I'm resentful...

I HATE this. I don't want to talk about this, but I'm so angry that I HAVE to write this down somewhere. And "here" happens to be the best place.

The United Pentecostal Church International is in a state of flux right now. During General Conference '07, a vote took place that effectively changed the bylaws of the UPCI to allow for advertising (and apparently broadcasting) on television. The vote was extremely close. While there are plenty of opinions as to how it was handled (some think there were some underhanded decisions, while others think it was completely above-board), I won't discuss that here. That's for another time...

The aftermath of the vote has been horrid. Ministers threatening to turn in their membership cards, other ministers trumpeting "victory". Stupid... I am not a card-carrying member of the UPC, but my father was and I am a minister myself, so I feel like anything that affects the ministry affects me.

More after the jump.

What is frustrating is that we (ministers in general) are being forced to "take sides" in this unnecessary feud. If we don't threaten to turn in our cards or throw our FULL support behind the more conservative group that is on the verge of leaving the organization, then we are branded as liberals. I resent that. If we join with this small group of conservatives who desire to break off, we are branded as conservative troublemakers. I resent that.

Why do we have to decide? I may or may not agree with the outcome of the vote, but I shouldn't have to be drawn into this feud. The vote didn't say if we DON'T advertise on television, we have to leave the organization. It simply made that option available to us. For some, it will be utilized. For others, it will not.

This entire diatribe frustrates me to no end. To the ministers of the UPC - if you don't like it, vote to change it! If it doesn't work out the way you wanted it (either way), don't leave the organization. We're a group of people with differing viewpoints on many things, but the things that unites us are our views on the Gospel, the New Birth, baptism in Jesus' Name, and the Oneness of God. Why throw away fellowship with those who believe the truth of the Name of Jesus because of a silly thing like this?

I am not a far-left liberal and I am not a hard-line conservative. I am middle-of-the-road, as are MANY ministers in our fellowship. We are the ones who will be hurt by this. If we stay with the organization while many conservatives leave, we suddenly become the hard-line conservatives. If we go with those that leave, we'll be considered by many of them to be liberals. There is no place for moderates in this stupid debate.

I resent it... I don't have a good answer other than to say that it is childish to threaten to leave if something doesn't go your way. Stay and fight for what you believe. If corruption in leadership is the problem, change it. Leaving is not at all the answer.

I resent it all and I cannot say enough how unnecessary all of this is.

Sorry for the rant... Just feeling more than a little resentful right now.

Read more!

Wait... Here's more!!

Ok, now we've gone too far... We're afraid to use the "o"-word to describe our kids now??? God forbid the kids realize they need to lose a little weight. When I was a child, I went to a (gasp!) WEIGHT DOCTOR... I wonder why they sent me there? Could it be I was FAT??? :) Oddly enough, he didn't help much. I'm still very much the "o"-word.

Come on, out with it. Let's just call it what it is. I am one BIG OL' BOY! I can and will fix it, but right now I'm just plain fat... No gettin' around that. No, wait, let's say I'm "horizontally challenged" or "at risk". That won't hurt my feelings as much. Maybe, but it sure won't get to the root of the problem. Good grief! This politically correct mess is going waaaay overboard.

If you're wondering what I'm ranting about and haven't bothered to click on the title of this post, here's the article from foxnews.com in full...

---

Experts Debate Labeling Kids Obese

Monday, July 03, 2006

CHICAGO — Is it OK for doctors and parents to tell children and teens they're fat? That seems to be at the heart of a debate over whether to replace the fuzzy language favored by the U.S. government with the painful truth — telling kids if they're obese or overweight.

Labeling a child obese might "run the risk of making them angry, making the family angry," but it addresses a serious issue head-on, said Dr. Reginald Washington, a Denver pediatrician and co-chair of an American Academy of Pediatrics obesity task force.

"If that same person came into your office and had cancer, or was anemic, or had an ear infection, would we be having the same conversation? There are a thousand reasons why this obesity epidemic is so out of control, and one of them is no one wants to talk about it."

