3.30.2003

i still don't get it, i don't deserve you

Well I could say a lot of things about this weekend. It has been an insane week, very busy and yes, even stressful (declares the man who insists he is never stressed out). So much happened in so many different areas. And to end the week I led a group of 27 people up to Sacramento for a big youth rally. The rally was a lot of fun, in the end.

I've been to atf for three years now and I go through the same emotional trip each time. I am initially skeptical, then critical, then almost disgusted, then disappointed, then bored, then worried, then touched by God. Those don't seem to follow very much but they all combine to make the divine intervention that much more meaningful.

God has actually been all over this weekend and this past week of my life and it has been utterly amazing to see. He answered countless prayers and worked out so many things to make it possible for us to go this weekend. And then when we were in Sacramento He did so much I couldn't even begin to list it out.

I was the most touched when I went down to the floor with a large group of my students at the last 'altar call.' They were overcome with tears, sobbing, holding each other, and crying out to God. I am sometimes worried about emotionalism - about this experience substituing for a real connection with God. But I could see in some of these kids' faces such a desire for God and a brokenness before Him that I had no doubt He had touched them and had worked. It is literally awe-inspiring for me to be in a big group hug with ten of my girls, or to see someone I was talking to a few hours before about how they felt empty just look at me with red watery eyes and give me a big hug because God just gave them a bigger one.

I didn't cry yesterday, I'm not given to that sort of thing. But God totally touched my heart with what He did for these students. Because really, He did it for me too. They bless me more than I think they know, or can know. God is freaking awesome, I suppose that's what it boils down to. I have almost never been more certain of His existence than I am now, after seeing what I saw happen these past seven days, the good and the bad.

More than anything though, I don't want what God did with these kids to become a memory for them. I don't want it to be an event they went to and got worked up at and cried at and felt like they deepened friendships at. I want them to view it as an experience they had with the Almighty God that changed their lives, that showed them in a new way how He cares for them through all the garbage of life. Cause man, I don't care where they were this weekend. I care where they will be in two years, five years, ten years, twenty years. Will they still be walking with God, or will this all have been a phase, reduced to a memory? I want so bad for them to meet God and never turn back.

3.27.2003

I don't have time to go in-depth about anything. I wasn't hacked...the page was being pointed to a resource on an anti-war website to display the image. Apparently the rabid anti-military people in charge of the site discovered that the picture was very popular with people opposing their viewpoint. So, they decided to change the filename on their end so all these ostensibly pro-war sites would be showing the new picture. I have no response aside from "whatever."

Gotta go. Helping my dad and bro move today.

3.24.2003

i forgot to order my latte nonfat

Awesome. I guess the Chinese government isn't all bad. And there's something ominously cool about saying "You must immediately stop this activity and go to the Hangzhou Urban Administrative Bureau for punishment."

There's something that pastors call "PMS", or "Post Message Syndrome." It's characterized by a downcast mood and general lack of emotional energy following delivering a message/sermon. It usually last for 24-48 hours after the message. I've experienced this every time I've given a message in the past. It's pretty weird - you feel depressed and drained and you're not totally sure why. Thankfully I'm only experiencing a minor case this time. I don't have time to be down! I have to get in gear for Acquire the Fire this coming weekend. Various arrangements have fallen through and it's on the verge of being stressful. Not too bad though, since I'm confident God will provide what we need. I'm just saying. It's making me do a little scrambling, which has helped me to avoid the P to the M to the S. So that's a good side of it.

It feels really good to have people I haven't seen in a while come up and say 'you look like you've lost weight.' Rather than dwell on the fact that this means at least at one point I looked fat to them I prefer to focus on the positive side. I am happy that the change in my eating habits has produced results - I have to keep it up though, and develop an exercise routine I can keep up with. Then I'll get healthy like I want to be.

Okay I am finished rambling. Except...oh yeah...

