Moving again!

Hey everybody it looks like I'm moving my blog again. This should be the last time for awhile. Please set your links to go here. http://juniorhigh.blogs.com/joshuamichael

A Retreat Day that Rarely Happens

On the first Monday of the month I have scheduled on my Outlook to take a work retreat day to pray, read, and refocus myself for the coming month. However, it seems like when those days come I just end up getting too busy with work that it doesn't happen. That's what is happening today. Lord, give me the time to sloooow down. Today's agenda: plasma email/phone calls pray lunch Survivor Draft read/pray some more drama club dinner/play with kids Skating with Celebrites

Pulling for Seattle

I guess I will be pulling for the Seahawks today for the Super Bowl. Mike Holmgren's wife Cathy will be serving in the Congo with our denomination the Evangelical Covenant Church during Super Bowl XL. I think there is going to be a report about it today on a pregame program. Click here for more of the story about Kathy Holmgren.

Rachel's Tears

Tonight we took the youth ministry to go see Darrell Scott speak. The place was packed with a lot of Lutheran Kids as they had it as a requirement for many of the confirmation programs around town. Darryl Scott was the father of Rachel Scott, one of the girls that was shoot in the Columbine shooting. A few years ago at mission trip I got to hear the story about Rachel for the first time from her aunt and uncle. One of the most amazing stories is of her final drawing she made. Follow this link to hear about it. The part I had never heard about was a man that had a vision of what Rachel had drawn (to the left) before her dad had ever discovered it. It is amazing how much god's hand was working in this tragedy.

Back in Minnesota

I am back from Minnesota. I am really glad to be back home with my family. I really did miss them. The final exam I took on my class in Chicago felt more difficult than the first one. Oh well I at least I passed, at least I hope I did. The professor said that he had only failed 2 people in the history of teaching the class. Yesterday I performed in a drama at church. It went pretty well. As a part of it I got to impersonate Napoleon Dynamite. It was a lot of fun. We used a Skit Guys drama. Today, was back to work for the most part. I am current working on directing a play for the local middle school. It is going to be somewhat of a "Saturday Night Live" format. We have much work ahead of us. It should be pretty good. The show opens in the first weekend in March. Feburary here we come!!

Current Guilty Pleasure

Skating with Celebrities oh. i'm so embarrassed.

DE-FENCE! DE-FENCE!

For some reason when I get sick I really get sick and it takes me forever to get over it. My new strategy for this is to not get sick ANYMORE! Since I am a youth worker and the drama coach at the middle school I am constantly around germs. So now from time to time I am going to take Airbourne. It is suppose to boost your immunity and prevent you from getting sick. We will see.

Smallville's 100th episode

I watched Smallville tonight. I normally don't watch because I have been wanting to wait and catch up by watching seasons 3-5 on DVD. However, tonight was the 100th episode and it was a good one! I won't spoil it for any of you that have Tivo-ed it.

It kinda makes a guy feel good

Tonight I won my first "Battle of the Blogs". That isn't saying much because I still have a losing record. Anyway, it kinda makes a guy feel good. Today was day 6 of my intensive class. Only 2 more days to go and I will be heading back to Minnesota. Tonight we went bowling I won one of the 3 games. That also kinda makes a guy feel good. I found out my son was sick tonight throwing up, that is never good. I pray that it is just a one night thing. Ok...not much else to say. Oh...the dead Swedish theologian of the day was Nils W. Lund.

Test #1 Done

So today I thought my brain was going to leak it was so full. I stuffed my brain with as many facts as I could about the beginings of the Covenant Church history. It took about 3 hours to complete it! Definitely the longest test I have ever taken. It was all essay questions. I have another essay test on Friday but for that one we get you use our notes. We went bowling tonight to celebrate this finishing of our first test. I tied with Carlos. It looks like tomorrow morning we are playing some pick-up basketball so I better head to bed soon.

