Willow, Fathers Day, Infected Toes & Tech Support

Random things that have happened over the last few days that I need to mention.....

I just got back from a few days in Chicago at an Arts Conference at Willow Creek Community Church. I have been there before in 2000 and was quite amazed and "gob-smacked" at how they do church. In fact as one friends says, it takes about 3 months to reacclamate to normal church after a Willow experience. However, this year I was doubly amazed and even more "gob-smacked." Obviously, they pulled out all the stops with a crowd full of Artsy folks. In many ways it was like drinking from a pool of refreshing water that was inspiring and regenerating. In other ways it could be the most depressing thing to contemplate that "we'll never be able to ...."(fill in the blank). It depends on how you choose to look at things and see God working. Instead of depressing me this time, I think I was able to see God's mighty hand all over Willow and how they inspire others to be just a little better and then to see what the potential is for us. Delirious recorded a live CD and DVD on the Tuesday night and we got to be part of that. It was fabulous - awesomely incredible. Yes, I liked it. Although it was a quick day and a half it was great.

Fathers Day rolled around on Sunday and church was literally more than I could bare. I miss my Dad obviously (29 years later, and there is still an ache there). But the clincher was our theme of being "Fathers to the Fatherless." Wow, it was incredible. Dan preached through the texts that call us to be champions of the poor, the orphan, the widow, the marginal - the Fatherless. They showed a video piece from World Vision that outlined the millions of children around the world who are left fatherless from AIDS. Christian Relief Fund was there and they had packets for people to take and adopt a child. Dan in his alter call, asked if instead of walking down the aisle to save ourselves, we would walk down the aisle to save the life of another. The aisles were packed - Christian Relief Fund ran out of packets there were so many people waiting to be a Father to the Fatherless.

My friend Missy has infected toes from a youth trip, Elevations. She jarrred them so much while coming down the mountain in Colorado that her toes are infected and in fact her feet are too. She had no downtime between Elevations and Youthwave, so she called me from Urgent Care in Austin last night to tell me the toe news. I can barely stand the thought of that pain - sore feet are bad enough.

And the final random entry is about the new look of the blog. My friend Angela, who has been moonlighting as my tech support dropped a site meter on my blog and set up my link list. We discovered that I needed a new template because of issues I was having with the old one and so this is the new look. It is so much fun to have someone who knows what they are doing and I just email her and tell her what I need and then magically it appears and works. I am trying to get her to do the same with laundry, house cleaning etc, but she hasn't taken the hint.