Now I don’t feel obligated to burn CDRs full of camp pictures for everyone at church. Kevin already burned 16 copies for everyone, so everyone should be taken care of by now. What I didn’t like was almost immediately after camp, I was being bugged to burn CDRs for people….and these were people who before rarely gave me the time of day. Now they were begging me for CDRs? Hmmmm…..
We’ve got an area wide youth devotional at church tonight. I volunteered to be the person to show the songs on the big screen. I probably will leave immediately afterwards simply because I have very little in common with the people there.
Here is the picture which is on the front of the Mt. Juliet church bulletin this week. I would like to point out that the caption on the church bulletin is wrong. It states “Summer Intern Brian Manning teaching Bible class at Summer Camp.” This could not be further from the truth. In actuality, I am teaching the Bible class and Brian Manning is just dazed and confused. So it is me and me alone who is responsible for putting that kid in the background asleep.
I have demanded that the church secretaries print a retraction.
A word about the suit. You’ve been seeing pictures of me wearing this ugly suit at church camp. The day before camp, I bought it at a thrift store for $6.50. I wore it to all the devotionals at night as a joke (thank goodness for those air conditioned chapel areas). However I don’t think the kids ever really got the joke. Instead they always asked me why I was wearing the suit. Some people don’t have a sense of humor.
Turkmenistan President wants to rename months on the calendar after himself. This doesn’t make any sense. Apparently he wants to rename April to simply “Mother.” I would suggest he name May as “Mother” since Mother’s Day is in May.

I had the closing prayer at church tonight. I felt as though I messed it up. It started out good. I had alot of things which I wanted to say in it. The only problem was that in the middle of it, someone’s cell phone rang. I could hear it all the way from the pulpit. It distracted me enough to where I just ended my prayer then and there. I meant to mention the sick and all the other pertinent things, but the cell phone completely distracted me. So my prayer was much shorter than I had planned. ARGH!!!
This happens all the time. Someone’s cell phone goes off during church and everyone is distracted by it. I wish there was some type of electronic blocker of cell phone calls. It would seem to me that it has happened enough times that people would be very much aware of it to where they would be highly embarrassed if it happened. Somehow I think there’s some people who are frivolous about their Christianity who laugh it off and don’t do a thing to prevent it from happening again!
Maybe we need to get one of these things.

15 years ago today I was baptized and became a Christian. Have I grown spiritually since then? I hope so. But who’s to say?
I remember it well…just as if it happened yesterday. When I was baptized it was on a Thursday night in the middle of summer in 1987 in a dark empty church building with my immediate family and another close family present. If I had it to do over again, I would have chosen to be baptized in a full church building or at a camp where friends are there to dish out an overwhelming neverending supply of hugs and support. At that time my whole mentality was screwed up. It was more of “I’m embarrassed because I am a sinner,” rather than “let’s rejoice over a new Christian.” So when people would congratulate me, I would turn away from them, not wanting to talk about it much. The only other regret I have was that I was not counseled at all before getting dunked. So at one point there were questions in my mind as to why I made that decision. But all of that has been worked out in the end.
Seemingly right after I was baptized I attempted to do stuff and make promises to God which would be a sure bet to get me into heaven. Again, my whole mentality was messed up. I couldn’t pray enough prayers, nor read enough Bible verses to get into heaven. By being baptized I was already on my way there. I guess at that time I didn’t understand the concept of grace.
To be honest I don’t think I was as spiritually mature as some of the kids in my cabin last week at camp when I was 12. Growing up during my junior high years I think I was more concerned with annoying people than actually having a spiritual discussion with someone. My old youth minister, Bill Speight Jr., didn’t have much to work with when he got me in the youth group. It is a wonder I even made it through high school at all. But then again, I came from a stable religious family…which I’m sure would have found a way for me to make it through life with a little persuasion.
Whenever a woman or girl gets baptized during services at church, there is usually a whole flock of women who go with her to the dressing room. I guess it takes 2 people to cry, 2 people to hand them each article of clothing…and so on…. However lately I’ve noticed it is happening with boys who get baptized also. Last time there seemingly was at least 5 boys who went with another one to the dressing room as he was getting baptized. These boys tend to stick together in situations like this. It is very refreshing to see public support for someone over their decision. I joked around with one of them calling them “towell boy” who seemingly always went to the dressing room during a baptism.
I must give credit to preachers who can seemingly provide ultraquick counseling to someone who comes forward at church during the brief 2 minutes in the chorus of the invitation song. Seems like decisions like this would take a long time to counsel with.
Whew! That was quite an entry. Not sure if I should have posted all that. Normally I would not have told all that to just anyone. But seemingly it seems as if it is so passive to do it this way. I am not even sure who is reading this. Nor if anyone cares about these topics.
In other news…
Heaven or Hell Argument Ends in Slaying
My high school history book had this map in it. Too bad it’s been proven a fake (the map that is; my history book is still genuine).
My car is still in the shop due to that broken automatic window. I gave them a list of other things which was wrong with it…among them…the radio won’t pick up my favorite radio station when right outside of Nashville. Since the list is so long, they told me not to expect it back until before Wednesday. I’d imagine I won’t get my car back until late this week.