[image deleted]

There is no excuse for attitudes like that. Being anti-war is one thing, but this is another. These morons give intelligent anti-war people a bad name. I mean, seriously people. You make me not want to listen to anything you say.

3.22.2003

civilization is only skin deep

It was a beautiful day in San Diego. Hot enough for me to turn on the AC. I had today to myself essentially, and for the first half of it I was convinced I was becoming my dad. First, let me say, it's fun driving around Greg's big V8 truck. The thing only has 20k or so miles on it, runs wonderfully...there's definitely something to be said for high-clearance vehicles. Every time I drive a truck I want one. And then I go to put gas in it and am disabused of such foolish notions.

This morning I took a drive through some rocky canyon-like area, it really was beautiful. Clear, blue, sunny sky, window down, radio loud... I ended up in some smallish town, where I stopped at a yard sale and didn't find anything interesting. Looking at some of the stuff out on those blankets, I wonder if the people seriously believed it would sell. Who knows, though. One man's trash... I learned about the Battle of San Pasqual in my California History class a couple years ago and was surprised to see the historic site for it only 15 minutes from here. I went by there and did a little hiking - it was such the perfect day for that. I also stopped at an ostrich farm, where I picked up some ostrich jerky. At this point I am positive I am becoming my father. I'm saving some of the jerky to give to him when I get back. He's probably already tried it, considering his odd quest for all things meat, but I figure in case he hasn't it'd be a cool thing. After a brief stop at the North County Mall (basically Valley Fair, for those of us in the Bay Area) I headed back to Greg's place.

I'm taking care of this little Lhasa Apso dog named Pitoofa. I'm not sure that's how you spell it, but it's the closest I can come. Pitoofa is insanely in love with her masters, but she is also insanely in love with getting attention. This dog will not stop vying for my affection, and then when I give it to her she has this way of nonverbally saying "well, it's good, but I still wish you were Karla." It's insulting. She'll probably sleep on my bed tonight, but I know I'll just be a warm body and she doesn't really care who I am. Sniff.

Perhaps my greatest disappointment today was Cal's drubbing at the hands of Oklahoma. Maybe it's the whiner in me talking, but it sure seemed like Cal was getting called pretty tight with the fouls and the refs were letting the Sooners run all over the Bears when they were on defense. Really though, Oklahoma was the better team. It seemed like Cal didn't know what to do, they were totally off at the beginning, at one point there were three bears around the ball with no Sooners within twenty feet, and two of the Bears knocked the other one down. The crowd had a good laugh at that. It was a good final game for Wethers, I suppose, as he really shined and really single-handedly supplied that little bit of hope that kept me watching till the last few minutes.

Well, tomorrow I'm up for preachin' at the Bridge. I think everything will be fine, I trimmed and tuned the message today. I'm a little concerned about the length, and hope it's not too dry...I'm doing expository rather than topical, which is a big change not only for me but for my audience. With the empty house, I would verbally practice giving the sermon and by now I'm sure the dog thinks I'm insane; at first it perked up Pitoofa. Then she started walking around looking for who I was talking to. Finally, she settled down and looked at me with what can only be described as a mix of bemusement and pity. Hmph.

3.20.2003

off for the weekend

Right now I'm working on finishing up my message for the weekend; I'm preaching at The Bridge. I need to finish typing the manuscript so I can practice speak it and get the length right. Then I can figure out what I have to trim, etc etc. Here are some of the things that have been occupying my mind during my breaks.

Where is Raed? This is a blog from Iraq. The guy is in Baghdad, talking about the sirens and everything as we bomb. It's really amazing to me to be able to read this kind of thing. As far as I know this is unprecedented. It almost seems unreal to be reading his writing. You should totally check this out.

Optimus Prime. Jeannette popped on long enough to send me this link. I can't decide if it's cool, touching, or pathetic. It brought a smile to my face regardless.

Bravo Cal! Good job Bears...they've done really well this season, I'm proud of 'em. Here's hoping their run doesn't end in the round of 32, since they'll be facing Oklahoma, the #1 seed in the East. Waaah.

