This is one of my best friends here in Spokane, his name is Jim. He is one of the few people that lets me be me...it is good to have such a man as a friend. 

Here is another shot of the other side of the Snake river where we were fishing. There were fishing boats nestled along the shadows along the rocks...I'm sure that is where all the big ones were hiding. 

so true...

Who are you to judge a man before he is dead?

Not even God does that.

Micah and his friend Spencer, having a jolly good time at the park. 

My friend Scott is just pleased as punch to be living in Spokane...he has brought a little of Portland with him. 

What an invention, TV dinners, hummm, there is some heavy reflection on this image brewing in my mind. 

Mustaine just seethes with truth on these tracks. His newfound belief in God has either sharpened his teeth or giving him a sense of vengeance; whatever the case he has never sounded better. Justin Press from the Dallas Music Guide reviewing: MEGADETH - THE SYSTEM HAS FAILED. Hummmm very interesting...
 

"There's cathedrals and the alleyway in our music. I think the alleyway is usually on the way to the cathedral, where you can hear your own footsteps and you're slightly nervous and looking over your shoulder and wondering if there's somebody following you. And then you get there and you realize there was somebody following you: It's God."
--Bono in The New York Times

 

My youngest brother Matt and his son, Nic on his new tricycle. They currently live in Thailand where he does documentary video production. You can learn more at his site www.frontfilms.com
 

Todd Smith, CD ALIVE is great. He is a member of SELAH but this album is not like anything you would hear in that band. This is hard rock with some fantastic lyrics. We used thesong -Turn To You- in youth church last night and brought the roof down! Great cd! Not trying to slam SELAH Dad, I know you dig them. 

Chronicles of Riddick...saw it, enjoyed it, recommend it for SFI fans. A bit raw, dark and intense for most, but I like my sfi strong and black no sugar please. 

This cd rocks! Day of Fire lead singer, Joshua Brown, is the former frontman for Full Devil Jacket (Island/Def Jam). Joshua has a powerful testimony of turning away from his rock-star lifestyle after surviving a heroine overdose and surrendering his life to God while in rehabilitation. After a two-year hiatus, Joshua began writing songs again, this time with guitarist/songwriter/fellow believer Gregg Hionis, and the pair began playing out in Joshua’s hometown of Jackson, Tenn. The radical transformation of Joshua’s life along with the straightforward message found in the lyrics, has given Day of Fire the platform to have a major impact on culture.
 

You are dressed in a robe of light. -Psalms 104:2 

Let the fields and their crops burst forth with joy! Let the trees of the forest rustle with praise before the Lord! -Psalms 96:12 

Fall is on fire in my front yard... 

Please Santa, please...please, please? The 2005 Mustang GT is powered by a 300-horsepower 4.6-liter aluminum block V8 with three valves per cylinder. I own a 1968 Mustang, anyone want to trade? I'll throw in a Black lab too...
 

Why I am not a pacifist...

"My path is clear here: I am to love my neighbor as myself, in the manner needed, in a practical way, in the midst of the fallen world, at my particular point of history. This is why I am not a pacifist. Pacifism in this poor world in which we live -- this lost world -- means that we desert the people who need our greatest help." -- Francis Schaeffer

 

I read an essay by CS Lewis yesterday by the same title. It was very interesting, his answers to the above question were enlightening. The essay is in the book called "Weight of glory" check it out if the topic stirs you.

Taking Falluja

Read and see Iraq from the frontlines at this blog.

The Sheepdogs

The Sheepdogs

Most humans truly are like sheep
Wanting nothing more than peace to keep
To graze, grow fat and raise their young,
Sweet taste of clover on the tongue.
Their lives serene upon Life's farm,
They sense no threat nor fear no harm.
On verdant meadows, they forage free
With naught to fear, with naught to flee.
They pay their sheepdogs little heed
For there is no threat; there is no need.

To the flock, sheepdog's are mysteries,
Roaming watchful round the peripheries.
These fang-toothed creatures bark, they roar
With the fetid reek of the carnivore,
Too like the wolf of legends told,
To be amongst our docile fold.
Who needs sheepdogs? What good are they?
They have no use, not in this day.
Lock them away, out of our sight
We have no need of their fierce might.

But sudden in their midst a beast
Has come to kill, has come to feast
The wolves attack; they give no warning
Upon that calm September morning
They slash and kill with frenzied glee
Their passive helpless enemy
Who had no clue the wolves were there
Far roaming from their Eastern lair.
Then from the carnage, from the rout,
Comes the cry, "Turn the sheepdogs out!"