Back to School

Today we went back to North Park for more classes to learn about the Theology and History of the Covenant Church. My brain feels quite full and it looks like I will be studying for much of the evening tonight. Carlos and I will be studying with another guy that is staying in our hotel. To be honest I have a little aniexty oer tomorrow's exam. In my undergrad adult program we had no real examines just a lot of papers. So I haven't taken an exam for quite sometime. I better stop blogging and get to start studying. later I might be taking a break to watch this later.

Visit to Willow Creek

So before the family went back to Minnesota we all headed to Willow Creek just outside Chicago. This is probably the 4th time I have visited Willow. It was a good service and I think our kids really enjoyed Promiseland, their children's minstry. The one thing about Willow is they are always so stinkin' creative. The sermon series that they started today was 24 hours in the life of Jesus. The whole theme is based ff the TV 24. For the set on stage they had like intelliengence central. It was pretty neat.

By the way, the car that they took back to Minnesota broke done 40 minutes before they go home.

A Day at Navy Pier

My family came to Chicago last night at 1:00am to surprise us. So today the 9 of us, kids ranging in ages 1-6 took van, train, and bus down to the Navy Pier for the day at the Children's Museum. It was pretty much a day o fun madness! We had a good time. It was fun to see my kids enjoy the city. They have view little experience with big cities. It was neat to see them get all excited about going into the tunnel on the "EL" train. Tomorrow morning we will be going to Willow Creek for church. The main reason to go there is because Carlos' wife Emily has never been there. Also, I want my kids to experience "Promiseland" at Willow.

Dead Swedish Theologian of the Day: P.P. Waldenstrom

Another long day of class and now it is the weekend. So we are just hanging out in the room. We just got done watching Ghostbusters. It is a pretty funny flick that I haven't seen for awhile. Today we talked about a hero of the Covenant Churches denomination, P.P. Waldenstrom. P.P. Waldenstrom revolutionized the way many people look at the Atonement. Here are the main points of Waldenstrom's view: (I edited this so it was more detailed) 1. That no change occurred is God's heart because of our fall; 2. That it was therefore no wrath in God's heart which through the fall came in the way of man's salvation; 3. That the change which occurred through the fall was a change in man only, in that he became sinful and fell from God and the life which is in him; 4. That as a result of this fall a reconciliation was necessary for man's salvation; but not a reconciliation which appeased God and presented him as merciful, but one which removed man's sin and presented him righteous again; 5. That this reconciliation has been achieved in Christ Jesus. So yeah..we get two days off from class. I should probably continue my reading. There is so much to read.

Studs of the Swedish Pietist Movement

Ok...so we are done with class for today and back at the hotel room. Today we learned about Pietism in Sweden and how it lead to the early forming of our denomination. My brain is pretty fried with history right now. To the left is a picture of a Phillip Spener; leader of the Halle Pietist movement. Who Hoo!

In Chicago at Seminary

I am currently in Chicago for 10 days to study the "The History and Theology of the Evangelical Covenant Church." Today was our first day of class. I feel a bit ou of place because it seems like a lot of the people all ready have M Divs and whatnot. We got in yesterday to the airport at 6:00pm and thought we would save some money by taking public transportation from the Airport to our hotel. It ended of being a 2 hour commute on the "EL" or elevated train. It was quite a traveling adventure. We actually took "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles" in that order! Only the good thing was that my travel partner was not Del Griffith. The picture to the left is the actual building I had class in today. After class we went grocery shopping to fill our pantry at the Extended stay. The highlight of my shopping included buying some Easy Cheese. Man I love that stuff. Ok, time to make some dinner and read a few pages of the 2000 in need to read in the next 10 days. ugh.

