Check this out

Here's a vid of the new Alpha add got it from craig Borlase's site, an author I've been reading a book of called 'The Naked Christian' Pretty darn good stuff.

Worship at Woolies

I was havin a chat to my lovely wife and this really cool chick who I'll call Ali, cause that's her name, about worship the other day but before I get to that let me go somewhere else for a second. In one of my first blogs, Religion,I wrote about how much 'religion' has affected the true views of what being a true follower of Jesus is all about. Unfortunately what has happened over time in my opinion, is that we have become followers of a Christian religion rather than just being followers of Jesus and allowing him to lead us to the kingdom of God. So . . . in large my desire for this blog site is to break down boxes of religion so that followers of Jesus may have some thoughts and discussion that can assist them to help others really know what it means to live a life of following Christ rather than religion.
So . . . getting back to worship . . . firstly can I say that the input here is really good and it has made me think as I'm sure it has others. The question I posed was whether Jesus sang, well to tell you the truth I had no idea whether Jesus sang or not and thankfully Susan pointed out that yeh He probably did. The point I was making though is this (as a question again) what do we remember Jesus for as far as His worship of God? Well certainly not his singing, when I think of Jesus and His worship of His father it wasn't his ability to sing a Guy Sabastian ballad warbling 100 million times and hitting a falsetto note that cracks glass in the name of God. Although again as Susan pointed out, he probably sang songs of worship. It wasn't His articulate words when he prayed, although we know he prayed and honored God to His fullest while doing so. It wasn't the way he read scripture and again we know that when he read he had authority like no other and was devoting everything to His father in heaven. So how do we see Jesus worship? Well I can't explain it any other way than to say that His life was worship to God. He said here John 5:19 So Jesus answered them, "I tell you the truth: the Son can do nothing on his own; he does only what he sees his Father doing. What the Father does, the Son also does. So Jesus was lead by God in all He did, never was he separated from God. Does this mean he did some things without God? No, never as He was God in the flesh. So what does this mean for us? Are we ever separated from God? Nup, his word in Romans says nothing can ever separate us from Him and His love. He's also given us his Spirit to help and guide us. So is it possible for us to worship God with our lives like Jesus did? That's what I'm aiming for. Unfortunately along the way in this path this thing called sin sometimes heads me in my direction and not God's, that's the big difference between Jesus and us huh? He was sinless. So getting back to my conversation with Teresea and Ali, I said yeh . . we can even worship at woolies. (for all those people who may not be in Australia or who have Safeway and not Woolies then it's a supermarket where you buy groceries like fruit and milk vegemite and bok choy, stuff like that) What does that look like? Well it means getting your finest musicians, a stage, a few singers on mics and leading choruses and hymns for all those happy shoppers. Sorry, I lapsed into major sarcasm. Nah, I think just being available for God to use us in Woolies. Being available and ready in whatever way that God leads us, continually lifting our eyes, hearts, hip pockets, gifts and abilities, whatever we have and using them to bring God glory to the people that God places in front of us. I think that's how I see Jesus worshipping. Now . . . . if all followers of Jesus were living lives like this everyday, what sort of a difference would that make to our world? What would it look like when we came together? Would it really matter?

Gymnastics @ Broken Hill

Well what a huge weekend!
That week of training I had did wonders for my physique as you can see, and the skills training really paid off. After never doing gymnastics, except for the occasional floor routine at Boys Brigade about 25 years ago, my balance on the pommel really came in to play, actually you'd be forgiven in thinking that I was actually an olympian from russia, go figure!
Seriously. We had a great time, the whole family went to Broken Hill for the weekend with the Funky Moves competition team. We travelled up and back in a bus with the whole team. Shannon, Kirrily and Hannah are all on the team (not me) and they did really well. This was Hannah's first comp and she even managed to come away with a medal. Kirrily has been on the team longer which really showed as she won the overall 1st medal for her grade. Shannon also did very well getting a first on the floor in her level. The comp was between about 8 clubs from country SA and Broken Hill teams.
It was great getting to know people and being a part of a totally different community of people and it has totally deepened relationship with people we didn't really know. Some more 'real' pics are available to look at on the 'my pics' link. The girls all look the same though with their hair pulled back so I hope you can pick them. Ps Brod's was ok . . . we took a footy.