Daniel in the Lions Den: Take 5,426

Okay, so I'm not the first to speak on Daniel in the Lion's Den, but it was my first time of preaching a full weekend of services here at church and to be honest it was one of the highlights of my life. It took place August 11th and 12th during a series here at church called Showdowns. They were kind enough to allow a rookie like me to take the platform and I did my best. It was coming about four days after our four weeks in China so I was feeling pretty inspired and a little tired...here's a link to the 9:30 version if you desire to take a hear...can't guarantee that you'll get any money back however if you're not satisfied with the product :) Daniel 6 Message A neat aspect during the weekend included an artist, Scott Erickson, who painted a unique painting each of the four services that was birthed out of the message. It was fascinating to have the message expressed through the paintings, message, and music. Here's his four paintings.

The reincarnation of Chris Farley

Contextualization

I'm taking every opportunity I can right now to grow as a communicator and I thought this week was particularly full and varied in terms of audiences. Sat 9-15-Middle Schoolers Sun 9-16-Middle Schoolers Tue 9-18-College Group Thu 9-20-Middle School/High School Chapel at local Christian school Sat 9-22-Middle Schoolers Sun 9-23-Middle Schoolers Sun 9-23-Senior-Citizen Home 5 different talks given 7 times over a period of 9 days--and I absolutely love every minute of it. :)

Shane and Shane's new cd, Pages

Wow, rarely on a first listen through of a cd am I ever particularly struck by what I'm listening to but this new cd rocked my world. I absolutely love these songs, they literally stir things in my soul that little else does. I have enjoyed listening to and being moved by these homeboys since college and wow, get it!

Sweet Land of Liberty

I will post in the coming days more extensively on our time in China but wanted to write that we had arrived safely home and immediately jumped back into the hectic yet meaningful pace of life here in Salem. Our month in China is hard to put into words and I was able to take a significant amount of footage that will eventually be organized into bite-size snippets for our middle school students and youtube. It was good to go for a while and good to come home!