T.O.

So, the Dallas Cowboys wide reciever is back in the media spotlight again. This is a fairly rare occasion where something in the sports world is quite blog-worthy. Most of the time it'd be like: "Why do the Cardinals always blow it in September/October" or something. But really, there's not many lessons there except that maybe our payroll should be higher because our tickets certainly are. Ok, i'm done.

It was reported on Wednesday that T.O. had attempted suicide. It's come out now that it's been a misunderstanding and that Owens simply took some suppliments with his pain pills, and it was not a good combination. This came out in the press conference he held yesterday. His publicist who discovered Owens "groggy" called 911 and the Dallas P.D. ruled this a suicide attempt, but they've now gone to "accidental overdose". But here's the kicker...

During the conference his publicist said: "He's got 25 millions reasons to live." Referring to the 25mil that T.O. will make with the Cowboys. Wow.

So I wonder, how many of us are simply living to amass a bigger pile of stuff? A bigger bank account? A better care? Better stuff, and more stuff? Wow, she really hit the nail on the head. That reasoning is amazing, his money justifies his existence.

Well, I guess i'll stop blogging now, as I don't have as many reasons to live as T.O.

(thats not a cry for help, simply an observation according to Owen's publicist's logic. Try saying it yourself, it really makes it more ridiculous.)

MuteMath

What up,

MuteMath's album is available for download on iTunes. 20 songs for $11.99. Not bad! These guys are seriously unbelievable. My friend Brad (BB) has a post about facebook, which we talked about at Youth on Sunday night. So me and give had a good conversation, as did the youth group. So, hopefully some good stuff comin up.

Peace

The Dude Store

Sorry for the lack of a title, i'm not feeling very creative.

Right now i'm sitting in my living room....AND using my computer. Wireless is a beautiful thing. I really don't understand how this all works. So now I can go to Bread Co. and look trendy like everyone else! Plain Bagel with cream cheese, and a side of street cred please!

I saw Jet Li's Fearless over the weekend. It really wasn't that great.

My cell phone is having more trouble. Looks like ANOTHER go around with Cingular. I should be a pro at that junk.

Ok, I just thought of a topic.

Recently, I bought a pair of "close-toed" shoes. For those of you that know me, you know that I wear flip flops a lot, thanks to my bro-bro Adam. The reason this is a big deal is because my feet are huge.

I've actually have people I don't know commenet publicly on the size of my feet. What happens when you have big feet (size 14-15) is that NOBODY carries your size. In the Journey's catalogue they don't even make my size in lots of brands.

I walk into Champs and ask for the big 1-5's, and the guy either laughs at me or takes me to this little room with like, 3 pairs of shoes in it. The shoes are all verbatim copies of Magic Johnson's 1988 high tops. It's terrible.

Also, my head is rather large. I can never find a hat that fits. Trying to buy a hat is pretty much the same thing as buying shoes.

So here's my proposal: The Dude Store. Stuff for small dudes, and stuff for big dudes. Some guy comes in looking for size 11's: "Sorry sir, you can find those at ANY OTHER SHOE STORE ON THE PLANET. NOW GET OUT!!!! GO ON, YOU AVERAGE MALE, GO!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Let's give the marginalized disproportionate consumer a home, a place just for them.

Here's to Foot Locker for carrying size 14 Puma's.

OnLine Dating Tips?

Hey, I have one...

TALK TO PEOPLE IN FREAKING PERSON! (ironically, this is posted on my blog....whatever)

Wasn't online dating an alternative for people who needed tips in dating? Now there's tips for online dating? Whew. What are we comin to folks. The only TRUE success story of online dating is Me and Sarah. Seriously.

http://personals.yahoo.com/us/static/dating-advice_first-date

Sunday at youth group we're talking about the dangers of the world wide web and the ability to create your own lil' identity, and this article reflects that.
























































































by the way, I was kidding about me and Sarah. just makin sure. ok, it's really late.

