Spring Cleaning

Spring is almost here. Actually, it already feels like Spring here. Anyway, with the start of Spring, many people get into the habit of Spring cleaning. I have gotten into this habit. During the month of March, I will be cleaning my room, parts of our house, working on the yard, and in the church. Today was the beginning of this massive cleanup for me.
It began with a much overdue cleaning of my car. I cleaned out the trash and other stuff I did not need in my car, vacuumed the floor, polished the interior, and washed the exterior. Boy that car was dirty!
I went to church after finishing the car and began working on my Sunday School office. There was some trash, and many things that I put aside for our church yard sale on March 30th and 31st. I did everything but dust and wipe the area which I will do later this week. I have had requests for our cleanup crew to work on cleaning Sunday School classrooms, shampooing the carpets, and clearing the back yard area where an old unused playground is. We hope to get all this done before the new contemporary service starts which will hopefully be sooner rather than later. Our evangelism leader printed out new business cards today to be given out as an invitation to come to the new service. The card is the main picture for today's blog.

What are your plans for Spring cleaning this year? My plans are heavy this year, and I plan on completing most of it by the end of March. Can I get it done? We will see...

The Nintendo Power Adventure Series

Today I posted a new video to Youtube called the Nintendo Power Adventure: Episode 1: Getting Started. In this new series, I will explore and re-live the experience of being a gamer as a devoted member of Nintendo Power or as it was called in the beginning, the Nintendo Fun Club. In this first episode, I receive my membership to the Nintendo Fun Club complete with letter, first issue of the Nintendo Fun Club News, and coupons for free scorepads and a strategy book called How to Win at Super Mario Bros. In the next episode, I will go through the first issue and will go through about an issue a month. The bigger the issue, the less I will be able to cover in one month, but I do expect to complete this issue in the next episode. Check out the video by looking up trojanpear on youtube.com.

Were you a Nintendo Power fan? Were you a member of the Nintendo Fun Club? What are some of your memories of video game experiences?

My Thoughts on the 2012 Oscars

I just finished watching the oscars and I want to share a few things:

First, Billy Crystal did a wonderful job hosting the oscars and the overall show itself was probably the best one I have seen since I started watching the oscars when Billy Crystal last hosted. The theme about paying tribute to the theater was very appropriate and well done.

This was probably my best year predicting award winners as I correctly predicted 17 of the 24 winners and I was really surprised by only one winner, Hugo when it won the first award for cinematography. I picked Tree of Life and thought that War Horse was the second choice with Hugo a distant third. I personally felt that War Horse was the best, but after winning a previous cinematography award, I believed Tree of Life would win.

I was confused several times by the oscars logic in awarding winners in some of the categories. Once Hugo won for cinematography, I knew I would be wrong and Hugo would win for Best Sound Editing and Best Visual Effects. It still surprises me that there would be a rout in these categories when there was no evidence that there was going to be one. War Horse and Rise of the Planet of the Apes traditionally would win the respective categories and were poised to do so by previous award wins. Makeup went to Iron Lady over Harry Potter because it fits the tradition of previous oscar winners, but then it goes against its tradition and just selects the better movie in editing with The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo over The Artist. A complete head scratcher to me was choosing Undefeated over Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory in Best Documentary. I was not surprised because it had been getting a lot of news coverage in the last few days, but I still do not understand how the oscars have in the last few years failed to to give the award to the movie that was clearly the best in the Documentary category.

