There’s nothing like the dulcet tones of Pantera early in the morning after a Dallas Stars playoff win. Enjoy.
Author: Allan (Page 4 of 492)
We’ve got Minnesota right where we want ’em. The Wild outplayed the Stars in Saturday’s Game One up and down the ice for the entirety of all three periods. They out-skated us and out-hit us, they won every face off and beat us to every loose puck, they out-shot us, out-fought us, out-hustled us, out-goalied us, and killed us on special teams. It was Game One. Again. For the eighth time in the Stars’ past ten playoff series. We’ve got ’em right where we want ’em.
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Coconut Cream Dr Pepper is back and it’s just as wonderful as I remembered! It’s been a couple of years since Dr Pepper first gave us this glorious option and then took it away almost as soon as it arrived–I didn’t realize how seriously they were using the phrase “limited edition.” For almost two years now I’ve been lamenting its demise and begging for its return. It’s back now–for how long, I don’t know–and it is still, by far, the very best of the many different flavored Dr Peppers. The coconut flavor is really strong–you smell it before your first sip and it lingers even after you swallow. It smells like summer and it tastes even better. And, yes, we are stocked up at Stanglin Manor.
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I have just ordered a book based on a review by D.J. Bulls in Restoration Quarterly, and I’m planning to read it before the end of the week. The book is called Sing Loud, Die Happy: An Exploration of How God’s Gift of Song is Meant to Change Us. The title is intriguing enough, yes? The author, Jim Thompson, surveys the entirety of Scripture to present a comprehensive case for the paramount priority of singing for the individual disciple of Jesus and for his gathered church. According to D.J., Thompson explores the whole of Church history and encourages us to reinvest in singing. He also quotes from a variety of historical Church and music figures, including Aristotle, Martin Luther, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and Bono. Here’s a quote from the book:
“We do not sing in worship to reflect our moods any more than our sermons should reflect our pet theories on the Gospel. Rather, quite bluntly, we sing in an effort to take us away from what we think and draw us toward what we ought to think, feel, and experience. We sing to create a mood more than to reflect one.”
And, from the last chapter, a list of ten encouragements for all of us:
1 – Sing with your family.
2 – Be a part of a church that enjoys singing and whose singing reflects the variety of song found in Scripture.
3 – Join a church where the song leaders aren’t trying to be faddish Christian celebrities but are shepherding people by inviting them into the transformative power of singing together.
4 – Learn and sing along to new music.
5 – Remember and sing along to old music.
6 – Look at people when you sing.
7 – Sing when you don’t feel like it.
8 – If you can’t sing with your lips, sing with your soul.
9 – Gather some friends for a sing-along.
10 – Sing with people different from you.
Singing is not only what we do; as children of God and followers of Christ Jesus, it is an important part of who we are.
Peace,
Allan
The greatest annual postseason in all of sports gets underway late this afternoon, and I am absolutely beside myself with giddy anticipation over the multiple two-and-a-half-hour heart attacks I will endure over the coming weeks. The Dallas Stars, who have been to the Western Conference Finals the past three straight seasons, are dropping the puck against the Minnesota Wild in what will definitely be the most thrilling matchup of the first round and, potentially, of the entire tournament.
Just push “PLAY” on the video below. Go full screen and turn the volume way up. Feel your pulse quicken. Notice the catch in your breath. The gulp in your throat. The butterflies doing somersaults in your stomach. The urge to throat-punch anyone not wearing Victory Green.
The Stars finally addressed their one glaring need, the one thing that has kept them out of the Stanley Cup Finals the past years: toughness. They’ve been ramping it up all season. They are physically forechecking now, from goal line to goal line, throughout the lineup. They have two 40-goal scorers in Wyatt Johnston and Jason Robertson, a superstar sniper-scorer in Mikko Rantanen, and one of the NHL’s top power plays. Miro Heiskanen is probably the best two-way defenseman in the NHL, and I’ll take Otter in net right now over anybody else in the league. One of the Star’s major strengths, their incredible depth, is being tested right now with Roope Hintz out for at least the first two games. But they entered last year’s first round without Miro and Robo and still came out on top.
However, almost all that one says about the Stars can also be said about Minnesota. Two 40-goal scorers, a violent forecheck, and depth. These two teams are about as equally matched as you can get. And I can’t wait.
It’s going to be tight. The energy is going to be over-the-top, the desperation will be palpable, the bodies will be flying, the hits will be bone-rattling, the momentum will be constantly shifting, and the margin of victory will be measured in inches and seconds. Bring it on.
