To all my friends on Facebook…..

Matt22

36 Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?

37 And he said to him, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.

38 This is the great and first commandment.

39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.

Matt 5

43 “You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.

44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,

45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.

46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?

Matt 7

Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?

4 Or how can you say to your brother, Let me take the speck out of your eye, when there is the log in your own eye?

5 You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.

I think social networking sites are great.  You get to see and read what’s going on with all your “friends” from way back.  Normally, I like it.  I’m a little nosey so quite frankly I enjoy it.  But lately, I’ve become tired of it.  I’m finding out way too much stuff about people.  What I’m finding is that there are a lot of supposedly good Christian people that don’t read the Word and take lots of pride in hate.  I’m far from perfect and have boat loads of flaws, so I’m sure I’m opening myself up here but it’s becoming painful to continue to read this stuff and I feel the need to say something.  Ultimately, I guess I won’t read the stuff anymore.

Instead of thrashing on all of the people who feel the need to express their hatred for the Liberal Democrat, the Homosexual or the Muslim….I just implore you to read the scriptures above, ask the Holy Spirit to speak to you, and see what you might hear.  It just might be life changing.

Peace

Nick

Last night was fun!!

And it really was. Earlier this week, James told me that George (his f-n-law) wanted to go see Junior Brown at the South Plains Fair and he wanted to know if I wanted to go too. To be honest, I remembered the name but I really couldn’t recall anything the guy had done. So I did a little research, refreshed my memory and decided that I’d go. At a minimum I figured it would be better than sitting around the house all evening. Besides, these opportunities are fixing to be put on hold for the next year or so.

Anyway, we went last night. The fair was packed because of the stock shows, so parking was a little bit of a problem. Not really a big deal for two able bodied men, but for a grumpy old tee shirt salesmen….good parking is a big deal. James dropped us off at the gate and he went to park. I had to get out with George ‘cause he needs supervision.

We got to the venue and I wasn’t surprised to see that there wasn’t that many people there. So, we got good seats and settled in for the show. The opening act was a Texas Country band. They were’ pretty good but I wasn’t overly impressed. They played for an hour and then there was a small intermission. Then the real show started.

First, two guys that I know are younger than me come out on the stage, decked out in their suits and ties to set things up. These dudes looked like they were lost in the 50’s tonight. They were the bass player and the drummer. The bass player had a the typical set up but the drummer had a snare w/ brushes and small ride. They started a little intro. It reminded me of the beginning of the Johnny Cash movie a couple of years ago, where they’re waiting for him to come up on stage in the prison. Anyway, Junior Brown came out. The crowd went wild and he went right into it.

Initially, the coolest thing is his instrument. It’s called a “guit-steel”. It’s basically a double necked guitar. The top is a tele and the bottom is a lap steel guitar. It’s kinda ugly but it’s really cool. It looks like it weighs 50 lbs. He actually sets it on a modified music stand with padding to hold it in place. He jumps back and forth from the electric to the steel with ease. It’s pretty freakin’ cool.

As time went on, I was seriously impressed with his talent as a guitar player. This dude can tear it up. It’s hard to explain what it does to me watching a master do his work, but it’s something like watching the sun set over the mountains. It’s kinda crazy. It’s dang near a religious experience. Junior Brown is the best guitar player I’ve ever watched at a live concert. I’d venture to say that he’s as good as SRV…just a little different.

Ultimately, I was blown away by the fact that for an hour and a half he never stopped. There was virtually no end to any song. If there was ever a pause, it was for literally one second. He transitioned from one song to next, one right after the other until it was all done. More bands should play like that.

When it was over, I was dang near gitty. It was a great show. Maybe the best I’ve ever been to. I never would have guessed it. James, George and I went up to the stage as everyone filed out. We wanted to look at Mr. Brown’s amp and associated set up. He plays a vintage 60’s era Fender Twin Reverb. It was something to behold. We gawked at his stuff until the bouncer had to politely ask us to leave. That’s when George told the guy “We were gonna just kick you a$$, but I guess we’ll go.” Note that this guy was pushing 350lbs easy. Fortunately, George looks like the crazy old man that he is. The bouncer thought it was funny, cracked a joke or two and was glad to walk at a short distance behind us until we finally left the building.

So, it was great night. Thanks James for inviting me. I’ll remember this one for a long time.

Nick

As usual, it’s been a long time…..

I guess I’m just not cut out for being a real blogger.  Other things seem to get in the way, like guitars, amps, bands….oh, and really important stuff like my wife and kids.  Anyway, I figured I would give a small update to what’s been going on.  Since my last post, we’ve found out that we’re having twins, moved, changed churches and changed schools.  It doesn’t sound like much in eight words or so, but to say the least, change and transition have been the two words that best describe the last six to eight months.

I really can’t complain about anything.  Of course, the news of Pepper being pregnant was great.  The news of twins was and still is excessively exciting.  The move from Post to Lubbock and everything associated with that was timely and no doubt a God send.  So everything is really good for us right now.  The boys love their new school, we love our new house and we’re pretty excited about our new church.

As if I didn’t have enough going on, James and I have been doing quite a bit of research to start moding our guitar amps.  Ultimately, we would like to start moding anyone’s amp that would like us to.  And really, there’s a huge market in Lubbock for amp repair.  I just got mine repaired and it took the one guy that’s here in Lubbock a month to get it done.  So, maybe someday soon we’ll have a little side business going on doing stuff we ‘really like. 