Tonight I went to a church youth devotional expecting to be fulfilled by worshipping God. I came back with a bad taste in my mouth because I can’t seem to do anything right in some people’s eyes. It takes 10 positive comments in order to overcome one negative comment. I need some of those positive comments right now.
We did have 2 more baptisms tonight at church. We are experiencing a little revival at church among the young people. Because of these conversions, I can pretty much tell you that today has been the highlight of my year. Feeling as though you made a difference in the life of a young person is very fulfilling. I knew there was some purpose in this world for me being around.

It feels really good when you feel you’ve accomplished something through camp. Case in point – today during church one of the kids which I got to know and become friends with at camp – was baptized today. He’s a good kid with a good heart. His mom told me that going to camp this week got him thinking about salvation issues. I’d like to think that somehow I played a role, no matter how minor, in his decision. Sometimes all this hard work preparing for camp and teaching bible classes does pay off. I’m feeling pretty good today.
I think I figured out why I’m unable to get to this webpage occassionally. I had the wrong DNS settings in my PC. It was still referencing the @Home IP addresses. What does this mean to you? More updates to this webpage since I should be able to access it more often. Wooohoooo!

People keep asking me why I’m not at camp this week. Apparently they don’t read this weblog, as it has been addressed a few days ago. It just isn’t worth it to go to 2 camps in a row. I’d just be too tired. At the Maury Christian Camp I went to over July 4th, there was one guy there who was doing 4 camps in a row. I thought he probably was crazy.
Houston Church Opens a McDonald’s inside….surprising but true. I think these people have totally missed the point. Seeking and saving the lost does not include opening a McDonald’s inside of the church building. What a waste of money. Didn’t Jesus mention something about disliking the money changers in the temple? Isn’t this the same thing? This church needs to get its priorities in order.

Got a call today to come up to church to rig up the screen to show a movie on it. The youth group was having a “Destination Unknown” activity…where they come to church expecting to go somewhere fun but not knowing exactly where they are going. It’s a summer thing. Something to keep the kids busy during those long summer days.
Anyways it was raining today, so no zoo trip for the kids. Instead they hung around the church building. I tried to get the screen going, but the electricity went off just as things were getting started. I waited around for 15 minutes afterwards, but the power didn’t come back on.
We really need to hold some type of workshop for church people on how to operate the screen. More people need to know how to use it, without having to bother the audio visual people about it.
I redid the colors on my sister’s weblog to match the ones on her webpage. (Sorry Johnny, it’s that same wallpaper).
Scott Burka has posted some insightful thoughts about summer school on his webpage.