Funny Error

So here's an article about Veggie Tales on NBC:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060922/ap_en_tv/tv_veggietales_flap (sorry, my link button isn't working)

But the interesting part to me isn't the article neccessarily (sp?) check out this last part:

"If NBC is so concerned about that four-letter-word God, then they shouldn't have taken `VeggieTales'," he said.

FOUR LETTER WORD! HA!

I've got 4 words for you- Peace out.

One More Thing...

Hey, last post was my 100th post! Yippee! I guess thats something to celebrate. So here's to scores more entries with quirky insight and poor spelling.

Saw Jet Li's "Fearless" today. It was entertaining but I wouldn't rush out to see it.

I wish teleportation was possible.

Seein Shane & Shane tommarow. Sweet!

Peace.

I'M RICH BABY!

Alright, after posting a couple little puny ones...it's time to dig in. Get those mouses ready.

Time magazine's headline reads: "Does God Want You to Be Rich? Yes, say some megachurches. Others call it herasy. The debate over the new gospel of wealth."

Now I think before any discussion of this takes place, we should note that Time magazine wants to make money. They do this by selling magazines. They sell those by creating stories that people want to read. People don't want to read boring stories, they want to read controversial ones. So the joke of "subjective journalism" is that Time won't provide a balanced, rational smattering of the issue. They want to get people's attention and make money. I'll admit, it worked. At Dierberg's on Sunday I saw the cover, and bought it without hesitation. Shame on me. You know what I thought first? "Oh, this is nice blog material!" (sigh)

That being said, the article was actually not to bad. But to see scripture quoted in the little tables within the article was just kinda funny. They provided 5 verses "for" and "against" God wanting his people to be wealthy.

So they talk to Joel Osteen, who just looks way to perky. This dude's church bought out THE ARENA WHERE THE HOUSTON ROCKETS USED TO PLAY. "The Summit" as they call it, is freaking huge. Huge. Ridiculously huge. So, can Joel claim God's blessing because of the monetary supplication?

Joel actually doesn't say what you think he's gonna say. I'll bet Time was kind of dissapointed: "I think God wants us to be prosperous. I think he wants us to be happy. I think he wants us to enjoy our lives. I don't think i'd say God wants us to be rich." This is somewhat contradictory to a parishoner (sp?) of Joel's that Time begins the interview with. Homedude said God promised him a six-figure job and 25 acre house. Whew.

Anyways, they use Rick Warren as a counterpoint if you will. Mr. Purpose does a good job of refuting the "prosperity gospel" that Time is investigating. At one point, they use people like Joyce Meyer to illustrate "Prosperity Lite" which I thought was pretty funny.

So scripture is taken as a one sentance absolute and qutoed, people are interviewed and the article was fairly balanced. I guess it did a good job of inspiring thought, in me and a couple folks at church anyway. So, good job time.

Let's tackle this ourselves shall we?

Really, to me the whole thing centers around what you consider "wealth" to mean. In a minute, i'll rephrase that with the same intent. It's that simple. I don't know many rational people who believe that becoming a Christian means you won't ever struggle financially. While we're at it, "being saved" doesn't exactly "save" you from sickness, grief, pain, lonliness, or bad spelling.

I love what author Donald Miller says about looking for formulas in the Bible, about finding absolutes that certainly apply to humanity forever. Miller points out that in his quest to write the perfect Christian self-help book he looked for formulas, but most of the ones he discovered wouldn't really work. Consider Stephen (Acts chapter 7), who became a Christian and was stoned to death. Was Stephen stoned to death with "ice in his grill" as the kids might say?

Joyce Meyer says: "Who would want something where you're miserable, broke and ugly and you have to muddle through until you get to heaven?" Paul might. I'll bet it wasn't real fun in jail, or being beaten.

Time quotes John 10: 10: "Then Jesus said...'I have come that they may have life, and have it more abundantly'." Well, the issue then is what you consider 'abundant'. One dude in the article thinks it's 25 acres and a dream house. Joyce Meyer has a helicopter I think. Rick Warren has sold so many books he doesn't get a salary from Saddleback, and paid back all the salery he's ever recieved. Dang. Are they more blessed than you and me? Does God love them more? Are they worth more to God so they are literally, fiscally worth more than us? Could anyone REALLY believe that? Isn't ABUNDANT life- Life with Christ himself? Isn't that enough? Living the way Christ calls us to live leads to abundant life, and may in fact be incongruent with monetary abundance.