Okay, I'll possibly post more later. If not, I hope you have a great weekend. If you're into that sort of thing throw a prayer my way for safe travel this weekend and that God would do His thing with me in San Diego.
Okay, now, I'm all for keeping up on the war and all that. Staying informed, etc, that's well and good. We have countless channels devoted to this, countless ways to keep up on the war. Channel 2, Channel 4, Channel 5, Channel 7, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, etc.

So answer me this...

Why would UPN pre-empt the Simpsons with war coverage?!?!?

Hussein has already won.

3.18.2003

Quick note - any of you know Tina Key? Well it's her birthday today. I know way too many people with birthdays in this little itty bitty span of time. But Tina, if you read this - Happy Birthday!
acrostics gone too far

Warning: This post may be semi-inappropriate. I woke up about five minutes ago and as such my filters aren't fully working yet. So right now the amusement I felt over this overrides its questionable nature. If you're easily offended then don't ready any further.

I had a bad/amusing dream last night. I dreamt that my pastor was doing a sermon on whether or not we have the desire to follow Christ and he was challenging us to do so. Paul has a thing with acrostics, he has one in almost every sermon to help demonstrate his point. The acrostic he was using to encourage us to boldly follow Christ? Do you have the B-A-L-L-S to serve the Lord? I distinctly remember looking incredulously at the message outline in the dream thinking, there is NO way Paul did this! Apparently, I was correct.

I also had a dream that I accepted some sort of award on behalf of Star Trek people. I don't know what that was all about. But I do know my acceptance speech went on too long. I got a few rounds of applause though, so those production jerks shouldn't have tried to hurry me up. If the people love me, the people love me, dude. Don't hate.

3.17.2003

this rules

Two things rule right now. One - I am at Bay St. coffee and I'm updating this mofo. While talking to my mom today I mentioned that I was sort of looking for a laptop, and if she came across any or any good deals at work I'd appreciate it if she'd let me know. Well as it turned out she had two laptops at home right then. The 'good' one has issues so she's going to send it in for warranty repairs. For now though I'm using another, inferior one. But this inferior one is still infinitely better than the nonexistent one I had not four hours ago. I hopped over to Fry's and picked up an 802.11g wireless card and voila, here I am at ye olde Bay St giddy with excitement over my newfound internet freedom.

The other thing I wanted to mention. A guy at the table next to me just farted and I felt almost no inclination to laugh at him. Jesse would be proud.

You know, I could type on this thing forever. I love the clickity-click noise laptop keyboards make. Wheeeee!

3.14.2003

my paper heart will bleed

American was a good time yesterday, and Irvington was enjoyable today. I got a lot of work done on my sermon for next week, actually. I've decided to talk about Paul and Acts 14. When I asked for direction on what to talk about Greg said "talk to the young people Jackson." So hopefully they'll connect with what I say. Last night at the coffee shop it all just kinda rolled off the pen as I outlined the message. Today was a little rougher but I feel good about it overall.

This sermon will be more 'storytelling' than my previous ones. I'm going to set the stage by talking about Saul before he became Paul and establish how much of a villain he was. From there I'll talk about his conversion and how vastly different his life was from there on out. Acts 14 is the focus, and I'm going to actually take them through that entire chapter. After that I'll draw four lessons from Paul's story and wrap it up like that.

Perhaps my favorite story in Acts 14 is when Paul and Barnabas are preaching in Lystra. Paul sees a man in the crowd and God heals the man through Paul. The crowd sees that an is amazed; as Paul and Barnabas are relaxing later, they hear the people ran to the priest of Zeus at the edge of town. Everyone is convinced that Barnabas is Zeus and Paul is Hermes, and they're bringing oxen to sacrifice in their name! The Bible says that Paul and Barnabas ran out and tore their clothes with frustration, shouting at the people "what are you doing?!" Even after Paul explained again that he wasn't a god and was there on behalf of "the living God that created heaven and earth" he had trouble dissuading the people from sacrificing the oxen.