The diplomatic approach adopted by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and used by many doctors avoids the word "obese" because of the stigma. The CDC also calls overweight kids "at risk of overweight."

Those favoring a change say the current terms encourage denial of a problem affecting increasing numbers of U.S. youngsters.

Under a proposal studied by a committee of the American Medical Association, the CDC and others, fat children would get the same labels as adults — overweight or obese.

The change "would certainly make sense. It would bring the U.S. in line with the rest of the world," said Tim Cole, a professor of medical statistics at the University College London's Institute of Child Health.

The existing categories are convoluted and "rather ironic, since the U.S. leads the world in terms of obesity," Cole said. "There must be an element of political correctness."

The debate illustrates just how touchy the nation is about its weight problem.

Obese "sounds mean. It doesn't sound good," said Trisha Leu, 17, who thinks the proposed change is a bad idea.

The Wheeling, Ill., teen has lost 60 pounds since March as part of an adolescent obesity surgery study at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

"When you're young, you don't understand what obese means," Leu said. "I still don't understand it."

The CDC adopted the current terms in 1998, using weight-to-height ratios and growth charts from a generation of children much slimmer than today's.

Children are said to be "at risk for overweight" if their body-mass index is between the 85th and 94th percentiles. They're "overweight" if their body-mass index is in the 95th percentile or higher — or greater than at least 95 percent of youngsters the same age and gender.

Many pediatricians understand the first category to mean "overweight" and the second one to mean "obese," said the CDC's Dr. William Dietz. He said the word "obese" was purposely avoided because of negative connotations but conceded that many pediatricians find the current language confusing.

Adding to the confusion is the fact that about 17 percent of U.S. children are in the highest category, and that almost 34 percent are in the second-highest category. That sounds like a mathematical impossibility, but it's because the percentiles are based on growth charts from the 1960s and 1970s, when far fewer kids were too fat.

In children, determining excess weight is tricky, partly because of rapid growth — especially in adolescence — that can sometimes temporarily result in a high body-mass index.

For children in at least the 95th percentile, high BMI "is almost invariably excess fat," Dietz said. But there's less certainty about those in the second-highest category. So to avoid mislabeling and "traumatizing" kids, the CDC chose to be diplomatic, Dietz said.

The committee, set up by the American Medical Association, involves obesity experts from 14 professional organizations including the American Academy of Pediatrics. Their mission is to update recommendations for prevention, diagnosis and management of obesity in children.

Final recommendations are expected in September, and the participating groups will decide individually whether to adopt them.

Dr. Ronald Davis, the AMA's president-elect, said it's unclear whether the expert committee can develop a consensus on the obesity terms.

"There are seemingly legitimate arguments on both sides," said Davis, a preventive medicine specialist with Henry Ford Health System in Detroit.

Maria Bailey of Pompano Beach, Fla., whose 12-year-old daughter, Madison, is self-consciously overweight, opposes the proposed change. She said their pediatrician has told her daughter to exercise more and see a nutritionist, but "hasn't told her that she's in a (weight) category."

"We're already raising a generation of teenagers who have eating disorders," Bailey said. "I think it would just perpetuate that."

Paola Fernandez Rana of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., has a 9-year old daughter who at 40 pounds overweight is considered obese. Rana said doctors "refer to it as the 'o-word' " in front of her daughter "in an effort not to upset her."

"They very clearly told me she was obese," Rana said. But she said she agreed with the term and thinks that at some point it should be used with her daughter, too.

"Obviously I don't want my daughter to be overweight, but ... in order to change the situation, she is ultimately going to need to hear it," Rana said.

Dr. Michael Wasserman, a pediatrician with the Ochsner Clinic in Metairie, La., agreed. Using the term "at risk for overweight" is misleading, creating the perception "that I'm only at risk for it now, so I don't have to deal with it now," said Wasserman, who is not on the committee.

"There's a tremendous amount of denial by parents and children," he said.

