Todd Agnew

We hosted a Todd Agnew concert last night. Wow, what a fun time it was. I came away feeling somewhat conflicted though.
First of all, we did not have as many people there than I thought we would. We had around 200-250 people total, not bad for our first production but still we are talking Todd Agnew here. Not Stephen Jones and his talking puppets but Todd Agnew, you know, "Grace Like Rain", "This Fragile Breathe", that Todd Agnew, the one that gets played on the radio? But oh well, I am sure there was something really good on TV that will never replay on TV Land one day that you could not miss. But for the people who were there, they all walked away pretty much blessed by the time they got to spend worshipping with Todd.
Second it was that worship thing that kind of surprised me. I mean he does this for a living. He goes some place, tunes his guitar and sings and plays for work. But he never made it sound like work. He truely enjoyed connecting with the audience and leading them into a place of worship.
Thirdly, I really expected him to plug his newest album, "Need'. You know, the new album is the one that makes the money. I do not think he did but a couple of songs off that album the entire time. If you pick it up check out "Writing on the Wall", I was kind of disappointed he did not do that one but acousticly it probably doesn't have the kick it would with a live band.
Fourthly, I know I am still going. He was a really good guitarist. That impressed me a bunch, it wasn't just up, down, up, down and chord changes but he added some riffs and kept a pretty good groove going the whole time. And trust me people, he did not have any help. His guitar went into a tuner and then into a direct box that went into the sound system. There was no track machine, click track or anything else to help him out, just Todd and the guitar.
Fifthly, I really like the guy. You know he is like famous and all but he was really a down to earth kind of guy. He carried his luggage in, we finally did relieve him of that but he wasn't demanding or expecting something, he almost seemed somewhat embarrassed that people were trying to treat him like a star. I guess I know why I am probably not a famous musician now, I would be big headed, obnoxious and demanding so GOD keeps me humble by being not so famous.
Sixthy, the dude has a sense of humor. He had everyone laughing and crying, singing and worshipping and laughing and crying some more. There was a point he kind of broke into a stand up comedy routine then realized that he had a guitar and kind of looked at it like, "I guess I should be playing this thing...". He was a riot with the stories he told and the theology he brought to the table.
Seventhly, He is what he is. When you see Todd, that is what you get. I was running around in a pair of cargo shorts and a polo trying to get dinner ready for everyone, making sure my wife was not too stressed out and then had to change to get "Pastorly" for the service. By the way my "Pastorly" dress was a pair of jeans, printed T shirt with a button up patterned shirt over the top. No suit and tie for me! Well Todd, he came in wearing this "Chuys" shirt right from the airport. "Chuys" is a Dallas restaurant that I was at years ago, so I keep waiting for Todd to go get into his "performance" clothes. We leave him for a few minutes and when he comes out on stage, yep front and center "Chuys" is heralded to all. Todd should hit them up for some burritos or tacos or something as the food sponsor for "Need" tour. Something like, "we all "NEED" to eat, at Chuys!!" Saying all that, he was real, transparent, and humble. Hopefully next time we have him I will get to set with him for an hour or so and just play guitar.
Eightly, that dude has a set of pipes!! I love Todd's voice, when "Grace Like Rain" came out my wife wanted to do it for worship. Now I am a baritone/bass by nature so I was loving it when she said she wanted me to sing it. All was good until the "Hallelujah" part where I pulled a hamsting trying to get that high. But Todd can just fill a room with his voice. Little guy, big voice. (disclaimer, Todd is not that little but I am 6'3" and 3 bills, he seems a little guy to me for that voice).
Ninethly, he got married a little over a year ago. A ready made family with a 8 year old son and a 6 year old daughter. His son's birthday was the night of the concert. He could have cancelled, I would have understood but he didn't. He told me that they got up that morning, and had Birthday Cake for breakfast before he flew out. That is a pretty good dad! I hope Sandy remembers the day that he had Birthday Cake for breakfast, because his dad was a man of honor. So much so that when the concert was over he went first to call his family. That was too cool, he wanted to share the worship experience with his family.
Tenthly, he was so nice. My wife is a control freak and she plans everything down to the minute and event. Well we were leaving having sent Todd off to get some sleep, finished cleaning up and I asked her how we were supposed to pay for the remainder of the bill to bring him to Miami. She kind of went white and started calling trying to find out what happened to the check. I kind of chuckled because I once had a guest speaker's offering check in my pocket when after I took him to lunch he had to kind of hem and haw and finally just asked me, "that offering you took for me, well are you going to mail it or did you write me a check?" I was so embarrased, I had it in my pocket and forgot to give it to him. Well we forgot Todd's check. Yep, sent him off without paying him. My wife ran him down at the hotel and he was like, "no problems, just mail it to me." He met us all of three hours ago and yet he trusted us with this living and said to just mail it. Well Todd, I will make sure the "check's in the mail" today for you.
Thanks for all you did, you were a blessing.
Pastor Pat

Ordained...finally.

