fred has new tires

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for those of you keeping up with the development of fred the sentra today he received two new, balanced front tires and new windshield wipers. this means that fred is now able to handle highway speeds. previously the front tires were bald and unbalanced and it made for an interesting ride at 70 mph, especially in snow, which is why i had only taken him on the highway once. that one time was enough for me. as fr the windshield wipers i am a fan of decent wipers and rain x. i can live with a car that might break down at any moment but i can’t handle with terrible windshield wipers.

next is fixing the exhaust system which should happen this weekend.

SIDE NOTE – i found this forum post concerning the rebuild of a 92 sentra. it is a lot more than i want to do to fred but still has some useful in it.

hanna

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hanna-movie-trailer

pam and i just finished watching “hanna” and it must have been a good movie because pam not only watched it but made comments concerning the plot. it has to be a pretty good action flick for my wife to remain interested. i was just impressed that the hero (or more correctly heroine) of the movie is a 16 year old girl. there are not many movies where a 16 year old girl kicks everyone’s butt. the movie is basically a bourne identity movie about a girl. i think they did a pretty good job with it.

what is a disciple?

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disciple

last weekend i spent a few hours with devon s  flying to rome, new york to officiate his wedding. we talked about quite a few things but ended up focusing on asking what is discipleship. you see i believe that to a large extent the modern western church has misunderstood discipleship. i believe we have primarily understood discipleship as an intellectual exercise. we have treated discipleship as a series of bible studies.

please don’t get me wrong. i think studying the bible is VERY important. i love bible study and i know it is very important but i do not think being a disciple of JESUS CHRIST is merely studying a lot. i would actually describe that as a mild version of gnosticism. a very generalized description of gnosticism would be that salvation comes down to the right intellectual knowledge (i.e. gnosis). i fear that much of the modern church has become gnostic in its practice of making disciples. using aritotle’s “ends and means” studying seems to have become an ends rather than a means.

studying should be a means for reaching the aimed for end which is following CHRIST. the problem is that far too often studying is treated as the aimed for end. instead i believe the biblical example of disciple making comes back to JESUS call to HIS disciples which was “come, follow me.” following is the goal or end. knowledge helps in following. studying is important for following but it is never the ultimate goal. following is.

at tapestry we try to focus on following and doing things to help people follow HIM.

so here are the basic instructions for what we do.

  1. In what ways have you been a testimony this week to the greatness of JESUS CHRIST with both your words and actions?
  2. How have you experienced GOD in your life this week?
  3. How are you responding to HIS promptings?
  4. Do you have a need to confess any sin?
  5. How did you do with your reading last week?

it is basically derived from neil cole’s life transformation groups. i think it does a wonderful job of helping us to focus our studying on being better followers. it helps us keep our ends and means in line.

SIDE NOTE – i that the modern western church would do a better job of making disciples of JESUS CHRIST if we asked “what is a disciple” more often than we ask “how do we make disciples.”

help me put eric in his place :)

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IMG_2029pam and i have pretty much always viewed cars as merely transportation. we take care of our autos and try drive them until they can’t reasonably be fixed any longer. we’ve done this to all but one of our cars – a 1998 ford explorer that was a lemon. my 1998 mazda 626’s transmission died recently and it was sent to salvage. the 626 was my car, which is basically the family beater. it was my “throw the canoe on top and go fishing” car. since the 626 died i needed to replace it because i have to continue fishing.

eric & natalie were nice enough to sell me their 1992 sentra which i hope to fix up. of course, eric said that i would probably be better off buying a different car considering the money he thinks i will need to put into the car to fix it up to the level i am considering. he thinks i will have to put $1,000 to $2,000 in the car. i on the other hand think i can fix it up to very respectable for less than a $1,000.

IMG_2006here’s the work that needs to be done to the vehicle

  • replace front exhaust tube (rusted out)
  • new tires for front and rear (basically bald)
  • replace power steering pump
  • general maintenance

and the work that i want to do to it is

  • body work (there are a couple of sections that have rusted out)
  • paint – both for protection and looks
  • add roof rack for my canoe – difficult because the car is a coupe
  • replace broken radio
  • add fog lights – i’m not sure why but i really like fog lights

now i wonder if any of you would like to help me prove eric wrong by helping out on the improvements. i.e. i have a thule 400xtr roof rack that doesn’t presently fit the sentra – do you know someone with a thule 400xt roof rack that would like to swap? or do you know someone who has ever painted a car (i’m considering painting my own car – its a beater after all but it still needs to be approved by pamela). or do you have a car stereo wasting away in your basement?