Chicago pediatrician Rebecca Unger, also not a committee member, said she likes using the term "at risk for overweight" because it gives patients hope that "we can do something about it."

Read more!

The most outrageous idiocy I've seen in a while...

Found this on foxnews.com today. The sheer numbers of cases like this are truly sickening me. In such a feverish clamor to placate the masses, we are rapidly taking away EVERY right Christians have to express their own beliefs. Seems everyone else has a right to express theirs... What's wrong with this picture??? Read on...

---

Spiritual Skating

Sunday, July 02, 2006
By Scott Norvell

Back to School
September 19, 2005
The New York Division of Human Rights is clamping down on a privately owned roller-skating rink that has advertised a "Christian skate time" on Sunday afternoons, according to the Times-Herald Record, claiming that the marketing ploy is discriminatory.

Skate Time 209 in Accord, N.Y., advertised the Sunday skate just as it has "tot skates," "tween skates," family nights and adult disco parties. But when the Christian advertisement appeared in the local weekly paper, officials in Albany sent the rink's owners a cease-and-desist note.

A "Christian skate denies or at a minimum, discourages non-Christian patronage," the letter said.

The skating rink changed its ad to refer to "spiritual skate times" on Sundays, but insisted that "Christian" referred only to the type of music played during the sessions. No one was discriminated against, its owners said.

Read more!

Almost five months without an update... WOW!

Well, folks... It's been a long, long time since I've posted anything here. Approaching FIVE MONTHS! Obviously, I've been really busy. No really good excuses, just doing other things.

Anyway, I'm feeling the need to start posting more often. I'm considering a change of format, however. I will possibly begin with a podcast in February. I have all kinds of pro audio stuff and haven't ever done a podcast. So that must change... I hope you'll enjoy it.

So check back again soon... See ya then!

Read more!

Here's a tree that fell right beside the house. Thankfully, we were spared any damage to the building.

Read more!

Unforgettable Katrina

Devastation in New Orleans

Guys and girls - I have never seen such devastation. I'm sure many of the men and women of the Armed Forces have had occasion to see destruction on this scale, but never on our own land. The pictures and footage I have seen, the stories I have heard and read are almost too unthinkable to be believed.

I know you have heard and seen so much already about the hurricane and her aftermath, but the effects are only beginning to be seen...

It has been said that the costs to the insurance companies will be as much as $25-50 BILLION. But the cost in morale and lives is so much greater than one could put a monetary value on.

The effects are still being felt here in Jackson, Mississippi, where much of the city is still plunged in darkness and may not regain power for as much as a month in some places. We have been blessed to have to deal only with power outages, as a myriad of others have suffered great loss. Our prayers go out to those who have lost family, friends, and possessions, and to those who are still searching for their loved ones.

I will do my best to keep the blog updated over the next few weeks. Right now, we're doing as little travel as possible, since there is a severe gas shortage here. I traveled around for miles tonight trying to find stations with gas, but to no avail. Only a few stations in the city have gas, and those that do have a three-hour wait or longer. I'll try to post pictures of some of the weirder things as I see them...

Please consider volunteering if you are anywhere near the areas of devestation here in the South. If you are not, consider giving a financial gift to the American Red Cross.

Although we all may not be able to give of our time or our money, we can all say a prayer for the safety of those missing and the quick recovery of things lost in this devastating tragedy.

Read more!

Wow! How time flies!!

Things are going crazy around here!!! It's been fun, but more graphic design work than I can handle (almost)...

It's been a month since I've posted anything worthwhile. But I WILL POST GOOD STUFF SOON!!! I promise... Next week will see some new material.

Check back again soon!

God Bless!

Read more!

On The Road

Well, I'm on my way out of town tonight. Going to do a choir clinic in Louisiana for the rest of the week. Been a while since I've accepted anything like this. I haven't enjoyed doing this kind of thing for quite some time. So it's almost new to me again.

I'll post a little info on how things go soon. Also, I'll be getting back to Chapter 3 of Pure Religion soon. Just really busy and distracted lately.