Does anyone know a good cardiologist?
Let’s Go Stars!
Allan
I believe God calls us to regular and serious self-examination, but my experience with this is that serious self-examination can be both difficult and dangerous. It’s very easy for the enemy to turn my thoughts against me. I avoid silence and solitude–just me and our Lord–because of what gets very quickly revealed about me and my soul. I find it easier to pray about others and minister to others and work harder and produce more than to deal with my own stuff. It’s better when I remember that the enemy is a big fat liar. But I do struggle with this.
Introspection and self-reflection is hard. It can be confusing, maybe even chaotic. Are these gifts from God or is it arrogance? Am I passionate or am I a bully? How mixed are my motives? Am I really making any kind of a difference in our church? Is my own level of discipleship to Jesus too inconsistent to be a preacher? Man, I can get twisted up inside myself pretty fast.
Thomas Chalmers, a 19th century Scottish pastor and theologian compared self-examination to walking into and sitting in a dark room. You can’t see what’s inside the room because the room is dark. So how do you see? How do you brighten the room? Not by straining your eyes or looking harder. Not by sitting longer in the dark and taking more time. Not by squinting. Not by concentrating.
You can’t see yourself more clearly just by focusing more intently on yourself.
Chalmers says you must go to the window and open up the curtains! Let the light of Christ, he says, break into the darkness of whatever’s going on in your soul. And Chalmers says the light is the Word of God.
“If we derive no good from the work of self-examination, because we find that all is confusion and mistiness within, then let us go forth upon the truths which are from without, and these will pour a flood of light into all the mazes and intricacies of your soul, and at length will render that work easy, which before was impossible.”
Self-reflection is difficult and dangerous. Don’t attempt it without soaking in the sunshine of God’s Word. Listen to the voice of the Lord. Learn to look more at Christ than at yourself. You’re not changed by focusing on yourself, but by focusing on Jesus.
God knows the very worst about you, and he still loves you. He does not deal with us according to our sins. He promises that if we confess, he will forgive us and cleanse us and transform us. You must be secure in the love of God for you before any self-examination can be confident or fruitful. Know how precious and honored you are in God’s sight, know the glory of who you are in Jesus, know the guaranteed future you have with God in Christ. Remember that God is for you!
Now.
Now you can identify where God is at work in you. Now you can keep going with the assurance that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion.
Now I can identify where God is at work in me. Now I can keep going with the assurance that he who began a good work in me will bring it to completion.
This post is more about me than you. Let’s both try to be better at this.
Peace,
Allan
Two Thursdays ago, almost our entire GCR Church was inside the Methodist church building, worshiping with the Methodists, Baptists, and Presbyterians. Four years ago, almost none of us had ever heard of Maundy Thursday, but now, for many of us, it has become a vital component of our walk with Christ.
Last month, some of our GCR singers teamed up with singers from the other three churches to sing at the funeral of a Midland High School student. His mom requested the combined choir because she and her family are so inspired by our 4Midland partnership.
Now, our four churches have come together to bless a Spanish-speaking congregation just south of downtown Midland.
Temple Penial, a small church with a huge outreach ministry in Mexico and Central America, suffered some terrible vandalism at their building near the Salvation Army. It was a random act of destruction by a young man who lives on the streets and struggles with drug abuse and mental health issues. He’d been charging his phone on the outside of the church building and, when his phone went missing, he took it out on the church. He threw bricks and rocks through 18 large windows on the church property, doing thousands of dollars in damages. Temple Penial does not have building insurance and the cost of repairs is way more than they could afford.
So the 4Midland churches went in together and paid for the whole thing. The windows were all measured and ordered and they were installed at Temple Penial yesterday!
I’m not sure yet how, but we are certainly going to celebrate this together — all five churches! — soon. We know that all five of our congregations are, by God’s grace, working to love and serve our Midland community in the name and manner of Jesus. So maybe God has something even bigger in store for us than just windows. It’s something to pay attention to, something to pray about and carefully discern. Regardless of where this might or might not lead in terms of cooperative ministry here or in Mexico somewhere, what a joy and a privilege from our God to be able to come together as disciples united by our Lord to help bear our brothers’ and sisters’ burden.
I continue to thank God for the blessings of 4Midland.
Peace,
Allan
Scattershooting on a Friday morning while wondering whatever happened to Efren Herrera. And then a preview of our new sermon series at GCR Church.