That's one of those "people are stupid" moments that only happens in real life or good comedy. Every now and then I'll read a passage in the Bible and I can really just nod my head and say "yep, that there's a real person." I know it sounds lame, but I can often relegate what I'm reading to the realm of story where the people are characters instead of humans. So I'm happy for the reminders that I'm reading about actual people.

On another note...tell the truth...you wish she were a stewardess on your last flight.

3.13.2003

both schools on alder avenue have eagles as their mascot

For those of you that may be interested, I'll be a "basic math" teacher at American High School today. The class title has me a little wary and brings up images of Stand and Deliver but we'll see. The cool thing would be to somehow be able to tell what schools are going to call you that day so you know if you wait you can get a job teaching a) a better subject or b) at Washington. I've been to American once though and it was fine.

Alecia, if you read this, find me and say hey!

3.12.2003

Major stokage. Is that a word?

Just got a call from John Pack - he's talking about me coming out there in the early summer to lead a little weekend retreat with him and Becca for his little sister's prayer group. Sounds freakin' cool. And I'll get to lead with John and Becca again...I already can't wait.
bonjourrrrr, ya cheese eatin' surrender monkeys!

[sarcasm]

Clearly the French have gone too far. No longer will America tolerate their chronic spinelessness. We have renamed a staple of the American diet; so go fatten yourself up with a large order of Freedom Fries and show those French what for. We may waddle and huff and puff our way to the front lines, but at least we're not hiding at home behind our baguettes and upturned noses!

[/sarcasm]

It's Kevin's birthday. Sing to him, or whack him, or something. If you wish to deliver gifts, give them to me first and I'll pass them along.

The most successful bully ever.

On another note, I was very discouraged this weekend. Sunday a couple different students came to me with problems on their mind, things that were bothering them. They came to me for wisdom/comfort/guidance - and I was completely useless to them. It pretty much ruined my day, I was miserable. What was I doing, if these kids were coming to me and I couldn't do jack? And I've been unable to help before, but for some reason it hit me more this weekend. I haven't felt so utterly useless before. After a few days I'm in a better place regarding the situation.

Deep down I think I liked (like) students coming to me with their problems. Some pride in me likes to be the one they come to and the one they trust with what's going on in their lives. And I was upset a) because I couldn't help but also b) because I couldn't help. See the difference? See the problem?

I must decide to point students in God's direction, and to be comfortable and acknowledge truly in my heart that I cannot help everyone. I have to get rid of any pride I have that wants people to acknowledge me as a source of anything but directions to God's throne. It's not me - I have to learn that! I'm a beggar telling other beggars where to find bread. It's liberating and saddening at the same time. Anyway enough from me for now.

3.08.2003

someone's gonna ask you what it's all about

How many of you share a bathroom/shower with other people? Okay, of you, how many think it's capital-N Nasty when they leave hair on the soap? Well I do.

I am almost completely devoid of energy. Last night I went camping at Big Basin with a few friends. Met the famed Minnesota Twins. Enjoyed a 10 mile hike on a beautiful day today. Came home for a wedding, where I was drafted as the video camera guy. Ran around the reception videotaping everything and everyone that moved. Turned off three false alarms on buildings and helped with wedding cleanup. Came home and sat in front of computer to type a quick entry before falling unconscious.

Let it be said that the Big Basin Redwood Forest is a beautiful place. I love that Fremont is less than two hours away from such things.

Okay, so about that whole bed thing...

3.06.2003

it's official

I vastly prefer high school to jr high. I actually had kids doing the whole spitwad thing today. Making fun of other kids for their names. Laughing at a fat girl because "she'd break the tv if she sat on it." Continually looking at me to see if I just saw that, or if I can see what they're about to do. And the notes, dear lord, the notes! Yeah, high school is much better. I can relate to the kids more, I can joke with them differently. Subbing jr high felt like babysitting whereas high school has felt like "spending time with students" most of the time. But hey, it was work.

