a new beginning...

well, it's been a long time! I've decided to step back into the world of blogging after a year or so away. I'm moving my site to my own page. Click http://web.mac.com/brucefamily

so many changes...

well, it's been a while, hasn't it? I am planning on sharing some of the many things that have been going on in future posts. I've been on a strange journey that I'm only now able to share publicly....on a unrelated note, I'm writing this from the cool BlogDash widget that I got for my brand new ibook! So far, I love this thing...OS X rocks!

STAR WARS!!!

OK, I've been sick the last 2 days; but managed to get enough energy to go the midnight premier. I just got back and WOW!!!
it was amazing! Go see it now! I'm too excited to type right now...need to go to bed. But I'll leave you with the memorable experiences of tonight (made a lot of friends, reconnected with kids from my old youth ministry, but this tops them all)

Immediatly after the movie all guys make a mad dash for the restroom (you CANNOT get up during Star Wars)...as I'm standing at the urinal, the guy next to me turns to me and says, "Man, it's really hard to pee while you're holding a lightsaber"...only at a Star Wars premier :-) (and no, I'm not being crude...he actually had a lightsaber)

kyra date night

Angela is gone this weekend, so I told Kyra we were going on a date tonight :-) I gave her choices on what she wanted to do...and here's what she chose:

Chik-fil-a ...followed by
trip to Disney Store...followed by
A ride on the train (those little coin operated thingies at the mall...but she doesn't know you can put $ in them and make them go :-)...followed by
Some time in the mall playland...followed by
A trip to Borders; where she could pick up the book of her choice (by the way, she choose Giggles with Tigger)

We came home late, I gave her a bath (always fun :-)
and off to bed!

What a night...great fun was had by all.

But earlier wasn't so much fun. I decided to try and let Kyra have a few books in bed during nap time. We usually don't allow this because for some reason she rips the pages out of her books. But I thought she might be over that. NOT SO!

I kept hearing strange noises from her room; went in and she had taken ripping to a whole new level. She had taken her "Woodsman and the Amazing Fish" book and literally shredded it into tiny pieces. Just like a paper shredder. WHY?
Her first words (after she stopped crying from me spanking her) "Fix it daddy!" Why would she do this, I ask? "I don't know", she replied.
2 year olds....

Anyway, tonight was good. I am a blessed man. On the way home she kept wanting to hear "Rudolph" No, we don't listen to Christmas tunes in May...but I had Toby Mac's DiverCity CD playing and he has a song his son raps called "TrueDog" No matter how many times I told her it was not Rudolph ("O.K Kyra say true..."TWEU"..."OK now say dog..."DOG!"...no say true dog..."RUDOLPH!") she just wouldn't budge. Oh, well...


As I type on the mac, I found an article about email management. I am an email junky. I needed to read this article (www.macworld.com) I brought home my work laptop this weekend to see if I could clean it up. I currently have the entire desktop full of icons (and I have a 17" widescreen PC!) But even worse, my Inbox currently has 4,076 messages...508 of which are unread! This is my WORK email address; that doesn't include my personal account that basically is full of junk and spam. I need an intervention.

Off to bed. I pray Kyra sleeps in...

i'm back!

Wow, it's been over a month since I've last posted! It's not that I don't have anything to say...just trying to find the time. Lots going on at church, and in Bruce-land. We finally got a car to replace our lease that is severly over miles. The Sentra is now sitting the garage; and I'm driving a 00' Impala. We bought it from Ange's parents...they gave us a pretty good deal. So that's a burden lifted. Our house still hasn't sold...please pray for this! It's gone beyond annoying at this point.

Well, I've finally done it. I have ventured over into the mac side! As a matter of fact, I am tying this entry from my new Mac Mini! So far, I must admit I'm impressed with OS X. I've only been messing with it for a few hours, but I do have a feeling this is the beginning of a long-term relationship :-) But I do notice I don't have access to formatting options here on blogspot in Safari (mac browser) Anyone know if how to get it to work?

