Come out to an indie music concert night!

Save the date for the indie music night at NLLP (New Life Lincoln Park), with opening act Seminary & Lill. 

Who is Seminary & Lill you ask? That is our amazing worship band at NLLP! They'll be opening up for these two great artists!

This is going to be an amazing night! Don't miss!

The father who keeps his promises

Sunday night our family visited Mosaic, Erwin McManus' church in West Hollywood. It was an incredible service and Erwin gave a phenomenal message, as expected. Before we left for church though, our kids had their hearts set on going swimming at the hotel. We knew we wouldn't be able to make visiting Mosaic if we took a dip, so we ensured them there would be swimming when we got back. 

While buckling Baylee in after church the first words out of her mouth were, "We're going swimming when we get back, right dad?" I love swimming and having fun with my kids, so with complete confidence and intention I said, "Baylee, we are going to swim! I promise you! Unless the pool is broken, we will swim. And if for some reason it's closed when we get back then I promise we will go in the morning." The result was one huge smile.

Now take the fact that 8pm Los Angles time is actually 10pm to Baylee and Jaxon's little Chicago bodies and add to it a 35 minute drive back to our hotel, and result is two zonked out little kids. Gone. Comatose. At this point it didn't matter if the pool was open or not.

But it did matter in the morning. At 7:45am Baylee was awake and the first words she said were, "Daddy, do we get to go swimming?" But she didn't stop there. She added the other words. She played the trump card. She called me out.

When "Plan A" fails

Love this pic I just saw on a friend's Facebook:

Two words you can say that will give someone an instant spirit boost

A couple weeks ago I did a message at church that I felt really didn't go over that well. It wasn't my worst ever, but it wasn't as I had hoped. The collateral damage wasn't a huge dark cloud, but there was a mixture of frustration and questioning of self. My sense of perfectionism can be rather brutal at times.

After service a guy from our church asked me if I could send him the notes from a message I'd done a few weeks prior. Out of my mouth came, "Sure, no problem." In my head was, "Obviously not wanting today's stuff." Despite my pity party I emailed the notes later that afternoon. 

In the morning my inbox had a simple message from him saying thanks for the notes. But he also had this post script: 

There was a day when it snowed REALLY hard.

We haven't gotten a lot of snow in Chicago this winter. Really barely any. But that wasn't the case in February of 2011. Last year we had one of the worst snow storms ever. Last year was when Snowmaggedon hit!

It was a year ago February the snow storm of the century headed toward Chicago. Now in saying that, this century is only 12 years old. Regardless, the winters over the last 12 years have for the most part been pretty lame. But what we saw crawling across the weather radars toward us last year did indeed look like a huge blue monster. The way that people talked about getting extra water, extra food, fuel for generators, blankets and the such, it was like they were getting ready for Y2K all over again.

The hour came. The monster crawled across Chicago. It was indeed the storm of this young century.

Snowmageddon. 

Would it even be worth it if you could go back and change the past?

This past weekend I finished reading Stephen King's newest novel, 11/22/63. From his website, this is the book's premise:

On November 22, 1963, three shots rang out in Dallas, President Kennedy died, and the world changed forever.

If you had the chance to change the course of history, would you? Would the consequences be worth it?

Jake Epping is a thirty-five-year-old high school English teacher in Lisbon Falls, Maine, who makes extra money teaching adults in the GED program. He receives an essay from one of the students—a gruesome, harrowing first person story about the night 50 years ago when Harry Dunning’s father came home and killed his mother, his sister, and his brother with a hammer. Harry escaped with a smashed leg, as evidenced by his crooked walk.

Not much later, Jake’s friend Al, who runs the local diner, divulges a secret: his storeroom is a portal to 1958. He enlists Jake on an insane—and insanely possible—mission to try to prevent the Kennedy assassination. So begins Jake’s new life as George Amberson and his new world of Elvis and JFK, of big American cars and sock hops, of a troubled loner named Lee Harvey Oswald and a beautiful high school librarian named Sadie Dunhill, who becomes the love of Jake’s life—a life that transgresses all the normal rules of time.

Explore the Possibilities...

Stephen King is an amazing story teller. Though I've enjoyed all of his last few novels this is by far one of his best ever. It has a great pace that demands you don't put it down. As the description explains, the theme throughout is dealing with the past. Not just JFK's assassination, but the moment a little girl becomes paralyzed, the moment a boy's family is shattered, the moment a relationship is changed forever. This great book got me thinking.

Hating on Valentines Day

This morning I had to wake up at 3:30am in order to catch a 6am flight for work. On my way home the night before I had stopped to get flowers for Jeannette and Baylee, balloons for Baylee and Jaxon. Knowing I'd be leaving early my devised plan was to have everything set up on the counter and ready to be found when the fam crawled out of bed. Not wanting to wake any of them up at that ungodly hour, I slept on the couch. 

Never been to Canada? Here's pics to show what the weather in February is like

As an American, my preconceived idea of Canada is that it is cold 365 days of the year. Supposedly it's not, but February isn't the best time for someone to try and convince me otherwise. When I found out in the fall that I'd be coming to Winnipeg this February my host told me over the phone, "You're basically coming to the coldest place in Canada during the coldest time of the year."

Yay!

It's super cold here! I've been through intense Chicago winters, and this is colder!!!

Never been here? Don't believe me? I took these pics of downtown Winnipeg to show how cold it is here in February: 

The Hearing God messages

This past Sunday at church we wrapped up our Hearing God series. I was so glad we did this series. It was a reminder of important encouraging truths that I know I needed to hear. 

Here are four of the messages if you want to give them a listen (the 2nd week wasn't recorded):

• God speaks
• Discerning the Whisper: listen or download
• Hearing Him in the Silence: listen or download
• Not Living Halfway: listen or download