I spent about 2 hours removing them from their packaging, and learning (actually, re-learning) how to transform them. Let’s just say mommy and daddy are sick of Transformers now… although I covet the time that I get to spend with my little boy, knowing that someday soon I won’t be his #1 choice person to hang out with. But for now we are best buds and I’ll take all I can get.

So it seems like everybody’s bragging about their kids (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, uh you get the point). So here’s a proud dad on Miles:
Miles is a special little boy - he always has been. He’s the first grandkid, so he gets doded on by both families. He’s always been a happy boy, even as a baby. He was hard, very active, but always happy. His smile melts hearts, his eyes are deep and intense (like his mom’s). People love him, and he attracts people to him. He is so smart, his personality is so outgoing and caring. He loves his sister. He loves God, he loves to sing, to watch mommy or daddy at worship practice. He loves church, and helps daddy tear down each and every Sunday (his choice). He swims like a fish, and eats like a bird. He draws about 20 pictures a day, he probably runs 10 miles a day. He loves his spiky hair, and wants to be just like daddy (that’s scary).

Jen and I love him so much and we pray with him and for him every night. My biggest prayer is that he would allow God to make him all that He has planned for him - he’s got all the potential in the world, and I know God has something very special for his life.

Happy Birthday Miles! You are loved!

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We have a 1997 Chevy Suburban that is on the fritz. What happened is that an O2 sensor went out a few months ago (and yes, the check engine light came on, but that’s another story). Anyway, as a result of the O2 sensor going out, the engine began running to rich, which caused the entire exhaust system to be damaged, including the very expensive catalytic converter. Another result of this problem is that the vehicle now does not get very good gas mileage, and when at idle, it knocks around a bit and runs a little rough. Lastly, somehow this effected one cylinder and now we have a v7 instead of a v8.

What’s very interesting is that as soon as that little $50 O2 sensor started malfunctioning, a little signal was sent to the computer telling it that something was wrong. The computer sent a little signal to this light on my dashboard which when lit up says, “Check Engine”. Know what I did? Procrastinated. I thought, ‘oh, I’ll get to that later, it can’t be that bad - the vehicle still runs’. But here we are today - nobody’s fault but mine (great Led Zep song). All because of a little neglected O2 sensor.

So you are probably already putting this together in your head but here’s what I was thinking about. As a staff in any organization, but especially in a church ministry, we all work together to accomplish the vision. And from the smallest most insignificant person, to the largest and most visible member, we all work in harmony to achieve something. When something goes awry with a less significant staff member, when they are not functioning at full capacity, when their vision strays from the organizations, when their attitudes begin to deteriorate, it begins affecting the entire organization, and can cause some serious damage if not “fixed”.

Another point is that vehicles need maintenance. Same with staff. How important is it for staff members to be constantly learning, to be constantly reminded of the vision, constantly encouraged, challenged, rewarded. And some staff are “higher maintenance” than others, right? But maintenance is still important for the health of the entire staff.

And sometimes parts fail and must be replaced (sometimes if you’re lucky you can replace them before they fail). But think about it, sometimes you just have to replace parts, sometimes they get tired and worn out, sometimes they just plain fail, sometimes they were designed to be somewhere else. As a leader, it’s your job to see what the problem is and fix it. Hopefully your “parts” aren’t wearing out and failing because of your lack of maintenance.

Lastly, sometimes we worry about stuff that is superficial (I am guilty of this). It’s easy to wash the car, clean it out, get it detailed - but neglect the very basic maintenance. Sometimes we get carried away with how ministry looks and completely forget the basics of building relationships, investing in people, holding each other accountable, teaching, training, and having fun.

So some questions I am asking myself are:

• Am I making sure that all the parts are working towards one goal?
• Am I watching for the “Check Engine” light?
• Am I consistently performing maintenance with my staff?
• Am I prepared to change out the failing parts? (and find the right fit for them?)

How’s your vehicle running lately?

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Here’s this weeks confessional - hope you enjoy it!

For those who just read, Karl led the team with Jen and Rose. The Band was Tim on Bass, Rob on A-guitar, Rich on Drums, Karl on E-guitar & Keys. The set was All We Need is You - Hall, Enough - Tomlin/Giglio, Ready Now - Desperation Band, How Great is Our God - Tomlin, Here I am to Worship - by I forget…

How was your weekend?

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I just can’t get comfortable in these new skins, so I am customizing the current theme, and we’ll see how it goes… (plus my wifey didn’t like the last change)

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Today was the second week we’ve used a “confidence projector” (at least that’s what I’ve heard it called). The vocalists love it, I loved it last week when I was leading. It keeps the vocalists heads up and away from music stands (which we’re getting closer and closer to banning). But we quickly learned that depending on it is a serious crutch, and it shouldn’t be an excuse for not knowing or learning a song. Once, last week the operator went to a blank screen in the middle of a song that we didn’t know - Emergency! Luckily the words were visible on the side screens (we were doing “If we are the Body” by Casting Crowns). Today we had power issues and blew the right side of the auditorium like 4 times during sound check. All this got me thinking, ‘are we ready for emergencies?’.

I vaguely remember a post flying around about having a contingency plan for worship, so forgive me for the redundancy (but maybe not). But I put together a littl, or rather large list of items that we should have on hand for that “Oh NO!” moment. I’d love to know if you have a similar list, or if you would add things to it:

• A default worship set to use if: power goes out, band doesn’t show up, computers go down, sound goes down, etc.
  • Lead Sheets, Lyrics saved in computer, Lyrics handouts (in case there are no video screens)
• Lyrics and Lead Sheets on music stands stored behind the stage in case confidence projector goes down, or plain forgetfulness
• Audio/Video Signal flow diagram (this would take time to create, but be invaluable for troubleshooting)
• Extra acoustic guitar
• Extra pack of strings for acoustic, electric, & bass
• Extra sets of drumsticks (or 2!)
• Extra bass guitar (no bass = no drums too!)
• Extra DI boxes (I’m going to stop typing ‘extra’)
• Ground lift plugs
• Gaffers tape
• White board tape
• Guitar stands
• Guitar straps
• Capos
• Drum heads
• Kick pedal (trust me on this one)
• 9V batteries / AA batteries
• Light bulbs (stage lights)
• Projector bulbs
• VGA cable
• DVI to VGA converter (for Mac’s)
• FireWire cables
• XLR cable & ends
• Soldering kit
• Sharpies
• All kinds of RCA to 1/4″, 1/8″ to RCA, and that kind of stuff…
• SVIDEO to SVIDEO plug
• Guitar picks
• DVD’s
• CD’s
• Duct tape

That was my list - I’d say we have about 99% of that stuff. What we really have to work on the worship contingency plan. What about you?

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