Finally, the best actress award was given to Meryl Streep over Viola Davis in the greatest travesty of the night. Not to say Meryl's performance was not worthy or that I was surprised, but I believe this was wrong because it seemed like this was Viola's night and she was robbed of her moment. Meryl had this happen to her when Sandra Bullock won for her role in the Blind Side a few years ago. The voters fell for the trap that Meryl has ONLY won twice in her 17 nominations and her last win was for Sophie's Choice many years ago. I felt Viola was not only the best, but she also would have had a lot more to bring to the show with her acceptance speech. When Meryl's name was called, you could see her say, "NOO!!" because she wanted Viola to win as well. What made it harder for me to understand was that earlier George Clooney lost the actor award to Jean Dujardin when I felt Clooney was the best, but I did not pick him because I judge the acting category by two criteria: momentum and winning the SAG award. Clooney had both against him and I ended up with the right choice. Viola had won the SAG award and I felt had enough momentum to win. Obviously, I was wrong but this isn't the first time this happened. Alan Arkin beat Eddie Murphy for Supporting Actor years ago even though Murphy won at all the previous awards ceremonies. The oscars wanted to give Arkin his first award for all his years he came up short.

What are your thoughts about the oscars? I enjoyed this year and look forward to the next year. Good night and good luck.

Academy Award Predictions

With Sunday bringing the 84th Academy Awards I thought I would go ahead and make my picks today. I have enjoyed watching the oscars for several years now and my whole family gets involved in the selection process. So, here are my picks in all 24 categories with some explainations in certain categories.

Best Picture: The Artist
Best Actor: Jean Dujardin
(This was the most difficult major category for me. I believe that deep down George Clooney will win, but my two most reliable predictors in this category lead me to predict otherwise.)
Best Supporting Actor: Christopher Plummer
Best Actress: Viola Davis
(Another difficult category where Meryl Streep could win, but I feel confident in this pick.)
Best Supporting Actress: Octavia Spencer
Best Animated Picture: Rango
(I saw this one. It deserves to win.)
Best Art Direction: Hugo
Best Cinematography: The Tree of Life
(I liked the War Horse better, but this movie is good as well.)
Best Costume Design: The Artist
Best Director: Michel Hazanavicius
Best Documentary: Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory
Best Documentary Short: Saving Face
(These categories are always a coin toss, but it was either this or The Tsunami and the Cherry Blossom for me.)
Best Editing: The Artist
Best Foriegn Language Film: A Separation
Best Make-up: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows Part 2
(I am going against what I think is what the Oscar voters consider best make-up. Iron Lady is more their style, but Potter deserves one award and this award is it.)
Best Score: The Artist
Best Song: Man or Muppet
(There were only 2 categories, so I have a 50-50 shot.)
Best Animated Short: The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore
Best Short Film: The Shore
(I have also heard a lot of buzz about Raju as well.)
Best Sound Editing: War Horse
(Hugo is also a strong contender.)
Best Sound Mixing: Hugo
Best Visual Effects: Rise of the Planet of the Apes
(Hugo is also a strong container, but this category has to go to the Rise of the Planet of the Apes.)
Best Adapted Screenplay: The Decendants
Best Original Screenplay: Midnight in Paris
(Even though Woody Allen probably will not be there.)

What are your predictions for the Oscars this Sunday? We'll find out how I did this Sunday. Until then, make your picks. Who ya got?

February Fellowship

Tonight was our Sunday School group's monthly fellowship, and this month we went to Jason's Deli. The first fellowship we had seven attendees and tonight we had twelve. We had a great time and will have another fellowship next month.
This is something that is very simple to plan and we plan to do it every month. We can make the event as large or small as we feel. Since we are just starting, we are taking it small with restaurants. The goal is to plan the next one as soon as the current one ends and finalize it by the end of the month. We also set the same date and time for the fellowships every month to help people who work plan to attend by taking the day off in advance. We invite all class members and prospects. This is a great inreach and outreach activity since it can be easier to connect people through fellowship than in church. Though we have not been successful with prospects yet, it still has brought great excitement to our class and other classes who are interested in starting this as well.

Does your class or group have monthly fellowships? Has your class or group had a fellowship recently? Maybe it's time to start. Invite every member and every prospect to your fellowships every month.

