Over the weekend I picked up a little Moleskine pocket notebook. No, Mom, that isn’t some new electronic gadget - it’s happily analog.

I’m going to give it a try as a one-stop location for all my notes - thoughts, sermon notes, to-dos, etc. We’ll see how it works. Initially I’m quite impressed with the quality construction of the notebook; the hard covers provide a good writing surface, the paper is quality, the binding is secure yet allows the book to be opened up wide.

We’ll see how fast I fill up 192 pages…

OK, so she’s pretty cute, too.

OK, so she’s pretty cute, too.

OK, so she’s pretty cute, too.

I think she enjoys the bathtub.

I made this announcement after both services at Noelridge today. I didn’t read from a script, so this isn’t verbatim, but is the gist of the message I had for the folks.

After much prayer, thought, and discussion, I have come to the decision that the best thing for me and my family right now is that I step back from my role as the worship leader here at Noelridge. Now, that’s not a fun announcement to make, but let me explain a little bit.

The key factor playing into this decision is time. This hit home the most to me when I recently realized that my current life schedule of work and ministry is the same or busier than it was seven years ago when we moved to Cedar Rapids. However, in those seven years God has blessed us with two little girls. And while Becky’s schedule has changed drastically since the girls were born, my schedule hasn’t changed at all. And it needs to.

I also want the time to be able to get involved in community things. My entire social life and structure has been within the church, and that’s not good. I need to have the time and freedom to be able to be involved in the “real world”, to reach out to my community. You have also entrusted me with a role as an elder here at Noelridge, and I want to make sure I have the time to do that well.

Let me emphasize that we are not going anywhere. Noelridge has been a great blessing as our home church for seven years now, and our desire is very much to stay here, I will just be in a different role. Sunday mornings will look at bit different; we have many other talented musicians in the church here who are capable of helping with music, and we will be calling on them. Worship team may also look different for a while, we’re still having discussions on that.

So thank you for letting me lead these past years, and for understanding as I move to fulfill responsibilities in a new season of my life.

It is a big relief to get this off my chest and officially announced. I’m looking forward to see how God will use the folks in the church to fill in and minister in different ways.

Yeah, 4 words, huh Geof? Hey, I haven’t done a meme in a while. Nice to be thought of, too. Anyhow… here goes.

• Penalty. Nobody likes penalties. But they make me think of football. My local Hawkeyes are 3-0 so far and are looking forward to a prime-time matchup with Ohio State next week.
• Vacation. I just got back from a vacation, but it still never seems like it is enough. I’m taking a day of vacation next weekend to go to the Desiring God conference in Minneapolis. Woohoo!
• Competition. I’m only competitive to a point. Yeah, I like to play to win, but I’m usually the one saying hey, give ‘em the benefit of the doubt on the close play, rather than making a big stink about it. Now my brother Andrew, there’s competitiveness for you.
• Spelunking. Oh, sure, Geof. Spelunking?!? Back in high school we went with the youth group one time to a place down in central Texas whose name escapes me. There was a big rock to climb, and we did some rappelling, and then a little sorta quasi-spelunking, though I don’t think the bit of crawling we did underground really counts as such.

Now to perpetuate this Friday-afternoon meme to four others…

1. Dan. He should have something interesting to say.
2. Roger. If he ever comes back to blogging…
3. Dana. She blogs all the time, but I don’t know if she’ll see this…
4. Rae. Have fun, buddy. See you next week!

And the words:

1. Passport
2. Auditorium
3. Odor
4. Enthusiasm

Last Saturday I ran in my first-ever 5K, the Solon High School Spartan Fund Run. They had a few hundred folks show up, many to do the half-mile and mile walks, another 83 for the 5K, and mabe a few dozen for a 10K. My sister Rebecca had agreed to run it with me, so we got up early and headed down on the 30-minute drive to Solon.

The race was done well; the organization was good, the t-shirt design was pretty decent, and they had procured a bunch of donated food which was good as a late breakfast after the run.