i’m viewing this as a challenge and i will definitely taunt eric when i succeed.

small airplanes & snow

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i know that flying is statistically safer than driving and i am not afraid of flying BUT i am not the biggest fan of smaller commuter planes. this is basically because of the fact that i can feel turbulence much more dramatically when i am in a small plane.

i fly to syracuse, new york today to officiate devon s’s wedding. we would have the first decent snow storm of the winter season on the day that i am flying out of central wisconsin airport on a small commuter plane. i’ve never flown in any plane while it was snowing, let alone a small plane. this should be interested.

SIDE NOTE – i think i have adequately freaked my mom out now. i did at least keep the video for this post calm :)

can i have your empties?

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DSC_0009

i’ve developed a new hobby … well i guess it is a hobby. actually i’m not sure if it is a hobby or not. i do know that it enabled me to make a few CHRISTmas gifts and that my dad wants a few more. i’ve learned how to cut and sand beer bottles into 10 oz tumblers.

the photo above is of 5 that i finished before supper tonight. two are for my dad, two are for my brother, and the 5th is for eric g. i need to make some more because my dad swears he has five friends and therefore needs six glasses. i’m not entirely sure about this because i find it hard to believe that my dad could have 5 friends. ;)

making the glasses is more difficult than you would originally think, or at least more difficult than i originally thought, for two reasons.

  1. modern beer bottles are very thin and therefore glass cutting is not easy on them.
  2. you have to find bottles with painted labels instead of paper, since the paper labels will wash off with use.

i guess there is a third difficulty and that is that i don’t drink alcohol and therefore don’t have any beer bottles lying around. so if you have any beer bottles with painted labels on them i would really appreciate you giving them to me rather than throwing them in your recycling bin.

convicted by this american life

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i’m listening to this week’s this american life episode concerning the making of electronics in china. while it deals with a plant that primarily makes apple products it mentions that many other companies do the same thing. i’m not an apple fanboy but if i was i would have a hard time justifying it after hearing this. you should go listen to it and then we should do something about it.

one of the things i love about being nomadic

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one of the things i love about being a part of a nomadic church (i.e. a church that does not possess a building) is answering the question that invariably occurs whenever i am with a group of pastors and we have a “round robin” introduction. when i say i am a part of tapestry someone usually says “now where are you guys?” of course, i know that what they mean is “where is your church building,” but i still enjoy saying “well i guess right now we are here and 40-50 other spots across town.”

after they look at me confused i tell them that we gather at washington elementary school.

SIDE NOTE – as an alabama fan i probably should say something about the BCS national championship last night. i will say two things 1) ROLL TIDE! 2) while i am thrilled that BAMA won the national championship i am also very ready for the BCS to change. they are supposedly going to make some changes. we’ll see what happens.

fred #8

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we are a three driver family who have been living with two cars for about 9 months. my mazda 626′s transmission died at the end of last winter and it just wasn’t worth fixing. we don’t often need a third car but every now and then one would come in handy. we now have a “new to us” 3rd car. i spent a $100 on eric g’s 1992 nissan sentra. i shouldn’t take long for it to be worth every penny … which isn’t really saying much :)

i had a message secretary tonight

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tonight i had a first for me. i usually end messages sunday nights in tapestry by asking if anyone has anything that needs to be added before i end. quite often this leads to some wonderful things. tonight when i asked the question one of the threads asked “what was the second thing you said at the end?” you see, i have a habit of ever now and then during my messages speaking in a conspiratorial whisper that can be hard to hear if i’m not facing you..

now i prepare pretty well for the sermons i do. i spend a lot of time studying beforehand and i develop a pretty thorough outline BUT i don’t write a full manuscript. i am not speaking from something i have memorized word for word. so i tried m best to answer her by giving her a general summary of my last point. i just wasn’t word for word sure of what i had just said. when i finished my summary another thread said “oh i wrote it down” and she then read off to the other person the word for word statement that had been missed because of my whisper.

i’ve never before had a “message secretary” who was ready to read back what i had just said. as a pastor it was kind of a cool experience for me.

SIDE NOTE – apparently i have a new title. since i don’t really like people calling me “pastor robert” (versus people introducing me to their friends as their pastor – which i do love) tonight i was called “shepherd bob.” i think i like that title. :)