God Bless!

Read more!

Read more!

Time Is Flying By...

Haven't had much time to update the blog lately. I'll be working on Chapter 3 of Pure Religion and should have it up by the first of next week.

We're in a state of flux waiting for some decisions to be made that will affect our future, so I'm working on graphic design, video production and some audio recording to make some extra money just in case...

Through it all, GOD IS GOOD! I'm seeing some wonderful progress in my personal life and in the lives of some of my family members.

Come check the site out over the next few days. It'll be updated soon. Or you could subscribe to the RSS feed and you'll be notified anytime there is an update. Gotta love technology!

C ya!

Read more!

Worship Team Wisdom

I'm starting a website specifically for worship leaders that deals with worship ministry and will have a great amount of resource materials for those in this specific area of ministry. Visit it in a few weeks when it starts to take form... CoreWorship

Until then, here is an article written by Phil Christensen I found extremely interesting and thought I'd post it.

Ten Secrets of Life I Learned While Leading Praise

After interviewing hundreds of psalmists, I can safely say that worship leaders are a special breed. They nurture the souls of sensitive singers, and encourage brusque sound guys to be…less blunt. They see the gifted drummer within a goofy 9-year-old. Worship leaders sharpen their mastery of Scripture and musical chops in the same week. They calmly walk into meetings where they'll receive near-lethal doses of personal criticism.

Through it all – praise God – these worship leaders will somehow emerge with tender, Davidic hearts. I suspect it’s all part of God’s greater strategy in conforming us to the image of Christ; pressure turns coal into diamonds, and the constant rub of a grain of sand creates a pearl. The unique pressures of a psalmist create a unique kind of perspective and character.

Such “Worship Team Wisdom” probably contains the essence of what we need to know about life; it worked pretty well for King David. Over the years, I’ve repeatedly found myself drawing on principles learned while working with worship teams; I’ll share here my personal top ten bits of Worship Team Wisdom.

There’s only One Person in the audience. There are lots of people out there to please (and some of them are quite insistent). At the end of the day, though, One Person matters most, and His name is Jesus. Seek first His approval. (Mt. 6:33)

Everybody needs to tune to the same pitch. We pass around the tuner every time we gather, and find that this guarantees we’ll be in tune with each other. Similarly, if we’re all in fellowship with God, we’ll also get along together beautifully; our differences simply become rich harmonies. (1 Jn. 1:7)

Sometimes we’re at our best simply because we spent quality time together. An afternoon together as friends can tighten the groove of a bassist and drummer when they play together that evening. God has commanded a blessing when people “dwell together in unity.” (Ps. 133)

All our plans are subject to change. I have yet to experience a worship service, a wedding or a work-week that went exactly as I expected – or wished. Wise people are prepared to bend; they also know that these changes are often directly from the Hand of God. (Pr. 16:9)

How we respond to change is probably more important than whatever we had planned in the first place. When we’re thrown a curve, the way we handle it reveals much – maybe everything – about our character. (Job 1:21)

The song is bigger than the singer. The message we carry is more important than we are. When the cheering masses greeted that donkey at Jerusalem’s gate, he might have felt pretty good about himself, but I doubt he was ever received that way again. Without his Divine Passenger, he was just another donkey. (Jn. 3:30)

The person in charge of your “sound” can help you or destroy you. If your work has to be channeled through someone else, make sure of their competence and character. A lot rides on the shoulders of the middleman. (2 Kg 5:21ff)

We never really leave the platform. The wireless microphone is never truly switched off. Strangers, co-workers, friends and family are observing us every moment of the day. We are – 24/7 – as Paul said, ambassadors for Christ. (2 Co. 5:20)

God often turns our worst mornings into miracles. There are Sundays I step down from the platform thinking I should resign and get a job at Walmart. These are usually the same days someone grabs my hand, and – tearfully – thanks me for leading them into the Presence of God. I don’t know how God transforms my clumsy moments into masterpieces, but I’ve seen Him do it over and over, and not just with music. Trusting that His transforming power is working in us (and often in spite of us) should keep us both humble and confident (Ph. 2:13).