While we're at it, doesn't Jesus explicitly say that we're not to work to simply acquire a huge pile of things, where theives can steal and moth can destroy? Doesn't that sort of life make little of what God thinks of us? Doesn't Jesus deal with rich folks who love their stuff so much that it seperates them from God's love? While i'm thinking about it, crap! How much do I do that?

Honestly, I thought we were over this whole prosperity stuff once The Prayer of Jabeaz craze finally died. The notion that God will shower his people with Mercedes Benzs (thats hard to say) the more they love him is absurd. Once we try to proportionalize God's love with our bank accounts, it's a big mess.

(Ok, my attempt to be thoughtful and well-spoken is over. At this point in the blog, if you'd like to move on to another internet task, please do. If you want further musing, please, proceed.)

Yet, as much as i'm sittin here goin off, I do the same thing. I compare my church's facilities and our youth group attendance to others all the time. I'm typing this on my expensive laptop, in a nice apartment, in a VERY afluent area of St. Louis County. So what do I know about financial hardship?

Something that's stuck with me for years is one time when Me and my Dad were at a stoplight in Cape Girardeau. We were behind this shiny, black, brand new Mercedes. Man, this thing was clean. The only adornment other than shiny chrome was a rainbow bumper sticker that read: "Jesus Is Lord!". Thats a lot easier to say when you're drivin a Benz isn't it? To me, that person would have been very wealthy to afford that car. But most people around the world would consider ME to be the wealthy one. So the joke of all of this American Prosperity Gospel stuff is that maybe we ARE blessed more than we realize and aren't doing what we should in our position.

Time grossly mis-interprets the parable of the Talents, which to me harkens back to the Abrahamic covenant. (I hope I phrased that right) Where we are blessed, to be a blessing. Not to admire our pile of stuff. To whom much is given, much is expected. So the more you've got, the more you've got to do with it. Thats how I make peace with being so well off. Again, it's all relative. To lots of people in my area, i'm a pauper. But thats not the case at all.

Really, we're only scratching the surface. Too often we're so obsessed with the QUANTITY as opposed to the QUALITY. We want numbers, and conrete evidence that we're crankin out disciples baby. But thats just not how it works. So in guarding against prosperity gospel, we can't speak out against one but then evaluate ministries worth by how many new baptisms we have. But then at the same time, God certainly doesn't want LESS baptisms does he? AAARRRGGGG so many questions. Alright, I guess i'm done. Maybe more soon, maybe not. My Dad says i've got to much time on my hands. Maybe he's right.

Hey, if anyone knows about a used Benz, i'm in the market.


















-I hope you caught the irony there, cause I was layin it on pretty thick.

My Dream

You know the celebration baseball players do after a walk off home run? Thats what I want someday. Maybe after I get married on the way to the car or something. We can tape it and replay it in slow-mo with "chariots of fire" in the background.

http://sports-ak.espn.go.com/mlb/recap?gameId=260918119

Time Magazine Cover

Hello all my prosperity gospel soon to be millionaires.

Check out the TIME magazine cover this last week....exciting material! Coming soon.

A/C

after MONTHS of wondering why my room was so hot...I have discovered the air conditioning vent was closed. *sigh*

it is now open.

Ok, i'm back

Buffalo Wild Wings was very tasty by the way. 50cent boneless wings should be a holiday. Anways, back to the hating game.

It's so easy to just tear down rather than build up! I think a lot of times people my age, shoot, maybe any age, get discouraged or just plain cynical because we don't see an anvenue of change. Thats pretty much what Mayer is talking about in "Waiting for the World to Change" it's just much catchier than this blog.

You turn on the news, you see all the crap thats going on in the world. You go to church or any committee meeting and just see how the way we do things is so warped and petty. You watch specials on global warming and feel guilty about driving a car. You watch documentaries of sweat shops and look at your shoes, realizing you're part of the cycle. Thats a lot of guilt!