Back to the Future Dream and Mr.Stuntman

One of my favorite movies of all time has got to be "Back to the Future". Last night I had a dream that Iwas about to time travel back to 1945. I thought I would choose that because I could run into the 50's and if I lived a long life I could get back to 2005. I assumed that I couldn't travel back into the future like in the movie. I could have gone into the future however that involved being frozen and that sounded like a little too much of a risk. So to travel back in time, you apparently need to get on an amusement park ride like that looks a little like this. So I got in the time travel "ride". Everyone else on the ride started disappearing except me. Sure enough, I wake up before I get to 1945. Why does it seem like that you always wake up right before a good part of your dreams? Today I was acting in a training video call, "Slips. Trips, and Falls", for a local company. I operated a forklift today during the shoot. I was demonstrating how not to use a forklift by not wearing my safety harness. I actually did a lot of dangerous stuff in a factory today.

Side Jobs

I am not sure I have mentioned on this blog that I am the drama coach for our local Junior High School. This has been a great way to get to know some of the JH students outside the church doors. Lately it seems like a lot of extra things have been coming my way. This week I was asked to be a commencement speaker a graduation for one of the 2 year colleges in town. That's a first for me. This week I was also asked to act in a safety video for a company in town that makes videos for companies to comply with OSHA standards. Last week I was asked to give a seminar or two about some aspect of youth ministry. Crazy stuff. Anyway...I am only on page 120 of my 800 some page book. The real number of pages I need to read it around 650. The rest of the book is index. I leave for Chicago on Tuesday.

800 pages!

So I found out I need to read about 800 pages of this book by next Tuesday. Basicly, it is a history book of my denomination; the Evangelical Covenant Church. I am beginning to take a history class next week and it is required reading. Oh...man if I finish it will be the longest book I have ever completed. Don't expect very much posting here for the next few weeks.

Yes! Hawkeyes Beat No. 6 Illinois!

This was a great highlight for me this weekend!

Drama, Meeting the Worship Pastor Candidate, and Pinkeye...

This has been a pretty busy day today. I actually felt pretty good waking up this morning. I went to bed at 11:30pm and woke up at 9:15am. Yes, about 10 hours of sleep. Man did I need it, I was pretty tired. This morning we had our junior high drama rehearsal for a drama team I lead called "Kid's Off the Couch." We did a "Skit Guys" drama called "Table for Two". Basically, it is a split stage scene where God is waiting in a restaurant to spend time with this girl. Meanwhile the girl is just hanging out the whole time with her friends next spending time with God. You don't find out that it is God waiting for the girl till the end of the drama. We are going to have the students perform it on Wednesday. The did a good job with it. Then Tammy and I had lunch with the staff and the Worship pastor candidate. We have been without a Worship pastor for quite sometime. It looks like he will most likely get the job. He is from Wheaton, IL and has been a worship pastor at churches bigger and small than ours. It looks like he is going to do a go job equipt our lay worship leaders. I also hope that he does a good job with bringing more drama to our services. I also woke up the morning with pinkeye. I haven't had it since I was a kid. My son had it and gave it to my wife, and my wife gave it to me. I guess you don't have to treat it unless you go to school.

Nothing Much to Post

Nothing much to post today, so I'll just post this... He has got to be the funniest puppet ever created!

Apathy Night

Tonight we had youth ministry for our 7th and 8th graders.We used an idea from my youth pastor friend Dylan that. Tonight he was going to do "apathy night". It was an idea he got from the "Ideas Library" that is put out by Youth Specialties. By the way it is a very good resource for YPers. Anyway so I thought I would give it a try this week too. The whole idea is to do pretty much the whole night apathetic. So, I had all my youth leaders dress apathetic. Basically dress like you don't care what you look like. We did boring apathetic activities like staring contest and reading the dictionary and phone book in monotone. The students couldn't be excited about anything or they had to wear a box over their head till they got apathetic again. We played apathetic games like air on a spoon instead of egg on a spoon "because I wasn't in the mood to buy eggs". By the end of it al the students were pretty sick of it. Then we talked about Rev 3:15-20 about our faith not being lukewarm. I wasn't really sure how the night went over, however the leaders said that it was pretty powerful. So that's cool.

