Reflections on Lame Repetitive Subject Titles

There have been several threats made against me by certain other bloggers who were offended by my Blog Etiquette post. It appears that I have stepped on the toes of the powerful fatherhood blogger syndicate. I must confess that I initially resisted the thought of bowing to their wishes. When will their tyranny end, my friends? But, then I was persuaded by a few factors. First, I realized that some day, God willing, I too will be a gushing father who will undoubtedly turn this blog into a forum for discussing how perfect my child is. Second, I was convinced that I couldn't stand up to the raw blogging power displayed by the sfb and b-u-r-l-y as well as many others from their cadre. So, I've decided to humbly and wisely confess that it was arrogant and wrong of me to speak against the practice of loving fathers sharing the joy of their children with the rest of cyberspace. What is more, I am convinced that sfb and b-u-r-l-y do indeed have the most beautiful (handsome), intelligent, clean, thoughtful, well-behaved, and well-dressed children in all of bloggerdom. Please accept my sincerest apologies.

Reflections on Travel Craziness

So, we are in the latter half of our crazy travel schedule. The weekend began with a quick drive from Carroll County over to Toledo. We spent the night with our friends Luke and Steph. The next day we headed up to Detroit to hang out with Becky and Jason. After two days of relaxing fellowship, we hit the road again - this time in the opposite direction to Rochester, PA. We attended a wonderful meeting with a church missions committee there. We spent that night back in Carroll County only to get up eight hours later in order to make the seven hour drive out to Chicago. Plain ridiculous.

The past few days we've been spending time with the various Chicago friends whom we haven't seen in a while. Tomorrow and Saturday we'll be busy with Frank and Betsy's wedding! It's going to be pretty awesome.

Reflections on Auto Empowerment

I've never really seen myself as a man's man. I'm not terribly athletic, I don't climb mountains, and I'm not very good at fixing things. So, it was a big step for me to actually learn how to change the oil in my car. For some people, it may seem like a small thing, but I've been forced all my adult life to rely on Jiffy Lube. Yesterday, Kathi's dad opened up their garage pit, and we change the oil on our Honda. It actually wasn't difficult at all. I feel kinda stupid now for having paid someone $30 to do a lousy job of it. You can laugh all you want, but I thought it was pretty cool.

On another note, Kathi and I are hitting the road tomorrow for a speedy trip to Toledo, Detroit, and then PA. We'll be visiting some friends and pounding the pavement for support. After a breif stop back here in Ohio on Monday, we'll be heading out to Chicago then on Tuesday for Frank & Betsy's wedding.

Reflections on Church Membership

This morning I was officially inducted as a member of Christ Community Church here in Dellroy. This is the same church that Kathi's parents have been a part of since children and the congregation in which Kathi grew up in. Now I'm part of the family. It's been awesome getting to know these people, and it's awesome to see church happen in a context besides suburbia. There's more of a sense of community and communal responsibility here than in my previous church experiences.

It also means that I'm a member of a church for the first time in my life. I've always been reluctant to join a church because membership always seemed antiquated to me. What's the point? If you're committed to a body to serve, love, and engage in mission with, why is the legality of membership necessary? I'm still not sure on that issue. Any thoughts? At any rate, I'm now a part of this awesome church body!

Reflections on Guys Night Out

Throughout the past six months or so, I've been craving a guy's night. I drove down to Columbus yesterday to hang out with Brian, whose wife had recently left for a week in California. We were joined by Randy Surface at which point we went to Quaker Steak & Lube for their all-you-can-eat wings night. Since college it's been a tradition to get together with the guys and eat obscene amounts of chicken wings. Unfortunately, we just can't pack'em away like we used to. Regardless, we had some good Louisiana Lickers, and then went back to Brian's place where we talked about politics and the fall of Western Civilization.

After Randy left, Brian and I stayed up till 3 am talking. It was a much needed reconnection, and an encouragement to both of us. Now I have to rejoin the support raising rat race today. But before I leave, I have to get a mandatory Chipotle visit while I'm here in Columbus.

Reflections on Blog Etiquette

So, I have some comments about blogging etiquette. I know that I'm not the best at this, but there should be some unwritten social rule saying that you have to write on your blog at least once a week. If not, what's the point of having a blog anyway? You just continually give your friends and other followers false hopes that you may some day give them a morsel of commentary. Instead your readers fruitlessly run through their blogrolls day after day with no satisfaction.

Therefore, I'm putting the following friends on notice for their delinquency in blog posting: Randy Surface, Sarah Surface, Aaron, Leggett, Matt Riley (come on, what's going on in France, friend?!?), Pastor John Ramer, Chris Lorentz, and Ryan Hofacre! Please, give us something! Anything!

In connection with this complaint, there are certain friends of mine out there that should have blogs but don't. They include: my wife, Brian Flora, Dennis Hoyle, Brian Herman, my dad, Neal Herr, Aaron Salentine (he has a blog, but all he does is post pictures of his baby girl...okay, we get it...you think your kid is cute), Frank Andersen, and Eric Sandberg. Please get to work on that for us.

Reflections on OCEA

So, we finished up our conference today, and it was all together a mixed bag. I'll start with the positive, I guess. We stuck solely to the break out sessions, and there were a few really good ones. We went to one about prison ministries, which was encouraging to hear about how God is redeeming and reconciling even those who are most hardened in life. We also went to an Islam session presented by a Pakistani who came to Christ as a teenager. He had some balanced, love-filled, and intelligent things to say about Christianity and Islam. He gave a wonderful presentation on understanding Muslim and sharing Christ with them.

That session proved to be a stark contrast to the other Islam session we went to. The presenter wasn't an Islam expert (she was a medical doctor who present earlier in the day about the crucifixion), and she was trying to give a biblical explanation as to why the Middle East is the way it is. Unfortunately, she didn't get very far because there was actually a Muslim in the audience who challenged (in many cases, rightly so) most of what she said. As soon as it came out that there was a Muslim in the class, it was like sharks smelling blood in the water. Many well-intentioned believers in the room decided they need to put in their two cents about the misguided nature of Islam - most of their comments not being very intelligent. Kathi and I were slightly embarrassed for the church because of it all.

Then there was the huge gym filled with Christian vendors trying to sell their wares. While much of that stuff I'm sure is helpful, I just couldn't shake the impression that the Church has become all about being a supplier of religious products and services for a Christian consumer culture. Blah. Don't listen to me...I'm just a Communist. On the whole though, it was worth the $35 at least.

Reflections on Christian Conferences

Tomorrow Kathi and I are attending the Ohio Christian Education Association's annual conference. Not really sure how good this is going to be seeing as their keynote speaker is a Christian puppeteer. But, they have around a million break out sessions, so I'm sure we'll find something interesting. Why is it that Evangelicals love conferences? Is it the emphasis in church culture on the "big event?" I never really saw the appeal.

We just found out that Trinity is going to be one of the exhibitors at the conference. Hopefully, it'll be someone from the Admission office that I know so that we can heckle them. Anyway, hopefully this will be good or else I'm going to end up playing Spider solitaire all weekend.