The one thing this 5K had that I hadn’t trained for was hills! I didn’t realize how flat my neighborhood course is until I got out there and had long uphill climbs at both the beginning and end of the race. And the last half-mile not only did you have to go uphill, but you were running directly into a 15 mph wind. But, we toughed it out. There were 83 competitors in the 5K, and I came in 53rd in a time of 31:12. Rebecca came in 69th in about 35:00. (Reba, leave your exact time in a comment and I’ll fix it here.) I didn’t get under 30, which had been my goal, but at least it was a good test.

I think I’ve got the bug; I’m looking for another race around here yet before the season is over. The one that’s reasonably close and on a day I could make it isn’t a 5K, though - it’s a 5-mile. I’m not sure if I’ll be ready for that by November 12 or not.

I am long overdue to post pictures from the concert that my brothers and I played a few weeks ago at church. Thanks to my sister Rebecca for taking them! Oh, I did post a song last week, but I never did really discuss the concert. So, let me discuss it.

We had planned to do the concert outdoors at Noelridge Park; our church has an annual Labor Day Sunday picnic and we were the entertainment. That Sunday was quite rainy in Cedar Rapids. The rain had pretty much stopped by 4:30 when we went to set up, so we set up in the park while keeping an eye on the ominous clouds still to the west. At 5:00 it was looking really dark, and a call to Becky at home confirmed that there was more rain a-comin’. So I decided to pack it up and we moved over to our rain location at the church. Wouldn’t you know it, by 6:00 pm the sky had cleared, and we had the most beautiful cool evening… grrrr. Oh well, you win some, you lose some. Still, it was a fun concert.

We traded off singing lead vocals through a set that included songs by Caedmon’s Call, Rich Mullins, Andrew Peterson, Andy Osenga, Derek Webb, and others. I played bass and keyboard, Andrew played bass and guitar, and Aaron was a full-time awesome guitarist. The set went well, though I may have gone overboard by singing AP’s Alien Conspiracy (The Cheese Song). We finished the night with AO’s Early in the Morning, which was an awesome closer.

I don’t know when we might get the chance to perform together again, but that night was a night to remember. Thanks to God for musical talent, loving family, and talented songwriters to steal from draw from!

(Click on the pictures to see them full-sized.)

While I dont’ generate quite as much link traffic as, say, Geof does, I figure it might still be fun from time to time to give you some idea of the web links I’ve been following and reading. Then you, my intelligent, discerning, and thoughtful readers, can enjoy this Chris-approved list of goodness.
Spiritual/Theological/Church Links

• Monday Devotions - Confession [Worship Matters]
  Bob Kauflin gives us the text of a corporate confession of sin used at his church recently. It’s good.
• No Fetal Positions Allowed! [The Boneman]
  A reminder that the communion service should be a time of rejoicing in our salvation rather than a morose reflection on our own sin.
• Quit and See What Happens [internetmonk.com]
  Michael Spencer says there’s many folks that are too busy with church stuff, that should quit for a while. Boy did this hit home with me.
• Answering Greg Boyd’s Openness of God Texts [The Resurgence]
  John Piper deals with some of the texts most often championed by Open Theism.
• Evangelistic Worship [The Resurgence]
  This is the best post I’ve read on worship in a long, long time. The thoughts in here will reshape the way we think about and do worship at Noelridge.

Geeky Links

• Download of the Day: myFairTunes6 [Lifehacker]
  This nifty little app will strip the DRM information from iTunes downloads.
• Pop-up Potpourri: Perpetually In Beta [The Daily WTF]
  Gotta love the humor of these pop-up error messages.
• Hack Attack: Get More From Google Desktop [Lifehacker]
  I’m still torn on Google Desktop; it’s a great tool, but I’m just a little bit leery of a Google app searching through all the documents on my computer. Still, these are some great tweaks and ideas.