My First Father’s Day – My 13th Anniversary – And Baby Luke’s First….

HAPPY FATHER’S DAY (to me) HAPPY ANNIVESARY (to me) HAPPY FIRST TIME SWIMMING (to Lukie) HAPPY HAPPY WEEKEND (to me and sara) YES! It was my FIRST Father’s Day as a DAD, and it was a wonderful day. Luke headed off to church with me early as usual to ‘help’ me with my morning set up duties and then we caught the first service so we could watch the video I made on the big screen! It was a very nice Sunday… glad to finally be in a part of “Club Dad.” After church it was off to Sara’s parents home for a DELICIOUS steak lunch and visit with my other awesome Dad. Sara’s dad is truly a father to me in every way… except that I don’t have any embarrassing pictures of him from when I was a kid. Luke is so blessed to have the heritage of a Grandpa who loves God and has given his life to serve Him. Who knows, maybe Luke will be a third generation preacher? But even if not, what a blessing to be adopted into a family where both sides know and love God. It can’t help but be a wonderful influence…

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A Tribute to My Dad

Yes, it is FATHER’S DAY today… so what better reason to post some sentimental pictures of my dad – a DAD of DADS… MY DAD: A great Nap Buddy… Fisherman! (with me and big sister) Handyman, and builder of his son’s first puppet stage! A man of toys… here seen fighting over a toy with the boy who one day would do Toybox Tales. Man of the Sea… well, paddleboat anyway. A man at one with his car… A man a fashion… even matching his car! A man comfortable in the kitchen… (did I actually EAT that?!?!?) A man one with nature… Camper Extraordinaire…Athlete of Athletes! A persistant man who never gives up even in the face of disaster! An avid swimmer… Ping-Pong Champion… A man of many awards… But the greatest award: World’s Greatest Dad.Yes, I had a great dad growing up. Not a perfect dad, but I had something better… a REAL dad. A dad who made time for me. A dad who sometimes helped me and other times let me learn the hard way, and always seemed to know which would be the better teacher. A dad who sometimes went before me, other times backed me up,…

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Year End KC Krew Party!

Well, it’s hard to believe, but I just finished my fourteenth year of K.C. Krew. (Kids Church Krew) So we headed off to a friends house on a lake to celebrate a year of serving God together. I still remember that first KC Krew – I didn’t have a clue what to do with the kids, just a conviction that I needed to be trainig kids to serve in church, rather than just sit and be entertain/ministered TO. Since then, well over a hundred kids have been trained to serve God and given the experience of serving God at church. Several of my past Krew members are in ministry today and a few are at Bible college! But even those who don’t do vocational ministry have learned that serving God is a lot of fun and rewarding too. My prayer is that serving at church will always be just something they do. It’s no mystery to me why so many adults have no interet in serving, the church trained them through childhood and youth to come to church and sit and watch…. and then we wonder why they won’t volunteer. It’s about time we taught kids to serve at the…

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Introducing the Senior Pastor Cam!

At our pastors/elders planning meeting last week, we came up with a great idea that is sure to sweep the country! As our church is growing, we are talking about the options for handling growth and the possibility of a video-venue service – live music/etc. in the gym and then the message from the pastor on screen from sanctuary. (Just in discussion mode, VCBers, no set plans yet) ANYWAY, someone mentioned that to make the video sermon enjoyable to watch, it would be important to offer several different camera angles rather than just one static camera showing one boring view from the back. THATS WHEN IT HIT ME! I blurted out, “THE DAVE CAM!” I slipped out to our Kids Church backstage and retrieved a helmet mounted webcam that I hooked up several years ago for Kids Church (where what/who I looked at appeared on big screen!) and returned to the serious pastor/elder meeting and plopped it on my boss’s head. Pastor Dave modeling the prototype “Dave Cam” I tried to convince the group that this was a fantastic idea! Not only would it create a great alternative view of the service, but it would provide a view of the…

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Few things are better in life….

Few things in in life are better than an afternoon with friends at the park… Today was the final event of the year for our VIP Family Ministry at my church. (VIP = Very Intentional Parent) It’s been a fantastic year! Our family ministry this year was an experiment in an opt-in partnering ministry where families and the church participated in a genuine partnership. I will be writing a review/evaluation soon for my church and will publish on Kidology.org for those interested in what we are doing at Village Church to attempt a better solution for families than just planning ‘family events’ and hoping parents will come. It has been a very encouraging year for me, and MUCH thanks goes to the Dawne and Jay who helped coordinate the ministry and manage the communication and details! THANKS! Any casual time hangin’ out with the kids you love is the best spent ministry time. Better than you greatest lesson is giving your love and time to kids. They will remember YOU longer than any cool lesson you can come up with, and will learn from those lessons better too! Its the best of everything… it’s all about relationships. Sack races are…

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