my afternoon view...

not as nice as the morning view.....

my morning view

sometimes it is tough to get out of bed.....

sent from my phone.

Uncle Sam

This sums up how I feel about our government.

I wish they'd focus on important things.


Credit goes here.

SEX: yep... I said it out loud.

Pastor Paul Wirth of The Relevant Church put a challenge to his congregation...
He says:

"Single men and women can't have sex for 30 days, and married couples are urged to have it every day."

"If you look at studies, studies say in 30 days you can develop a habit"

"Our married people are far more fearful than our single people"

Be careful if you click the link at work. He has music playing! :-)

So... to my fellow church members who brought that up. Are you participating?

Father Daughter Dance..

Three of the last Four years Breanna and I have had one special dress up date a year. We do more daddy/daughter stuff but this one is a "get dressed up" kind of night. After dining at Miyami Japanese Steakhouse, we went to the dance, had our photo taken, danced a little while then went and had some ice-cream at Cold Stone Creamery. These are memorable nights to me.

Isn't she precious?

Microsoft Server Video

A little comedy for you tech heads! Just saw this video from the Microsoft Server blog.

Thanks to Brett for sharing this!

Leadership

It's great to know that I work for a company that has great leaders at the helm. I've been with ACS now since 1992 minus 1 year when I had a lapse of good judgment. Thankfully, they let me back in.

I've seen Hal Campbell and Marvin Owen, 2 of the owners of ACS, tested many times over the years. They always "do what's right". I know at the end of the day, I can go to sleep because their moral compass is pointed in the right direction. I can go to sleep each and every night knowing that they were handling their company in a way that is "right".

Do you surround yourself with those people? I know I do!

Am I missing something?

Today, My wife calls me and tells me she's sitting behind a Mercedes. The bumper sticker (on a Mercedes???) says this:

"Tax the Rich, it's their war."

Do you see the irony in this? Am I missing something?

Single Point of Failure

In my line of business, I, and my team, are judged by how often servers and services go down and how quickly we get them restored. I'm constantly trying to make sure there's no single point of failure. There should ALWAYS be a backup. We have to employ tactics that use what the world calls Reliability Engineering. For you non-technies, here's a good layman's definitions

I'm often held accountable on items that fail on me. Sometimes it's people, other times it's a $5 part. Regardless, as I live life, I see single points of failure. Two specific ones are:

In January, AT&T had a single tower in the Charlotte area causing other towers to experience complete outages. I'm guess they had a single point of failure.

The other morning I dropped my daughter off at school. To get to work I have to travel a two lane road. An auto accident on that road forced me to go out of my way about 5 miles. They should widen that road. We'd have other lanes to go around.

My point is... you should always have a plan "b", a backup. Someway to get around the single-points-of-failure in your life. So... Do you?

Luke 10:1-24 Sunday School Lesson Talking Points

 

The text for today’s study gives us good insight into how we, the church, should work to build the kingdom.

 

First: Jesus didn’t try to do it alone.      

• For starters, he chose 12 men whom he trained to help do the work.

• Jesus had the apostles as his helpers, but he also “appointed seventy others. They went out “two by two” to help harvest the ripe fields.

 

Look at verses 1-4

 

A few things to keep in mind:

1. He CHOSE 70… that means many more were following him.

2. These are beyond the original 12.

3. Some translations say 70, others 72

4. These 70 are special.  My bible says they are better educated, more capable, or of higher status than others.  They know their skills and are engulfed in the vision that Jesus has for this project.

5. He warns them that they will be tested. Lambs among wolves.  Oh.. and by the way, love your wolves (enemies).

6. Finally, Don’t take money, change of clothes and don’t leisurely make your way.. I see Jesus saying: GO… this is important.  go, go, go...
7. There is enough work for everyone.  Don’t sit back and watch others work.  The Harvest is plentiful

 

Look at verses 5-12.

 

He gives them explicit instructions on what to do… how to do it… when to stay, when to leave.. what to eat.  

 

 

Verses 17-20

 

Apparently they all returned around the same time and they were pumped.  I’d go as far to say.. this experience rocked their world. 

 

They said, “Even the demons submit to us in your name!”  Jesus helps them screw their head back on straight by understanding that the more important thing is that their names are written in the book of life!

 

Verses 18-24

 

The seventy went forth and did the work of the Lord. They saw amazing things.  Too many of us go to church, sit down, and worship God. Too often we leave the church building and don’t give God another thought until the next Sunday.  I hope you don't fall into that category!

 

Home...Sick...

Last night before we went to bed, my 6 year old, Breanna, started complaining of her head and belly hurting.  I gave her some Tylenol (Dad's choice.) and sent her to bed.  This morning she's running a 101 degree fever and still complaining of head and bellyaches.  She's also picked up a cough.   Well, that certainly put me in a dilemma.  I'm a single parent this weekend with a Sunday School class and Welcome Ministry Team waiting on me to arrive.   I give her some more Tylenol and hope that by the time I get out of the shower and get dressed, she'll feel like getting up to at least go sit in my Sunday School class with me.

 

No Go... we're not going to Church.   So I call my backup teacher (the one I took over for temporarily 4 years ago!) and got an impromptu plan together.  So, I thought I'd at least post my notes out here for anyone interested.     See the next post.

 

Regardless, Breanna seems to be better at this time.  Only time will tell.  Say a little prayer for her.