Last Sunday we had our Mother's Day program. It went so well. I put together a video of NC folks paying tribute to their moms, including everyone from little kids (Kyra made an appearance) to more "mature" people (won't go into ages :-) It was very touching. We also included several readings, prayer and stories as well as a wonderful presentation of flowers to mothers and those who have been like mothers to us. Here was our order:

A Proverbs 31 Woman Video - can be previewed @ sermonspice.com

Greeting - David Mangum

Doxology
Blessed Be Your Name
How Great Thou Art

Offering - John Wilkins
Thank You, Lord

A Word of Advice from the Mother - dramatic reading w/ 4 readers (2 male/2 female) from www.lifeway.com

Step By Step
Open Our Eyes, Lord

Mother's Day Tribute Video

Mother's Day Prayer - from www.lifeway.com

I Need You More

Communion - John Wilkins
Faithful Love (during passing)

I'll Love You Forever (kids are called on stage; S.Sigo will read this story; Steven will share breifly following)
Flower Presentation (kids will give flowers to mothers; adult children will take a flower from vases around New Life Hall and give to their moms; if someone has been like a mother to you as well)

Thank You For Mothers (super-cheesy song sung during this Flower Distribution)

Listen to Our Hearts

Sermon - a praying mother (5 min)

Find Us Faithful (PT sings verses; congregation joins at chorus)

Shepherd's Prayer


Recently, as a Leadership Team we have been reading the book "BreakOut Church" by thom rainer. This has provoked a lot of dialogue about our current leadership structure and church vision. I can't go into too much detail right now...but many things are changing at North Central. I'm excited to see what God has in store for us!

I'm working at home Friday. Angela is going to a conferance with some ladies from church, so I'm on Kyra patrol. Should be fun! It's been a whle since we've spent a whole day alone together. Due to travel time and nightly meetings, I haven't seen very much of her lately. Last week, the earliest I got home was 9PM. That was an odd week, but I sure don't like that. When I asked her what she wanted to do Friday she said, "go outside!" So pray for nice weather. Otherwise, I'm betting to get out of the house we'll go to our old standy date night...chik-fil-a and borders books!

Have a great Friday. I need to get off this lovely mac and go to bed!

Blessings!

the "ba-da-bah!"

Ok, things have been pretty heavy here in blog-land recently; so I’ll share some stuff that I’ve been meaning to share for a while. A few weeks ago, Angela and I sat down to watch “Supersize Me”. What a disturbing movie! It’s a documentary about a guy who decides to eat nothing but McDonalds, 3 meals a day, for 30 days. He is being monitored by doctors the entire time. The rules are, he has to eat everything on the menu at least once, and if they offer to supersize it for him, he has to take it. I don’t even think I can fully describe this movie; you need to see it for yourself. I realize that the entire movie is a bash on corporate America and the brainwashing of today’s youth, but man, it’s hard to look at the chicken nugget the same way again. Will I stop eating McD’s? I doubt it. But there is something to this brainwashing today’s youth thing. Kyra, from about 1 year old started something that was funny, but a bit disturbing. We hardly ever go to McD’s. I go, but usually at lunch. So she wasn’t really exposed to it very much. As we were driving down the street one day, all the sudden she says, “Da Ba-Da-Bah!” We were like, “what?” Then we figured it out. She recognized the golden arches and thought it was called “Ba-Da-Bah”…the newest theme song on McD’s commercials. You know, “ba-da-ba-ba-bah!” So not only do those commercials work, but our daughter obviously watches too much TV. We have since cut back. Now, when she sees the arches, she says, “There’s the Ba-Da-Bah, which is also McDonalds.” I kid you not!

So go get a Big Mac Meal and rent “Supersize Me”. It’ll make for an enjoyable evening.

the final cut

I will first preface this by saying I am about to go to sleep, but my mind is spinning. So read at your own risk :-)

I’ve mentioned a lot lately this whole idea of our live as narrative. This theme first presented itself in early December through some interesting doors that swung wide open in my life (I hope to share more on this at some point) ; then it popped up again at our Elevate planning meeting, and since then I’ve been trying to sort through it. I didn’t get a chance, as I had hoped, to read any of Allender’s “to be told” while at LTC (I had a hard time finding time to eat and sleep :-) but did get to read a bit before and some today. Ironically, I just finished watching a movie with this "life as story" theme. My mom was up this weekend and today was the first day I really got to spend with her. We all ordered pizza and rented “The Final Cut”. What an interesting movie. It’s basically about a guy whose job is “the Cutter”. His task is to take the video footage from a chip that’s implanted in our brains and make “rememorials” to be shown at our funerals. In other words, every memory you have is recorded and someone gets to sit down after you die and edit it into a short version, preserving the memories the deceased loved ones want to remember, the rest of the memories are destroyed. I won’t give anything away, but it’s worth seeing (and not near as cheesy as I just made it sound). It’s got Robin Williams (he such a great dramatic actor), Mira Sorvino, and Jim Cavezel. So this whole idea of our lives as story keeps popping up. Actually, I’m starting to think that this theme is somehow tied to our shift in culture from modernism to postmodernism. Let’s take a very “postmodern” trend like blogging for instance. In essence, it’s the author, presenting the narrative of their lives, in their own words, their own terms, so a greater community can at the very least, be entertained, or hopefully, learn from it. It’s me sharing my story, my world, my viewpoint, with you. This seems to be a very big theme in our shift into postmodernism. We are not islands unto ourselves, each doing our own thing, delivering monologue after monologue, but part of a larger scene, in which we are all improving off each other and our Creator. Our story not only effects others story, but our story effects how others perceive their own stories. But what if when you read my blog you didn’t just get my “version” of my story, but THE version of my story? OK…now I ventured into the “what the heck did he just say” part of my brain I often visit after too much caffeine and not enough sleep :-)
I’ll leave you with a quote from “to be told” pg. 121. He’s talking about our present story and what it means.