So what is there to do?

You gotta control what you can, which is yourself. It's easy to sit on the couch and bag on the administration for our country being at war, but what about the anger in our hearts against people we know? Thats the same thing that leads to war, just on a tiny tiny level ya know?

Ok, segway.

See, there's a lot of feelings out there about getting people into church. Creating "Worship +1" Christians, as in they're in worship for an hour plus something else for an hour. I work at a church, I want people there too! But I think we're missing the point because, and PLEASE pardon the late 90's phrase here...but Jesus calls us to be 24/7 Christians. I really am sorry to say 24/7, but there it is. This to me is how the church has warped the gospel...get people into a building for two hours and we guess things will get better.

Jesus didn't just complain about the system, he challenged it with his actions. He was the change he saught. So while it's easy yak about whats wrong with this or that....who cares until you do something? So what exactly do you do? Live it. Live the way Jesus calls us to. Easy to say, hard to do. It takes time and can't be boiled down and discected for an hour on FOX News.

I think our culture really exaults talking heads. I mean look at Bill O'Reily or if you wanna go to the other extreme Al Franken. Those dudes just talk about stuff. Big deal. Roger Ebert critiques movies. Why doesn't he make one and we'll see how good it is? See what i'm sayin? We put attach all this esteem and authority into what these dudes have to say. Ugh. Even now as i'm bagging on dudes that just talk about stuff...while in actuality it's ironic because I'M just talking about stuff! aaarrrggg!

Alright, this has been a ramble. Hopefully there's something in there for you guys. It's midnight and i'm doing laundry. I'll try and be more coherrant next time!

Lessons from Desperado

Hello all my Antonio Banderas loving blog people.

In high school, one of my favorite movies and I guess still a favorite was Desperado. Antonio is simply the man. I know its violent and graphic and there's over 80 deaths (we counted) any movie that features a rocket launcher guitar case pretty much gets a free pass for me.

There was however a nugget of truth in the midst of machismo- a quote from the mariachi himself:

"You know it is easier to pull a trigger than to play the guitar. Easier to destroy than create."

I really like that. A lot of times on the blog and just in my life in general i'll go on rants about how lame stuff is. Or i'll see a movie and just rip it apart. I can be VERY critical of lots of things- music, other people's habits, and especially church.

But isn't what Antonio said true? It IS easier to hate than to participate.

I can blast guys like Stephen Curtis Chapman for all the cheese, but what have I done? How many lives have I touched with music?

Go to the mall and listen to people, observe them. There's all sorts of material there. People are so shallow, so superficial, just plain funny. But how is THAT a good use of my efforts?

Just the other day I lambasted (sp? is this even a phrase? I think I heard it somewhere...) street signs. Ultimately...who cares what I think! I've never tried to name a street, i'll bet its hard. I still wouldn't have picked Thunderhead Canyon...but whatever.

So if you go to RelevantMagazine.com and read some articles critiquing society or the church it's real easy to become cynical. I touched on it in the John Mayer interview. It's easy to say "the fight ain't fair" but it's never gonna be.

Ok, time to go eat Boneless Buffalo Wings for 50cents...but more later!

Discovery

So i'm cleaning out the office today...and what do I come across:

CARMEN, THE ABSOLUTE BEST CD. It's from 1993. Carmen was my first concert, in first grade while my parents were doing youth group in Centralia. This is truely a treasure.

Emails

So, I read The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard. I'm currently reading The Great Omission. The author is a professor at USC. Universities have staff directories...I could get his email address! So at the risk of looking like some sort of stalker, I emailed him...and...HE EMAILED ME BACK THE SAME DAY! COOL!

*note, I have officially entered a new era of nerd-dom

New Albums

Downloaded two new albums this week: Audioslave and John Mayer.