If last night’s 5-4 come from behind win over Minnesota is any indication, the first round Stanley Cup Playoff series between Dallas and the Wild will not be for the faint of heart. It wasn’t a physical game; it was violent. Bodies were flying, haymakers were landing, teeth were scattering, and superstar players were getting tossed–at one point early in the third, there were five players in the penalty box at the same time. With home-ice advantage on the line for their already locked-in playoff pairing, it was fast, it was furious, and it was desperate–it may as well have been Game One. Dallas all but clinched the number two playoff seed and the home arena advantage for what might be a Game Seven, but a couple of question marks remain from the thrilling win: how do they stop Minnesota’s lethal power play and how badly injured is Miro Heiskanen?
The Rangers have officially now unveiled their new City Connect uniforms, which feature a darker, richer, almost crimson red, and pay homage to our Mexican roots and culture in the Republic of Texas. I don’t love it. I get the “Tejas” across the front, which is Spanish for Texas, but also goes further back to the O.G. Caddo word for “friend.” And the big block “T” on the cap hearkens back to the 1970s, which is pretty cool. But this whole look feels weird to me. The lace doily on the upper sleeve is strange and the cream-colored pants give the uniform an OU feel. Regardless, it is still a massive upgrade over the Peagle unis we’ve been subjected to the past three or four years. I only hope that monstrosity has been buried for good. The new “Tejas” uniform will debut on Friday April 24, two weeks from today. Meanwhile, the ten-game road trip that starts in LA tonight will tell us a lot about whether the Rangers offense is fixed or not.
Here’s the Easter picture of our two grandsons, Elliott and Samuel, and their parents taken after church in Jenks last Sunday. Clearly, Elliott was not inspired by the resurrection sermon. The boys turned nine months old this week and they are both crawling all over the place, they both have teeth, and they are both becoming very… um… verbal. Loud. Elliott is the instigator and, I’m afraid, Sammy is very easily influenced. They are hilarious, incredible fun, and a lavish gift of grace from our God.
I have failed to report on our family and church March Madness brackets, mainly because I’m embarrassed by my own personal showing. It was a very unpredictable tournament–everybody’s scores were lower than most years–but that’s no excuse. Carley’s husband, Collin, won our family bracket by one point over Whitney, so his winning entry is now prominently featured on the front of our refrigerator for one full year. I finished in a tie with Carrie-Anne behind Whit and Carley. We were all a little Duke and Houston heavy. I’m certain Collin will choose Texas Roadhouse for his celebratory dinner.
On the church side of things, Brenda won our ministry team bracket pretty easily. See what happens, Brenda, when you don’t pick Texas Tech to win it all? I wound up in the middle of the pack, which isn’t that unusual. But I finished behind Cory, who’s never watched a college basketball game in his life! Humiliating! Not only that, Ashlee finished in last place, behind Andrew, who picked Virginia Commonwealth to win the title! One of the most unpredictable tournaments in recent memory, but Brenda had it figured out.
We’re beginning a new sermon series this Sunday at GCR that we’re calling “Stories Along the Way,” featuring eight parables our Lord told while traveling on the way from Galilee to Jerusalem during the final days of his life. The stories are all found in what scholars call the “Travel Narrative,” ten chapters in Luke 9:51 – 19:27, detailed material about this journey that we don’t find anywhere else in the Bible.
Jesus tells these parables while he is on his way to Jerusalem, as he walks along the way to his death. These are the last stories Jesus told and he told them to show us the Kingdom of God.
The way our Lord teaches is not the way we’re used to learning. Jesus doesn’t hand out information as much as he re-shapes our imaginations. He uses metaphors and aphorisms, idioms and exaggerations, informal conversation and common slang. And Jesus spins these stories not to give us something new, but to get us to notice something we’ve overlooked for years. He talks in parables to get us to take seriously something we’ve dismissed for most of our lives.
He tells stories about farmers and judges, wedding banquets and runaway sons, growing trees and building barns. Some of these stories are very familiar and some are completely obscure. Some of these stories already dwell deep inside your heart and soul and some of them have only seared giant question marks in your brain. These stories shape us to live in the way of Jesus while we’re on our own ways from home to work, from breakfast to dinner, from a friend’s house to the grocery store, from Monday to Sunday.
So, pack your bags, strap on your best walking shoes, and bring an open mind. Open eyes and ears. An open heart. We’re following Jesus. And we’re being changed by his stories along the way.
Peace,
Allan
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