Club VBS Prep

I opened the administrators guide to the club VBS packet today. I have thought much about VBS for our church this year. It would be our first in three years. I knew that we would want to progress into the VBS world slowly because of our lack of experience and resourses. I am glad we chose the club VBS format because we can go as large or as small as we need to based on our amount of volunteers. I am thinking it will be more of a Backyard Bible Club this year and expand in the future.
There are many things that need to be done and I think that we may want some of the money that we raise in our yard sale next month should go to VBS. Our biggest holdup in the planning process is the selection of a date to hold VBS because the New York Mission Trip Team has not set a date for their summer trip. We do not want both of the events to overlap, especially because of the size of the church.Hopefully, once we have our date, some serious planning can begin. Until then, I'll just get familiar with the guide book and put a few minor plans into effect.

Is your church conducting a VBS? Has it ever done a Club VBS? I would love to hear how club VBS worked for you.

Witness and Testimony Month Week 3

We continued our witness and testimony month in our Sunday School class today. We had our third class member give their testimony today at the beginning of class. I always enjoy listening to other testimonies because they are all so different to me.
The witnessing topic or tool we discussed today was using tracts. I happened to have some left over from our last interim pastor to give to the class. Tracts are very useful in leading a person to Christ if you are trying to show them how to become a Christ follower or if you are just giving them away. You can find tracts in several places, but the ones I was using were from Lifeway.
Have you used tracts before? What are some things you could share that would be useful for someone who has never witnessed using a tract?

The People Rebel

Well, this may seemlike a continuation of yesterday's blog, but that is because I read the continuation of the story in Numbers. This time in Numbers Chapter 16, the people are upset at what has happened and are looking to point the blame at Moses. They approach him and tell him what they don't like about his leadership. They are ready to remove Moses from his role until God shows them that they are wrong. He causes the earth to swallow up those who opposed Moses. Then, instead of realizing the error of their ways, the people rebel against Moses again because of what happened to the people who died earlier.
You can think, as I did, why are these people so stupid to oppose Moses when he is clearly on the Lord's side, but I see the same things happening today. Churches go through divisions all the time because people have such strong convictions against what their leader or leaders are doing that they begin to oppose the leader for poor reasons. Now, some opposition is reasonable if the leadership has done something unacceptable such as commit a sinful act worth of removal. This is not what I am refering to. I am talking about changing buildings, services, leadership structures, or anything that is not on God's priority list, but ours. Remember to keep perspective focused on the things that will matter more to God and trust that your leaders are doing what they believe God is leading them to do.
If you want to tell a preacher how to preach then preach. If you want to tell leaders how to lead then lead. If you want to tell teacher how to teach, then teach. If you are not in these positions, then you should not oppose your leaders. If you believe that someone needs to start a project or fill a position then maybe God is telling you to do it yourself instead of complaining about leaders who are not doing anything about it. We oppose leaders because sometimes we don't like what God wants to do so in reality we oppose God.
What do you think? Can we be for God while opposing his appointed leader especially if that person has committed no wrong against God? Or are we really against God because we don't like what He has revealed to us?