Thus is our nature but too our plight
To keep our dogs on leashes tight
And live a life of illusive bliss
Hearing not the beast, his growl, his hiss.
Until he has us by the throat,
We pay no heed; we take no note.
Not until he strikes us at our core
Will we unleash the Dogs of War
Only having felt the wolf pack's wrath
Do we loose the sheepdogs on its path.
And the wolves will learn what we've shown before;
We love our sheep, we Dogs of War.

Russ Vaughn
2d Bn, 327th Parachute Infantry Regiment
101st Airborne Division
Vietnam 65-66

This is an important thing to know about a genuine follower of Jesus Christ. You can civilize them for a while, but in the end, God will unleash the untamed faith within them. One difference between lions and tigers I'm told is that lions are more easily domesticated than tigers. The reason is that lions hunt only for the purpose of eating. Hunting, for them, is motivated by hunger. Tigers are different. Tigers hunt for the sheer thrill of the chase. When your pleasure is the hunting and not just the eating, it is much more difficult to be domesticated. All you have to do is keep a lion fed, and you will most likely be safe. A tiger is always ready to involve you in a game of tag. You're it.
-The Barbarian Way by Erwin Mcmanus 

I choose to...

Agent Smith:
The purpose of life Mr. Anderson is death. . .So why, Mr. Anderson? Why do you do it? Why get up? Why keep fighting? Do you believe you're fighting for something? For more that your survival? Can you tell me what it is? Do you even know? Is it freedom? Or truth? Perhaps peace? Yes? No? Could it be for love? Illusions, Mr. Anderson. Vagaries of perception. The temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an existence that is without meaning or purpose. And all of them as artificial as the Matrix itself, although only a human mind could invent something as insipid as love. You must be able to see it, Mr. Anderson. You must know it by now. You can't win. It's pointless to keep fighting. Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you persist?

Neo:
Because I choose to

posted by john o'keefe @ http://www.theooze.com/blog/

God Storm

God Storm...I had a picture in my mind of what I see taking place among the youth at New Generation. It's a spiritual tornado. It keeps touching down in worship and with a mighty aggressive force it has been pulling the fringe into the center and launching them vertical.

Like the transforming finger of God, it has bored into the cold earth of our hearts and left our self fodused lives all messed up. It has laid a path of destruction for the world, flesh and devil. It has strewn us into the streets with new found boldness, zeal and an aching hunger for more of God.

You still captivate me...

Inside Outside

Inside outside, under my skin
Never ending love I don't know where it begins?
I don't know where it ends, I don't know how high
I don't know how deep, I don't know how wide
Outside inside around the world
Never ending love envelops me like a cloud
I feel you in front, I feel you behind
I feel you up above, And I feel you at the side

And you, you're all over me, you're all over me
Your banner is over me, I give it all 'cos

You still captivate me, fascinate me
You still captivate me, saturate me

Inside outside, pulling me in
No matter where I run I know you'll never give in
I see you in the storm, I see you in a kiss
I've been around the world and never found a love like this

You're all over me, you're all over me
You're everything I want to be
I'm all over you, you're everything I want to see
You're all over me

You, still captivate me, fascinate me
You still captivate me, saturate me
You still captivate me, liberate me
You still captivate me

Written by Martin Smith/Stu Garrard ©2003 Curious? Music UK

I know it's a bit dodgy but in light of some depressing news overseas...it made me laugh. Forgive me if it offends your more finer sensibilities.
 

Theo van Gogh. God rest his soul. Murdered in the streets of Amsterdam by Islamic terrorists. His throat was cut, almost severing his head and a message of more to come was pinned by a knife to his chest.
 

Beheaded in Amsterdam...

Theo van Gogh, the film maker who had often attacked radical Muslims, had been riding along on his bicycle when a Muslim fanatic first shot and then butchered him on a busy street with the nonchalance of an abattoir worker. ... Now other people were being targeted, too, as evidence emerged of a "brigade" of Dutch jihadists preparing to murder "the enemies of Islam" in a terror campaign that would be easier to carry out than the bombing of trains or heavily guarded government buildings.

He was not the only one to be threatened. "There will be no mercy" said a document that the killer had held over van Gogh's chest before skewering it there with a final knife blow to his heart. By then van Gogh, 47, had been shot several times and was seen by one witness on his knees, pleading with his assailant, "Don’t do it . . . we can still talk about it." The response was a knife to the throat. The killer sawed through the neck and spinal column, almost to the point of decapitating him. -UK Times

Words cannot express my horror, sadness and fear over this. I am speechless and burdened deeply. God have mercy on us...my years of prayers for Amsterdam have taken on a new light.

Good advice...

Read the old dead guys, proverbs and the gospels a lot.

Is our DNA sacred?

A very interesting discussion about embryonic stem cell issues over here.

15 years together, 5 kids and a dog, ass. and youth pastors, mid thirties, home owners, live in Spokane WA...do I need to say more?  

Us...