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Category: Leadership

Revenge of the Birthday Party!

Today, cleverly disguised as P4-K4 (An Empirial Bounty Droid), my twin brother arrived on the scene of a rebel birthday party of a princess named Olivia. Forget the protocol and ettiquette – this droid ain’t one to mess with! Trained in the ways of the Force, this mild mannered droid packs a powerful (and wet) punch! After pledging his allegiance to Darth Vader (who, as you can see by the t-shirt, still loves his mom), to infiltrate and destroy this rebel outpost, he went on to Saber training. Jedi Master Nakooki trained all those in attendance in the finer arts of light saber battling. So far his plan to infiltrate these rebel scum was going along fine… They practiced their new skills sparring with each other… Each Jedi-wanna-be honing his (or her) skills so that they would be prepared to fight the enemy… little did they know, the enemy was already in their midst! Then it happened! One of the padawan learners, sensing a disturbance in the Force, struck out at the infiltrater while he was trying to refresh himself with a glass of water… His response gave him away and so he lept down from the patio and it…

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Golfin’ Campin’ Partyin’

OK, OK, just to get my brother off my case, I’ll blog already! I’ve been pretty busy!! It’s been hard to find the time, plus I was UNPLUGGED from the Internet from last WED-SAT! What have I been up to?? GOLFIN’ Once again, it was time for another VCB STAFF MINI GOLF TOURNAMENT. Of course, who wins doesn’t matter – it’s all about the fellowship. (since I didn’t win)Pastor Dave is still trying to repeat his amazing victory from 1999 when he was in second place (behind me) and won first place on a hole in one on the 18th hole!!! AND it was on a steep drop with NO way to aim. At best, anyone could get a two par, but after his lucky shot, I missed my two to tie him trying to tap in an amazing tee off (did I mention down a steep drop?), and ended up in a miserable second place. Pastor’s Dave’s victory was TOTAL LUCK and while I have completely forgotten about it and moved on and finished my counseling on it, I just thought I’d mention it. Pastor John won our last time out, but this time the Force was not with…

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My First Music Video!

This Sunday at my church we are starting a two month Family Sunday School class, and it will be my first Sunday using a new curriculum called 252 Basics, based on Luke 2:52 (Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and favor with God and man). Anyway, I won’t get into that here, but to say that it is a ‘virtue based’ curriculum and each month will focus on a new “virtue” with July being “HUMILITY.” The curriculum provides some very modern and up to date music as well, and a theme song for each month. The song for Humility is actually pretty cool – I think the kids will like it, almost sounds like Hillary Duff. Anyway, I took about 30 minutes tonight at church to film some puppets singing it, and forced myself to stick to one take. (Otherwise I would spend four hours filming and increase my editing time as well!) Editing took a few hours more, but in the end, here is my FIRST MUSIC VIDEO: With or Without Me (9.6MB QuickTime) AND THE LYRICS, which are pretty good: With or Without Me Music and words by Candi Pearson Shelton, Reggie Joiner, and John Carrozza. © 2004…

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Little Bro Goes Major League!

see full article As family and most friends know, my little bro got all grown up and married recently, and now right out of college at MSU, is off to Toronto (in the northern nation…. what’s it called?) and is covering the Blue Jays for MLB.com. Jordan has been an advid baseball player and writer since as soon as I taught him to throw. (Yes, I taught him everything he knew about baseball up to around age 7, after that, he’s always known more than me, and surpassed his baseball mentor quickly in skill.) One thing we both share is a love for writing – I write about and for children’s ministry, he writes about baseball. Well, after writing for the Lansing State Journal during college (for fun search for jordan bastian on LSJ, and get 61 pages of results!), his major league coverage has begun! full article Please pray for my brother – its a tough job, he has to go to every baseball game, get there early, meet pro players, write about them, watch the game, plus he has several deadlines throughout the game (Jordan puts your schedule in comments!) and then after the game has to do…

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Back to um, what’s it called? oh, yeah, work!

Well, this is it. The eve before my sabbatical is over. Tomorrow morning I head back to work, that is, if I can remember where I work. (hahaha) Wow, what an awesome trip this was! We got to travel to Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, (through a bunch of states on the train), Washington, Oregon, California and of course, Illinois. Got to go back to Yosemite (my favorite place on earth) plus Cedar Point (second favorite, funnest place on earth) plus along the way visited over ten churches meeting with the children’s pastor from most of them. (not to mention the Star Wars Convention, that was pretty cool too) I was back in church on Sunday, but didn’t have to do anything, just enjoyed being there. It was great to see all the kids again, and nice to be fought over again. :) After church it was back to Culver’s, the unofficial after church hang out. These pictures from Sunday lunch say better than words why I am so glad to be back, and why I love my job so much….. Still some more Sabbatical Posts coming – but thanks for following us along the way. POST A COMMENT and tell me…

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