40 Years. Really?

I read today in the book of Numbers chapter 14 how the people rebeled against God through their leader Moses. First, angry leaders who did not like what Moses wanted them to do told the people why they were opposed to it, then the people began to murmur and complain. They even suggested getting rid of Moses and starting over with a new leader who would do what they thought best. God punished those people by keeping them out of the promised land until all the troublemakers died in the wilderness. It would be 40 years before the people would be able to see the promised land.
This reminds me of stroies that I have heard of churches that struggle for years, and suddenly it all comes together without a leadership change. John Osteen struggled to grow Lakewood for many years and it suddenly grew and now is lead by his son Joel as one of the biggest churches in America. Many new churches grow fast, but many of the older churches that for some reason have struggled after growing early on begin to see rapid growth not with new pastors, but with committed pastors who stick with the churches long enough to see the renewed growth. Why?
My theory is that new churches are built through the work of the man God called to start the church, the pastor. The first people involved with the church are supporters of the pastor because they not only believe that he is the person who was called by God to lead them, but also that the pastor will lead the people to do what God wants them to do. Older churches had that pastor many years ago, and when he left, the man or men who replaced him could never compare to the pastor who lead them for all those years successfully. It then changed from the pastor leading the church to do God's work to the people who were lead by the former pastor to do what they collectively believed was God's work.
What I am trying to say is that pastors of older churches are not trusted to lead, or if a pastor asks the congregation to do something such as pray or visit or write a testimony the people do not treat it as an important assignment. Instead, they get upset when the pastor suggests something new or different even though there is nothing Biblically wrong. It might actually help to advance God's Kingdom, but that doesn't matter because it will never work, they say. So starts the grumblings as in Numbers 14. The next thing to happen is people start to cry for a new leader and start over again... and again... and again... and again until there is no one left because the church has closed its doors. If the leader sticks with it long enough; though, those people will either leave or pass away to where he will have a new group of people who trust his leadership or the next leader and the begin to see growth.
Now if you say, "I would never have done what those people did to Moses by disrespecting his leadership!" Look at your relationship with your pastor. Are you treating him with the respect and trust that a man of God deserves? Are you open and available to the things he wants you to do whether through the church of in your personal life? Or do you debate his decisions? Question his leadership? Grumble against him? Silently wish you had a new pastor who would make things the way they were in the past? If you can't trust your pastor, what makes you any better than the people who opposed Moses?
I have stuggled with this myself, but by reading God's Word, He reveals to us the things we are doing wrong in our lives whether they are sinful or things that keep us from doing the work that He has called us to do. God revealed this to me today, it was so important that I felt like sharing it with everyone. I hope this helps you in your daily walk with the Lord. I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments if you have any. A final request: Thank your pastor for all that he does for you, for the church, and for accepting the call to lead the church.

*Thank you, Pastor Mike for all you do. - Waldrop Memorial Baptist Church

The Monster Movie Tournament

Today, I offically began the Monster Movie Tournament. You can watch my video explaining the tournament on You Tube. It's called "The Monster Movie Tournament" located on Trojanpear's channel.
This tournament is about watching movies, not Dracula or the Mummy, but Godzilla, Gamera, dinosaurs and other giant monsters. There is a 68 movie tournament with two play-in tournaments, a 16 and 8 movie tournament. Today marked the beginning of the 8 movie play-in tournament. The match-ups are listed in the bracket above, ranked according to my judgement of how well known the movies are or if many people have watched the movie.
The game goes like this: take your first match-up and watch the higher ranked movie first. After you watch it, score it as a basketball score. I consider 70 to 79 an average score. Watch the second movie the next day and score it. Compare the two scores. The higher score wins.
I will be completing the first round over the course of the next month. At that time I will report the results of the first round and move on to the next round. I also predicted which movies I believed would win and how confident I was in their victory. The predicted winners are: Inframan, Atragon, Varan, and Legend of the Dinosaurs.

Will you play the tournament? What were your outcomes? Were they what you expected? Who do you think will win and who should win?
Check out my video on you tube for more explanation of the tournament.

Wednesday Night at Waldrop

This Wednesday evening, Waldrop was all about missions and prayer. Our Fellowship dinner tonight was provided as a fundraiser for the youth and to help with costs for our mission team going to New York this summer. Then our regular prayer meeting started with its normal music and prayer for those on the prayer list, but afterwards we listened to a special speaker from The Voice of the Martyrs. He provided everyone with a magazine that included a prayer map for all the perscuted countries that we need to remember during our prayertime. He offered subscriptions to the magazine and I signed up. He also gave away bracelets to remind us to pray for China while talking about the Chinese persecution. Despite the persecution, he said that China is leading thousands to Christ every day. Praise the Lord! He also provided everyone a copy of the book Tortured for Christ. In addition to all the freebees he also had a collection of books he was selling for a reduced price to any interested. Tonight, I will be praying for China and the other persecuted countries mentioned tonight.

