My Worship Revolution

Well, if any of you missed it last month, our Tri To Lose weight loss challenge came to an end over a month ago, which is why you haven’t seen videos of me on the scale every Wednesday anymore.  And for those of you that didn’t watch the final video, here were the final results:

     weigh in:      173.2 lbs
     week1:        168.2 lbs    total loss:  5lbs         
     week2:        166.6 lbs    total loss:  6.6 lbs    
     week3:        163.6 lbs    total loss:  9.6 lbs   
     week4:        165.8 lbs    total loss:  7.4 lbs    
     week5:        164.4 lbs    total loss:  8.8 lbs    
     week6:         ummm…
     week7:        163.2 lbs    total loss:  10 lbs      
     week8:        161.2 lbs.   total loss:  12 lbs      
     week9:        161.2 lbs.   total loss:  12 lbs      
     week10:      160 lbs.      total loss:  13.2 lbs   
     week11:      157.4 lbs.   total loss:  15.8 lbs
     week12:      159.4 lbs.   total loss:  13.8 lbs

     FINAL WEIGH IN:  155.6 lbs.   Grand Total Lost: 17.6 lbs.

In the end, with an extra gift or two and all said and done, Rachel and I raised about $684.00!  (I say about cause there’s a small amount that we still have to calculate and send in cause we forgot about it when we wrote the check.)

Add that to Mr. and Mrs. Transition Pete‘s $186.00 the final Grand Total brought in by Tri To Lose was…
$870.00!!!!

That’s awesome you guys!  Below is a video of me heading up to San Francisco to an Invisible Children screening to give them our part.  But first, a couple of thank you’s to y’all from some of the peeps at Invisible Children:

"What Bobby and his friends are doing is incredible. Taking the stories of the Invisible Children lives and applying it to a physical discipline is what a life change is truly about. Thank you to everyone who helped raise money… I hope that one day you are able to travel to Northern Uganda and see just how far $684 will go on the ground. You are changing lives both near and far! Thank you and God Bless."

-Jason Russell
  Invisible Children founder/filmmaker, in an e-mail

"This is a brilliant idea.  I applaud your sacrifice and ingenuity.  Thank you for such dedication to the invisible children. 
Love wins always,"

-Bobby Bailey
 
Invisible children Founder/ Filmmaker, in a comment left on Tri To Lose intro post

"I wanted to let you know how much you truly ARE blessing Invisible Children.  You are doing exactly what we labor for and more importantly, what God delights in. THANK YOU! And Praise God!  Be encouraged and know that God is really being glorified by your efforts—in Uganda and even within the IC staff.

"[This] blog is spreading around our office and we LOVE it. Please stay in touch with us and keep us updated on your efforts.  Continue praying for Uganda as well."

-Lisa Dougan
  Invisible Children Movement Regional Manager, in an email

I share those mainly because they really are thanks to all of you.  Know that giving to such a worthy cause, even a little bit, can make a difference.  ANd it is appreciated by those receiving it!  Once again, thank you all!!  And don’t stop there.  Keep informed on what’s happening in Uganda, do something about it, and find other places in the world that you are passionate about and make a difference there, too.  Your street is a good place to start! 

So, here’s a final video to give a little bit of closure to the whole Tri To Lose challenge.
Enjoy!

Here’s what happens when a guy like Dan Kimball pimps your blog:               

134 visits yesterday.  OK, I know.  For some guys, that’s an hour worth of visits.  But for this humble little worship blog, thats over double my daily average.  Actually, it upped my daily average by 11.  I’ve never been enough of a stat ho to try real hard for big numbers, but it’s nice to have y’all stoppin by.

And I’d like to point out that Dan left a comment on the post he reffered to that says,

i hope we get to meet and connect sometime!

Dan

Well Dan, coffee, lunch, I’ll buy!  I’m right across the street…let’s do it!

So if you ever happen to be by again Dan Kimball, thanks both for stopping by and for sending some peeps over to that post. 

Make sure you all swing over by his place and check it out.  He’s got some good stuff to say over there.  And if you wanna, leave him a comment letting him know I’m down for lunch.  Just kidding.  About the comment thing, not the actual lunch part.  He might not appreciate that. 

Oh, and in case you were to stop by again, one more thing Dan.  I noticed you stopped by using Internet Explorer 7.0, and even worse yet, on Windows XP.  Do yourself a favor…buy a mac.  You won’t regret it.
There we go.
My contribution to helping out Dan.
I don’t think I’m really qualified to give him any other advice right now.

*UPDATE:  Still climbin:

Thursday. 173.

Had a great week.  Here’s the DL:

Takin my wife to the airport in a few minutes.  She’s taking Caleb down to SoCal to see family for his birthday. 

That means I’ll be bach’n it this week.  I have to figure out my own meals…which means I’ll probably be getting fat!  One week of violent guy flicks, later nights at the office, and leftover birthday cupcakes for dinner!  Here we go!  (Please come back soon honey!!  I need you!)

Went to my first game at Giants stadium Monday night.  My friend from CLC, Jono, invited me to join him with his season tickets.  He’s also my dentist.  Definitely the first time I’ve hung out at a baseball game with my dentist!

He knew I was a Padres fan.  And he let me come and root or my team.  It didn’t help.  They got whooped.  Too bad we didn’t go last night.  They won.  Still up in the Wild Card race.  let’s go Pads!!