3.05.2003

three posts in one day, wow

A Primer on Ash Wednesday. I really like Tony Jones.
Haha...life really sucks for some teams. Truly a QB battle for the ages. Peete or Delhomme? I realize my tenuous position, however. If Garcia goes down my Niners are screwed. But still, I can laugh.
my foot is out the door and you can't stop me now

Subbed at Washington again today. I was sitting in the class waiting for the 1st period tardy bell to ring, and a group of five students came in, saw me, and said "Yes! Mr. Perdue!" Once I got over the fact that they called me Mr. Perdue I was happy with the fact that they were excited to have me as their sub. They'd been in the history class I worked last Friday and I guess they liked me. Hehe. I enjoyed my day, Kirstin from the youth group made me lunch and I hung out with her, Phil, and a couple of their friends. I'm not sure a job combination gets better than this. And can you imagine a better job than substitute teaching for maintaining/building/creating relationships with students?

Besides cop maybe. Hehe.

Tomorrow I'm subbing at Walters, a Jr. High. I'm not as excited about that, but it's work. I was tempted to wait it out and not accept the job to see if I got a call from Washington, but I'm not sure how to do that without getting a call every five minutes. Plus the guy specifically requested me cause he got my name from a lady at church. So I guess I should take it. Hopefully Friday I get a call from Washington. Fridays I usually get calls.

So that would mean three days of sub work this week! Looking up I say, looking up. I'm not yet at the point where I can pick and choose my jobs but I sure hope I get to the point where I can just work one or two schools (one of them being Washington).

I finished reading The Emerging Church today and it was a freakin' awesome book. There are a lot of people that want to borrow it from me too. The book's only ten bucks. I'm thinking of buying a copy for my pastor, as an early birthday present or something. I'm reluctant to lend mine out quite yet cause I'm not sure I'm done with it. The book has excited me and inspired me to do some more reading. That rules. Ministry rules. Lots of things rule.

My camera once again breaking is not one of those things. I refuses to deploy the lens. I've shipped it to Fuji twice and it's done me no good. The thing works sporadically, I don't get it. When I sent it to them last it was working by the time it got to them so they fixed nothing. I'm not sure it's even worth sending again. Sucks cause it's a nifty camera and I love takin' pictures. Ah well.

I came across a Deception Dollar at school today. First time I'd seen one of those. Mindless criticism of authority annoys me.

And oh yes, Frances now has a livejournal. She's now linked on the left there, so check it out.

I'm not sure why, but I like Zwan (warning: cracked out web page) more than I liked Smashing Pumpkins. The Pumpkins hold a certain nostalgic value for me, since they remind me of Jr. High and High School, late night sessions with friends and whatnot, but I don't consider them especially wonderful. In fact I think Billy Corgan's voice could be considered borderline irritating. But I like Zwan. Why is that?

3.04.2003

Yikes. That post is all jacked up. I hate Blogger's inability to fix stuff like that. If you screw up a link tag, it's all over for you. Oh well. Gotta go.
we're the pirates who don't do anything

I fairly certain I enjoyed my weekend. Hmm, let me think. Yep, I did. Friday I went out to the City with a few friends. Among the places we visited was Chirardelli Square for an earthquake. If you don't know what that is...it's a monstrosity of an ice cream. Eight huge scoops, eight toppings (like hot fudge, marshmallow, caramel, strawberry, etc), bananas, little chocolate trolley cars, nuts, cherries, and chocolate chips if you don't plead with the guy to not put them on because you can already tell you're going to get sick when you eat it. We were pretty optimistic when we brought it to our table, and the church service this weekend, that was fun. It's always fun in the end, cause it's basically with a bunch of my friends and people from the youth group.

Yesterday I saw Gettysburg was much better.

It's time for me to go. Lots to do today. I'm reading