~ Do I embrace, take care of, and have gratitude for my current situation?
~ Do I take responsibility for the world that has been both given to me and created by me?
~ Do I bring my story and mission to bear in my present?

…Most of us feel outnumbered and outgunned by our current situation. We want to be freed from our problems so that we can get on with our pleasures. But God has a different plan. He wants our problems to serve as the context for knowing him and living out the story he invited us to write for his glory. This means the present is not meant primarily to be resolved, or even learned from, but to be written in a way that allows us to reveal God to others and to let him reveal himself to us.

Read that last sentence again…

the weekend

Well, I must admit, I’m glad this weekend is over. LTC went great, but man, I am worn out! It is always great to see so many young people developing and using their talents for Him. There are a lot of events for them to participate in from Bible Bowl to Scripture reading, puppetry, group singing to drama, speeches to song leading (although I wish they would help develop Worship Leaders, not song leaders…but that’s a whole different blog subject) But my favorite event is the Christian art. That gets me the most excited. I am super passionate about raising up young people who are not afraid, and are in fact, encouraged, to use their gifts in the church. “art” is something that has gone pretty much unrecognized in most churches of Christ for far too long. I am encouraged to see this change. I think the total attendance figure was around 1,100. The worship times went OK; although I must admit, besides being completely beat by the time I go up onstage; the venue is not exactly what I’m used too. I love everyone at LTC dearly, but the crowd is generally much more conservative than I am. I know I often talk about North Central being conservative; but at weekends like this, I remember that North Central is pretty “out there” comparatively. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not knocking the LTC crowd; it just puts me even more out of my element than I am at NC. Friday, we had a short worship time and the sound was rotten! It was by far the worst conditions I’ve ever led worship under. The system sounded like a bad megaphone. Saturday, everything was fixed and sounded great. Autumn from Rochester College helped me out as the Praise Team. They are a great group of college students, good hearts and good voices. For the 1st couple of songs we used vocal percussion. It sounded great; but when we went up for the extended worship time, I was asked to cut the percussion. Ouch! Opps, I had forgotten where I was :-) Then, before we launched into “Above All”, I stared sharing some thoughts on Easter. Opps! I forgot where I was again :-)
I quickly sensed the Spirit’s (thank you God) nudging that I was going to lose some of these people, so I (HE) found a way to bring it back home to convey the same message without offending. Is that compromise what Paul was talking about? And I think some people weren't quite sure what to do with "This is How We Overcome"...mourning into dancing?...spinning around? :-)

This mornings gatherings at North Central went well. The first was dragging a bit. But the 2nd, WOW…the singing was awesome. Yes there were more people, and yes, they were more awake…but I think it was more than that. God’s presence was just very strong. I got lost in His presence. I still have not figured out the differences between services. I think it goes to show you, it’s not really about you (what is planned, how well everyone does, etc.) Same leaders, same message, same set up, same location, totally different vibe. Anyway, I am constantly amazed how great the acoustics are when we have a full crowd. My ears were ringing on a New Anointing! WOW! Jenn did a great job on "For all You've Done". The Praise Team did OK on “Your grace still amazes me”. That is such a powerful song! It was a bit rocky in parts, but it ended strong and the video really helped solidify the message of the sermon.

As I prayed this morning, I hope that God’s Spirit touched someone there who does not yet realize the gift we have in receiving a new life, NOW! I can only trust that those who worshipped with us this morning came to know Him more deeply than they did before they arrived, and those that don’t yet know Him, fell in love today.

I’m going to sleep in Monday. Hey, anything more than 5 hours would be a record this weekend. Blessings.