Missions is so important in our prayer life and should be important in our own lives, but so many of us do not even think about it until someone reminds us about it. Why is missions so hard for us? We don't pray or act enough for missions. I have been on two mission trips and done some local work, but I always have felt that I have not prayed nearly enough. There is also more that I could have done. God commands us ALL to do missions. What can we do to improve our mission focus?

Acts 1:8 "But you will receive power when the holy spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere - in Jeruselem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day! I hope everybody enjoyed it. I also hope everyone got their gifts in time because I was out delivering everyone's last minute gifts that they sent via express mail. I know people were shipping and ordering stuff late for Valentine's Day because I picked up about 100 boxes Saturday which contained poems in a bottle with teddy bears. I understand they cost about 40 dollars plus shipping. When I showed this to my supervisor she said, "Oh my God!" At least the post office is making some good money from this.
Today we normally have a heavy load of express mail that needs to be delivered, but today was way more than normal. Most zip codes had a 33% increase today. That means there must have been a lot of people ordering gifts at the last minute. I also found that most people were home to sign for their express mail. To all those who ordered for Valentine's Day, I would like to thank you on behalf of the post office for your business.

Valentine's Day was just another day for me, but what about you? How was your Valentine's Day? Did something special or memorable happen today?

Dinner at Longhorn

Today, we had my birthday dinner celebration. Now, for those who don't know, my birthday was January 21st. It took us a little while to get everybody available at the right time, particularly because we don't like to eat out on weekends. It finally gave me a chance to use my gift card. We had been planning to go to Longhorn to celbrate my birthday, but with all the delays, I thought we would end up waiting until the new one opened. Of course, the new Longhorn seems to be taking forever just to finish the parking lot, so who knows when it would finally open.
We decided to go to Longhorn for the first time in a long while. I had enjoyed my one and only time at Longhorn with a Sunday School group; however, my parents did not enjoy it the last time they went which is why I haven't been in a while. Some things have changed since the last time I went there, but that shouldn't be a surprise.
The lighting was much better than at Bonefish, the last place we went. The server was also very good. The only thing was that she took a little while bringing our drinks. The bread they provided was the most basic bread I have ever seen at these pricey resturaunts. It was basically toasted wheat bread with butter on the side. It was still better than the bread at Bonefish though. We ordered an appetizer called the Texas Tonion. This was probably the best part of the entire meal; of course, I do enjoy bloomin onions and this was pretty close to that. The salads were good as well, but I mistakenly got French dressing instead of Thousand Island so it was not as good as it could have been. The main course for me was grilled shrimp with fries and I substituted the rice for Macaroni and Cheese. The shrimp were excellent and the fries were great as well. The mac and cheese... well, I was not really pleased with it. I could taste ham in it which was a huge mark against it and it just wasn't what I expected. The worst part was that it cost extra to get the mac and cheese. Next time I will get something else.
To grade my experience:

Service: A-
Environment: A
Drinks: A
Bread: C
Salad: B-
Appetizer: A+
Main Course: A
Side 1 (Fries): A-
Side 2 (Mac and Cheese): D

Overall: B

By the way the place was rated 87/B which is not a very good rating considering most places have A ratings, but I could not tell why it would have the rating since we do not get the reports in our paper any more.

Have you ever been to Longhorn? What was your expirience like? Was it like mine? Better? Worse? Post your comments. I would love to see what your responses are.