I got up early today to type up the church announcements in Powerpoint to show on the big screen. The guy who normally does this is on vacation. I didn’t mind doing it. I just wish more people would bother to read them. Normally we print out the announcements, show them on the big screen, and then have someone read over all of them during church. It’s all redundant. I’d love to cut out the announcements all together. We have the ability to do additional announcements in Powerpoint right before services.
If there is one thing that our former associate minister, Joey Davis, did well at church, it was the Summer Faith Series. Basically each Wednesday night a fellowship meal is served before church, then a special speaker is brought in to preach a traditional sermon. Before there were some really good speakers from area congregations. Now it seems as if the whole series is thrown together at the last minute with mostly speakers from our own congregation. Its ok to have many of our own members as the special speakers, but it is nothing that would draw in visitors from the outside. We need more speakers from outside congregations.
Then again Summer Faith Series has become as worn out as VBS during the summer months. Seems like all churches of Christ are doing it these days. Maybe this once innovative idea is now just another expected thing.
My state senator Bob Rochelle is thinking about not running for another term. Good riddance if he does. Lately his whole purpose in life is to make sure the government gets more of my tax dollars through his income tax proposal.
Goat has an distinctive #3 marking….Earnhardt fans rejoice….message from beyond the grave.

“And hey June, why’d you have to come,
Why’d you have to come around, so soon?
I wasn’t ready for all this nature
The terrible green green grass
And violent blooms of flowered dresses
And afternoons that make me sleepy”
I use my digital camera alot during church events. Looks like all those times I harrassed people by taking their pictures has paid off. I got a preview of the new church directory which is set to come out in a month. Just about half of the candid photos were taken by me. So it looks like I did make a contribution to the church directory, no matter how meager.
That 4th grade Wednesday night Bible class I’m supposed to be teaching? Well I probably won’t start helping out until July 10th. I’ll be out of town on July 3th. I am looking forward to it. The guy I’m co-teaching with is a school teacher himself. I figure I can learn his methods and attempt to be able to teach on my own.
Check out www.blogathon.org. Basically it is a fundraising event which webloggers who post on online diaries (like this one) take up pledges. Then during a 24 hour period (July 27 this year), they post entries to their web diary every 30 minutes. After that they collect their pledges for doing this and give it to their favorite charity. I think this is a silly idea. What these people need to do is to get out of the house. No one cares if you post every 30 minutes to your lame web diary. Web diaries are so fickle anyways. How about donating your time to a soup kitchen for the homeless? Picking up trash in your city? Just don’t use passive nerdy recreation as an excuse to sit around and feel better about yourself.
The last post was done at midnight. That was no accident.

I’ve been on the phone with Comcast alot since I can’t access this webpage, nor any other webpage on alwaysonline.net. I know that this webpage is accessible from other locations (Blogger can FTP to it and other friends can view it). Comcast doesn’t have a clue as to what’s going on. I am pretty sure it is Comcast’s problem. AFAIK, my computer is working perfectly. I need to test it out on my neighbor’s computer (also a Comcast customer).
I don’t consider myself a hard headed religious person who can’t seem to compromise or not be able to see the other view of things. What I am trying to get is order to the chaos. I posted yesterday when I was upset and frustrated. To some extent I still am confused about the whole matter. I really don’t want to come across as some type of wet blanket or to rain on anybody’s parade. I know that we (members of the church of Christ) don’t get excited about God. It’s always refreshing to see someone on fire for Jesus. However yesterday’s and Thursday’s VBS assemblies were just different. It was more a pep rally rather than a religious service. The main focus was being loud rather than worshipping God. My mom still doesn’t think that these VBS assemblies in the auditorium are indeed worship services. She classifies them as some kind of other service. I think that VBS assemblies are worship services since it has all the characteristics of any other worship service…..songs, closing prayer, etc…..
I cringed when the VBS song leader let the kids speak over the wireless microphones during the songs and after the worship service. This was just asking for trouble. The audio team tries to keep kids from speaking on the microphones before and after services to a bare minimum. We turn off the sound system as soon as worship is over. By letting the kids jokingly speak during VBS, they will want to use it during normal assemblies on Sundays. This is just opening a can of worms.
VBS is nothing new to me. While I was growing up, I rarely missed a day of VBS at the church I attended. I can remember singing all those VBS songs. However nothing really got out of hand. It was always a structured worship service in some form or another.
On a side note, I can remember as a 6th grader attending VBS, thinking that I myself was the coolest ever. In any situation there was a pecking order. When you’re a 6th grader at VBS, you’re at the top of food chain. Gone are the days of being picked on by the kids in the grade ahead of you.