The song might not end exactly as we rehearsed it. Musicians must follow the leader’s cue as he closes a song; life’s that way, too. Sometimes there’s a key change. Sometimes we finish a Cappella. Once in a while, the song even has to be cut off early. Our times are in the skillful hands of the Chief Musician, Whose timing is always perfect. (Jn. 20:22)

God is the Supreme Economist; He never allows one teardrop more than is absolutely necessary to complete the good work He began in us. Along with the pleasures and the pressures of His calling, may we always clearly sense the presence of Him Who is our Wisdom (1 Co. 1:30).

Phil Christensen is worship pastor at Cedar Hills Evangelical Free Church (CHEF) in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He is married to Mitzi, the Beauty Queen, and is father of four great kids. Phil has served as a worship development missionary in the Pacific Northwest and is co-author of two books for Kregal Publishing. You can reach him via email at philc@chefc.com.

Read more!

Pure Religion - Chapter 2

"Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world." - James 1:27

A Common Oversight

As far back as I can remember, I have heard sermons preached that focus on our need to keep ourselves separate from the world. "We are a peculiar people." This is a basic truth and not to be questioned, as it is directly from the Word of God. Indeed, we are admonished in James to keep ourselves "unspotted" from the world.

Many of us labeling ourselves "Christian" have clung to the latter part of James 1:27, priding ourselves in our distinction from the world. However, James was clear that there are two overlapping aspects of pure, undefiled religion.

While the latter part of verse 27 is emphasized, the former part is often overlooked. "To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction..." The "fatherless and widows" here are meant to be types of anyone who is in need of charity or suffers affliction. Matthew Henry observed that the word "visit", in this context, indicates "all manner of relief which we are capable of giving to others." In other words, we are not to just visit those in need, but we are to give whatever assistance is necessary to alleviate the pain and discomfort of those who are afflicted in any way.

Let's imagine for a moment that those of us (I include myself in this) who claim to be "religious" actually exemplified the true definition of "religion". What kind of churches would we have then?

How many times in the past have we looked disapprovingly on someone who entered our sanctuaries looking disheveled, world-weary, or smelling of alcohol and smoke? How many of us have frowned on the crack addicts we have seen roaming the streets late at night looking for another "fix" for their affliction?

On my way to service last Sunday, I passed a cigarette butt laying outside the door to the church. My first reaction was to think, "Great, what are we gonna do about the person with the smoking problem? We'd better get the air freshener ready!" But God spoke to my spirit and caused me to view that situation in a different light.

We really aren't doing our job of reaching the lost until we regularly see cigarette butts, beer bottles, crack pipes and other questionable paraphernalia outside our church doors. We need more churches that have ashtrays outside the doors and the distinct odor of smoke and alcohol in the sanctuary. We need churches that have more seats in the front for the visitors and fewer reserved parking spaces for deacons and VIP's.

"My brethren, have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons. For if there come unto your assembly a man with a gold ring, in goodly apparel, and there come in also a poor man in vile raiment; And ye have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing, and say unto him, Sit thou here in a good place; and say to the poor, Stand thou there, or sit here under my footstool: Are ye not then partial in yourselves, and are become judges of evil thoughts? Hearken, my beloved brethren, Hath not God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him? But ye have despised the poor. Do not rich men oppress you, and draw you before the judgment seats? Do not they blaspheme that worthy name by the which ye are called? If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well: But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors. For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all." - James 2:1-10

We are "guilty of all" if we offend in one point. Wow... what an indictment on the modern-day Church. How can we sit idly by and attend service after service with no one there for the Word of God to reach? Please understand, I am not being sacrilegious. How else do we know we are truly reaching those who are afflicted? Only when we reach the needy and hurting and they become a regular, welcome sight in our churches can we say we're beginning to fulfill the Great Commission.

In my next chapter, we'll cover the attitude the Word of God commands we have toward those in need.

Read more!