Witness and Testimony Month Week 2

I look forward to Sunday mornings. My whole week revolves around Sunday morning when I get up and go to church. Every Sunday, I try to do my best to provide everyone who comes to church a pleasurable experience. I do all these things and every once and a while someone gives me a reson to believe that all these things I organize are worth while. One of those moments happened today when our Sunday School teacher Will Burgan gave his testimony today.
This was special to me because it was such a well developed testimony even though he has most of it written down on a paper I provided the class last week. You see, our Sunday School class is observing Witness and Testimony Month by having members give testimonies every week. I gave my testimony last week and asked Will to give his this week. We also have a volunteer for next week. The goal is to get everyone to write out their testimony and practice sharing it to others. I did it first so as not to put pressure on everyone else the first week. I also gave everyone a paper to help them set up their testimony and write it down. The paper also provided directions for marking their own Bibles. Today I went over that in more detail by providing them with old marked Bibles in the King James Version. I found them very useful and at the very least a good model for leading a person to Christ.
Witness and testimony month will continue next week with more witnessing tools and another testimony from another class member. I have found this to be a great blessing to see others grow by writing and sharing their testimony. You might want to write and share your testimony too if you haven't already done so.

The Postman vs the Teacher

I am a mailman. I used to be a teacher. I went to college to be a high school math teacher and spent three years teaching high school kids. Now I deliver mail. If you ask me, I think I am more gifted at teaching, but I love being the mailman. I was praised by my supervisor who said that she wished she had ten others like me. That made me feel good. It was not the firsttime I have been praised as a mail carrier or even the only time that day. I never got complimented like that as a teacher. The schools were more worried about management of the classroom than if the teacher could actually teach well. As a mailman, I may not be the best in my ability, but I have proven myself to be hard working, reliable, efficient, and one who doesn't complain. I think this is what is wrong with the world today. Many people complain and don't give their best because they should be paid more or treated better. I think I am treated well and don't care what others think. Give your best and don't be a complainer. Just do your job.

Which job do you think would be better? What are your thoughts about working hardM LetKs discuss.

New Video

Today I posted my first video on Youtube as Trojanpear. The video is about a book I wrote in second grade. I wrote and illustrated a book called The Crypt Keeper at the Beach. It is about a character known as the Crypt Keeper who spends his summer at the beach. The Crypt Keeper is from the TV show Tales from the Crypt which I watched around the time I made this book. My mom helped me get this story written and she did most of the color illustrations. My second grade teacher, Ms. Scranton, put my story in book format, so she was basically my publisher.

I hope you take time to watch the video. I would like to know your thoughts.
Did you ever write a book as a kid? Were there illustrations?
Maybe I will write another story someday...

The Sabbath

While reading my daily scripture passages for reading the Bible in one year, I read a passage from Leviticus which deals with something most people are familiar with. The passage is from Leviticus 23:3.

"There are six days when you may work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of rest, a day of sacred assembly. You are not to do any work; wherever you live, it is a Sabbath to the Lord."

I have long wondered how we could obey the command to "observe the Sabbath." Work is something we all have to do everyday, and if not us, then someone else will. Then I read this passage from Leviticus 23:7.

"On the first day hold a sacred assembly and do no regular work."

This passage is decribing the Lord's Feast of Unleavened Bread, but it brought to light in me an understanding about the Sabbath as we observe it today. Our Sabbath is Sunday, the first day of the week. We hold weekly Worship services or "sacred assemblies" and many of us do no regular work on Sunday. I as a postman do not work on Sunday and try not to do any major projects that day, but as a Sunday School Director, I always found myself working hard at church. The work I do for the church on Sunday is not regular work. It is not dishonoring the Sabbath. Making simple meals on Sunday is not real work, but making large meals is. Services such as hospital, police, and fire services are not regular work because they are essential for our protection and well being, but some things that they do are not needed on the Sabbath. I applaud places that are not open for business on Sundays such as Chick-fil-a, schools, mail delivery, and some small businesses. They understand their services are not essential and that it is more important to "observe the Sabbath."

I spend my Sundays by going to Sunday School and Sunday Worship, taking a nap, and generally not doing any "regular work." One area I can improve is to eat minor meals and not go out on Sunday. Church potlucks are okay because all the work can be done Saturday night so that it is ready to go Sunday.

What are your thoughts about the Sabbath? How do you "observe the Sabbath and keep it holy?