Anyway, that’s about all that’s going on right now.  Well, the short story anyway.  Pepper is due on the 15^th, so hopefully I’ll be updating things here with the twins.  It’s more likely that it’ll be on face book first but anyway….stay tuned.  You just might see something up here….then again you may not.

That’s what He said….Vol. 1

Before I start my first installment of “That’s what He said…” I wanted to explain briefly how I plan on doing this.  In an effort to not write 14 sermons or a book every week, I’m probably gonna stick to the high spots.  You know, the verses that sparked the most conversation within our group.  Lets be honest, not to diminish the importance of all scripture because it is all God breathed and profitable but some of the stuff Jesus said is pretty straight forward and there’s not a huge need to belabor the point.  We just need to do it.  So, I may skip a few verses here and there for the sake of brevity.  Otherwise, you’ll get bored, I’ll get tired and this will be less than what I want it to be.  So, with that said….here we go.

Oh, by the way, if I skip something that you think should be discussed just throw it out there and we’ll talk about it.  By no means do I consider myself an expert on what’s of highest importance.  This is just an exercise that I think will be beneficial.

In Matt 3:15 Jesus is talking to John the Baptizer who has just made an attempt to talk Jesus out of being baptized by him.  Jesus said “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.”   I thought this was interesting because I believe it showed Jesus’ understanding of the authority of Scripture.  He knew that this moment had been prophesied about in scripture and He knew that He needed to be a perfect example to us and that is why I  think He pressed John into doing it.  Did Jesus need to be baptized for his own good?  I’m gonna step out on a limb here and say no.  Since He is God, I’m thinking not but I do believe that in order to fulfill prophecy and show us the importance of it, He knew it needed to be done.  Can you imagine what’s going on in John’s head during this conversation and what He was thinking as he baptized Him.  It had to have been a crazy experience.

In Matt 4:4-10 Jesus has just spent 40 days in the wilderness and is now being tempted by satan.  We noted the fact that satan used misused  Scripture and his own perceived power to try and manipulate Jesus but Jesus, knowing the Scriptures the way He did, used them correctly to stand against the temptation.  I think this shows the absolute importance of striving to understand the whole of Scripture.  It’s so easy to take a small set of verses and misuse them.  We do it all of the time and satan must love it.  We need to ask the Holy Spirit to enlighten us as we study the Word so that we use it correctly in accordance with His will.

In Matt 4:17 Jesus sets the stage for His ministry and states, in what is  my opinion, the ground floor and most important piece of the pie….”Repent for the kingdom of heaven is near.”  Somewhere along the line to many churches have lost this concept.  Following Jesus requires a constant worldview of repentance.  If we don’t do this, we’re just living out our own version of this religion and that’s exactly what it turns into…..worthless religion.

In Matt 4:19 Jesus proclaims His call to us all “Come, follow me,”…..and that’s what we’re trying to do.  We just need to have people around us to help us remember that.  In our bible belt culture it’s a little hard to remember sometimes that we’re supposed to be following Jesus, not a set of church bylaws.  Personally, I wish we would quit calling ourselves Christians and start calling ourselves Jesus followers.  I know this is knit picky but I know too many people that have such a bad perception of Christians but if you talk about Jesus than they’re fine.  So for me, when people ask, I tell them I’m a Jesus follower.  It just seems to open up a few more doors in conversations and helps us move past all of the stupid stuff we as “Christians” have done over the years.  It also helps me keep a better perspective of what I’m following.  I’m not following my church, my church leadership or there to please the people….I’m following Jesus.  It just raises the bar for me and keeps me a little more focused on what’s important and the hope is that if you’re following Jesus, the rest will work itself out.

So, I think I’ll stop there for now.  Next we get into the sermon on the mount and that’s gonna be lengthy.  I hope this installment of “That’s what He said…” has been thought provoking for you.  If it’s a little too remedial for you, sorry.  Comment away and let’s take it as deep as you want.  Thanks for reading and I look forward to your comments.

Peace

That’s what He said….

Once again I’m back to the world of blogging.  I really do enjoy it.  I just tend to find more important things to do.  I have passed the 1000 mark on visits though so I think that’s pretty cool for the limited amount of people that read this.  So, thanks for reading when I post. 

Now, to what I’m really here for.  About six weeks ago I started a home group bible study.  It’s a small deal.  It’s my family and two others.  I’m really excited about it and so far I think it’s been really good.  I’m also really excited about what we’re studying.  We decided to go through the Gospels and look specifically at what Jesus said and get a solid grasp on exactly what it is and how to practically apply it to our lives.  End goal: Don’t speculate what following Jesus is, just look at what He said and do it.  We want to be Jesus followers and this should be a good place to “start”.

My goal….and I think it is a stretch goal…is to share this with you through a weekly post here on the blog.  I’ll call them “That’s what He said.”  And yes I love “The Office”.  I think it will be beneficial for me to write it all out and I hope that ultimately it would be beneficial to all who read it.  Also, if you see me or read a post that doesn’t show proof of living out any of this stuff, I give you free reign to blog bash me back into where I need to be.  I like…..need accountability.  So, as is the case with all of my posts, feel free to discuss.  I’m always interested in you guys thoughts.  It should make for some good discussion.

So, be looking for new posts and lets hope that it’s good stuff.  Throw in your 2 cents and lets see what we come up with.

Peace