My Top Songs Currently on the IPOD

Ok...I got an IPOD for Christmas and I have been using it everywhere! I listen in the car, I listen at home, I listen in bed. One of the coolest features of the IPOD is that Itunes keeps track of what songs have been played the most. I thought it would be fun to share my top 5 songs. Some of them are pretty random because I put the IPOD on random play quite a bit. From Joshua. Hey...this will be a fun game! So find another person with an IPOD or Itunes and post your top 5 songs from the "25 most played" list on your blog, no matter how random they may be. If their is a tie for a song break the tie by picking the song most recently played. Be sure to link the person that tagged you. 5. "Jackson" Johnny Cash 4. "Ring of Fire" Johnny Cash 3. "Overture" Celtic Romance (I know, pretty girly) 2. "21st Century (Digital Boy)" Bad Religion 1. "Folsome Prison Blues (Live" Johnny Cash Now tag 3 more people.

Back in the Office Again

So I am back in the office again. Oh...for some of you that don't know, I am a youth pastor at a church. I have been there for 7+ years. It is a good place to serve. I work mainly with Junior High students. So today I am catching up on a bunch of stuff. This week is a big week for me. Tomorrow night I have large group, Friday I have 5th and 6th grade ministry, Saturday: drama, Sunday: Church. I am also the drama coach at one of the local schools so I jump between church and the middle school on a regular basis. For our all large group night one of month I try to give some sort of gospel message and I haven't figured out what I going to do yet. I better get trucking on that. On a funny note, I forgot to give my wife a gift she wanted for Christmas. I guess that isn't that funny. She wanted the movie "Say Anything". I just looked in the paper and it is going to be on TV tonight. Hey I saved $15!! I'm cheap.

Iowa Robbed in Outback Bowl

It was a frustrating loss for the Hawkeyes today. Iowa made a great comeback in the 4th quarter and then was shafted on a offsides call during an onside kick at the end of the game. If Ferentz is going to leave this year, I sure hope he's going to coach for the Vikings. It wouldn't be bad if he went to the Packers ethier.

The Last Day of Vacation

Since I took the rest of my vacation these past two week it means we all go back to work/school/normal routine tomorrow. As for today it has included putting puzzles together with kids, playing Kinderbunnies and naps. Kinderbunnies is the kids version of my favorite card game Killerbunnies. I taped the Outback bowl at the church because I don't get ESPN. I hope to watch that later and cheer the Hawkeyes to a delayed victory. As far as my bible reading/listening in a year has gone, I am 2 for 2! Who Hoo! Only 363 more days to go!

God parents

We went over to a freinds house tonight for dinner and games. After dinner they asked us if we would be Godparents for their new baby. We are very honored. It made Tammy cry, I held back. :)

The Bible in a Year Blog w/ IPOD

I have decided again to try and read throughout he whole bible again this year. This past year I didn't make it. So I am going to try a different strategy. I got a IPOD for Christmas, so I will be using a podcast to listen to the Word in my car. I will also be following along with the Bible in a Year blog. We will see how it goes.

My Top 10 movies of 2005 This list if based on the movies that I have seen. 10. Coach Carter 9. Robots 8. War of the Worlds 7. Star Wars 3 6. 4 minutes 5. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory 4. Sky High 3. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe 2. Walk the Line and #1 is....(drumrole) 1. Cinderella Man (directed by our very own Ron Howard...go Opie!)

I'm back from my hiatus of blogging in secret. I thought I would start 2006 off with a new blog. Some of you may know me from a blog I shut down about a year or so ago called Joshua Michael. I thought I would come out of hiding for 2006. Instead of recapping all that has happened this past year for me I thought it would be better if I would just start from where I am today. That will save me a lot of typing. The name of this blog at this point will be called, "The Adventures of a 2nd Tenor." No...This isn't a blog about opera singing, or singing at all for that matter. It is a little reference to my favorite deputy, Barney Fife. As Barney says, "A choir without its tenor is like a star without it's glimmer." I am a 28 year old avid fan of "The Andy Griffith show". I know there are not many 20-something out there that are big fans of TAGS. Let the blogging begin...I will start with post my best of list for 2005.