First, Audioslave. Here's a good example of the dichotemy that is a new album. If they just keep doing their thing, people will say that it's just the same album, a la Jack Johnson or worse, AC/DC. At the same time, those people would also hate on them if they switched their style up totally. Personally, I think Audioslave has a good thing going and on Revelations it keeps rolling. I think the shoe is fitting, so what if I can't tell a huge difference from the other two albums. Thats a good thing because I like the other two albums a lot. Tom Morrello is the ultimate mad scientist guitar player. The bass player has a lot of tatoos. Cornell's voice should have been gone like, before I was born. So another standard album, which is good because the standard is high.

Second, and less listened to, John Mayer's Continuum. I just downloaded it like, 20 minutes ago. But i've heard the single for a couple weeks now; "Waiting on the World to Change". Check out some of the lyrics:

me and all my friends
we're all misunderstood
they say we stand for nothing and
there's no way we ever could
now we see everything that's going wrong
with the world and those who lead it
we just feel like we don't have the means
to rise above and beat it

so we keep waiting
waiting on the world to change
we keep on waiting
waiting on the world to change

that's why we're waiting
waiting on the world to change
we keep on waiting
waiting on the world to change

I believe Ghandi said "You must be the change you seek" which i've heard my good friend BB say more than once. So, I don't really think you can wait on the world to change. Thats a copout. Thus, I disagree with the first track on the album, but it still sounds cool. More on it soon.

Various Things

1. Finished The Divine Conspiracy. Dang. Actually, it was a book on tape, after which I purchased the normal book format. Just to give you an idea of how good it was....Dallas Willard himself narrated. A 60-some year old professor, not exactly James Earl Jones, or the chick from The Nanny. But his content was good enough to where his very normal, but very boring voice did not cause me to veer off the road in a narcoleptic fit.

2. Finished Traveling Mercies by Anne Lomott. It was ok. I would have liked her better before reading Donald Miller. She was funny and cussed some, which kept things interesting.

3. Picked up The Great Omission. By the aformentioned Dallas Willard. Dude, whats up with the fruit?

4. Had an AWESOME weekend in Kansas City. Maxin and relaxin with the fam- special lady friend included. It was my first time home without Harley which was sad. However it was nice to have people that love you enough to have cold Dr. Peppers waiting for you when you roll up.

5. John Mayer's new album comes out next week. It's been speculated by various magazine's that he and Jessica Simpson are now an item. I somehow see a connection between a new record and new relationship buzz, but we won't even get into that. What I WILL get into is my John Mayer theory. You see, John Mayer could never date Jessia Simpson. He would explode for overloading his coolness capacity. It is in fact, physically impossible for one man to be that cool. He is a handsome fellow (disputed by some, but whatever) He is maybe the greatest musician of my generation- he can sing, but lots of people can do that. He can play, lots of people do that, although not nearly as well as him. But he can WRITE, so well. HE DOES ALL THREE SO FREAKING GOOD! COME ON MAN, SAVE SOME TALENT FOR THE REST OF US! So, dating Jessica Simpson would simply be more cool than any single man could handle. It's as simple as that. Mark my words, if they start dating he will disintigrate.

6. Sorry for referencing the cover of People magazine. I normally don't do that, but in the check-out line at Dierbergs, I just can't resist sometimes.

7. Audioslave's new album came out this week. Gotta check that out.

8. One more time, check out the new blog site. I think in 5 years this will be the premier way of doing lots of things. So, even if this doesn't "take off" we're gonna keep truckin!

Peace.

Book Club

Hiyo!

So, last night was the first assembly of Adam's Book Club. I know the name is a big narcisistic, and I know I probably spelled that wrong, but how else could I emulate my idol....Oprah?

It was cool. Some snackage, great group of students, and a great book. I think this will work out quite well. I can't believe I get paid to talk about cool things with high school students.

Now, at this point you might be thinking...."Gosh Adam, I wish I could be as cool as you; Or at least be in your book club."

WELL GUESS WHAT?!?!?!? YOU CAN!

http://www.adamsbookclub.blogspot.com

Do it! Buy the book! Let's wallow in literacy together! Blog people unite!

Seriously, check it out. One more time:

Go Here.

Nothing like a little shameless self promotion eh?

More soon. Peace.