Tom and Annette Balch also have tickets and brought along Ed and Julie Tyler.  So we left the comfort of our club level seats and civil fans to join them in the outfield benches for most of the game.  Tom didn’t like sitting next to me.  Was afraid he’d get hit by a beer.  I figured it was a good way to get free beer.

Steroid Cove                                        Willie Mays


From the outfield benches                    The crew



From Club seats                                   Just cause

And here’s the shot that really makes you wanna heave…

Thanks again for the invite Jono!
Wild Card…here we come!

Wow.  Today Caleb is a full year old.  It’s kind hard to believe.

The past year has been the most incredible year of my life, and I can’t believe how fast it’s gone by.  A year ago Caleb came into our life and completely flipped our world upside down.  I can’t believe how much changed when we had a kid.  More than just the, "Oh crap…I have to keep another human being alive now" part.

Since having Caleb, I’ve been forced to really evaluate what is important in my life.  He’s literally changed the direction of our life in ways I can’t even begin to explain here.  It’s ridiculous to think about how different our lives looked a year ago.  I’ve learned more about myself and my wife in the past year than I could possibly imagine, and even more about God.  All because of Caleb.

He loves people.  He loves to smile.  Man has he got a lot of energy.  He has the best laugh in the entire world.  Hearing him laugh and seeing him smile cheers me up on the gloomiest of days!

Thanks you God for an amazing gift.  And thank you Caleb for the chance to be your dad.  And thank you Rachel for helping to keep him breathing this long.  I’m not sure I could have accomplished that on my own!

Happy Birthday Caleb!!

And below is a short video from his birthday party on Saturday.  Enjoy!

We’re singing this Charlie Hall song for the first time at CLC this Sunday.  Many of you know it.  many of you don’t.  Here are the lyrics:

VERSE
You’re the center of the universe

Ev’rything was made in You Jesus

Breath of ev’ry living thing

Ev’ryone was made for You
You hold ev’rything together

You hold ev’rything together

CHORUS
Oh Christ be the center of our lives

Be the place we fix our eyes

Be the center of our lives

BRIDGE
We lift our eyes to heaven

And we wrap our lives around Your life

We lift our eyes to heaven to You

ENDING
And turn your eyes upon Jesus

And look full in His wonderful face

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim

In the light of His glory and grace

As I was practicing the song during the day on Wednesday and then with the band that night, I kept coming back to one line in my head.  It’s the one in the bridge where it says we wrap our lives around Your life.  There is something that I love about that line.  I love to sing it.  I could never have written it.  Wouldn’t have thought of it.  Have trouble even wrapping my head around it.  Actually, not sure I even fully understand it.  But it just sounds prophetic, poetic, and profound to me.  (Isn’t alliteration wonderful?)

I’m looking forward to this one.  Any of these lyrics that you’re particularly drawn to?  Just wondering.

That was the invitation for Caleb’s birthday party.
Birthday is Monday.
Party scheduled for today at the park.
It rained a lot last night.
Looks like the party’s moving to the house!
I think I like that better anyway.  Easier to decorate.
Pictures to come.
And has it really been a freaking year?!
Crazy.

Last week I put up three seperate posts about the volunteers at the Monterey Bay aquarium and why they volunteer.  I asked myself what we can learn to ignite a passion and commitment in our volunteers.

A few days later, I got an e-mail from one of the directors at the aquarium.  Kinda fun, eh?  (Thought maybe this was my in to get to feed the fish in the kelp forest someday!    Hehe.)  And I was intrigued by what I read.  The final post talked about being passionate about The Cause that Christ has put before us.  I thought it would be fun to share what the e-mail said:

Your blog on why aquarium volunteers volunteer was forwarded to me. I found that interesting, but was more interested and inspired by your observation that we – as Christians – need to be as unapologetically passionate about our commitment to THE CAUSE. As a lifelong seeker I realized just a couple of years ago that that was why I kept on seeking – I was looking for Christians in leadership who are EN FUEGO for the cause. One would think that would be a no-brainer, alas it’s not!

Anyway, thanks for your comments and for the inspiration. Keep on keeping on.

It was cool to hear about this and to write back.  Here’s someone who spent years seeking, and was looking to leaders and other Christ followers to see if what they believed really made a difference in their lives.  The sad part is that it was so hard to find.

John Wesley was once asked about his preaching and the number of people that gathered to listen.  he is quoting as saying:

"I set myself on fire, and they come to see me burn."

So, as we go through our days today, people are watching.  And what will they see when they look to you?  Are you "en fuego?"

Being in ministry, it’s easy to start feeling like life is just going a hundred plus M.P.H.  There’s always something to do.  I know there’s other jobs and lifestyles out there like that as well, it just so happens that is my experience in ministry.

And my experience throughout my life has been that this is constantly applauded and usually encouraged.  The more you can accomplish, the more driven you are, the faster you go, the more successful you are perceived as being.  And I still buy into that regularly.  Given, it’s not all wrong, but it’s not alright either.

I heard a definition for success last week that I kinda liked.  I can’t recall exactly how it was worded but it was something along the lines of achieving God’s plan, in the steps that he has prepared, in the timing that he has…or something.  You get the point.

Anyway, the bigger point is this.  I read this post this morning and it was a great reminder.  It applies so well to my life as well as, I believe, the lives of most of our churches.

I’m not going to repost it.  Just follow this link and go read it.  Trust me, it’s worth the time.

And then find a time today to be.