My wife and I finally received our ordination last Tuesday night with the Assemblies of GOD in Oklahoma City before a whole bunch of people.
It was quite a significant step for us; for you see we were not even supposed to be ministry types growing up. I was so shy, reserved and would throw up with even the thought of standing up in front of people, let alone having to talk to them. My wife, well being in the in front of people never bothered her, but the idea of being a "pastor" never really was a thought she dwelt on. But GOD had other things in mind as he called us after we both had careers, children and car and house payments. We filled out our applications in the summer of 1998 and received a provisional certificate granting us credentials as long as we completed our "training" in the next two years. We did finally complete our training on the 23rd month, just in time, and stayed that way for almost 8 years. According to the timeline given to ministers, we were supposed to move up to a higher level of credentialing in the next two years but we are a little slow, it took us six to move on but once we got going we got our liscense and two years later our ordination.
I kind of poo pooed the idea getting ordained. I mean right now I am a senior pastor, leader of people; all ordination would do is give me something else to hang on my wall and cost me a few more bucks at the end of the year to renew my credentials. Oh and it also relieved me of the responsibility to attend the annual sectional ministers insititute that is mandatory for all credential holders that are not ordained, that was probably my most driving factor in it all.
But what I found out is receiving ordination was much more emotional that I thought it would be. As we got closer to the service time I felt myself getting more and more nervous, why I have no idea, they had already told me I was good, had my interview and had all the requirements covered but I still got nervous. All it was to be was a ceremony. We would get our names called, shake the district superintendant's hand, have him whisper in our ears, "good job" and then go and sit back down. no biggie. But when it came time that our names were called, when we walked across that stage a sense of honor came over me. Not the proud type of honor, but the "I can't believe that this is happening to me" type of honor. I am not something special, I don't have thousands of followers, I am not a great orator, writer or singer, I am just me, ordinary. So I walked hand in hand with my wife toward our leadership who placed a mantle on our shoulders, whispered in our ears and hugged our necks and we walked off to the side of the stage. I think it was then that it hit me. I looked out into the crowd and I saw my kids smiling at me. Even my youngest who had his Nintendo DS had taken a game break to watch the action of his Mom and Dad. My older ones (the ones who can't get away with not paying attention) were even smiling at us. My Father in Law was about to burst his buttons as his daughter and his no good son in law were receiving this high honor. My associate pastor and his wife, my youth pastor, my music pastor and his wife, my Mom and my Aunt who came in from Texas to witness this event and a mature couple from our church were all sitting there clapping for us as we were honored. It wasn't necessarily the honor from the district council, the words of praise from our fearless leader of the state's assemblies, or even the prayer of support given from our good friend and presbytrer Arliss Moon at the close of the service as he annointed us with oil and prayed over us that gave me a shudder down my spine and caused my eyes to fill with tears. It was the faces of those that love us, shining with pride over their pastors who were receiving a piece of paper and a draped cloth around their necks that brought tears to my eyes and filled me with such humility and honor I have seldom felt.
You may now call me your most honored revered ordained ambassador of the gospel when you see me... yeah I think the humility has worn off... :-)

To Tie or not to Tie, that is the question.

One of the guys in my church posted a facebook question as to what a "Pastor" should wear to church. It generated a lot of different replies and I found that the scope was very wide on what people "think" that the Pastor should portray.
I have found myself in the business world seeing the same thing. When I first started, sans late 80's every function you went to from a business meeting to a convention to a lunch date was suit and tie. I have pictures at my desk with me in a "pink" shirt and tie, had to be the 80's!
Somewhere in the middle 90's the shirt and tie were replaced with the "Polo" colored shirt. I loved it when that happened. No more stragulation, no more getting hot under the color, you could even golf without changing clothes. I really think that was the reason it happened, easier to go from the desktop to the green in no seconds flat.
Then somewhere around 2000 the tie made a comeback, it got really fat and the wide windsor knots were back in but men realized quickly how confining they were and we saw the Polo make a resurgence again.
So what should the Pastor wear at the church?
Well there are times I wear a suit and tie, there are times I wear a polo and slacks, and there are times I wear blue jeans and a T shirt. So which one is right?
I will never forget my first Pastor, the man was born wearing a suit I figured. I always saw him in a suit, on Sunday, during the week even on Wednesday he wore a suit although he would take the jacket off most times. Then we had a church work day and Pastor showed up in a one piece mechanics set of coveralls. They were bright baby blue colored and I just knew he had a suit on under there. But I could not get over the coveralls. They were the ugliest things I had ever seen. Functional but ugly.
So I made a decision that day, I would be functional but never wear something that ugly. So I alter my attire to suit the needs (that was a pun, get it, suit the neeeds!!) So sometimes I wear a tie, sometimes I option the tie and wear a jacket, other times I wear a polo and slacks and still other times I wear a "fashionable" T shirt and jeans.
GOD is not concerned about our outsides, but the condition of our insides. He is not concerned with how we clothe ourselves but that we are clothed in the righteousness of Christ.
So with all of that said, I get ordained the end of the month, I am going to be in front of a whole delegation of people. Some will think I need a suit and tie, other a Polo and slacks and still others will want me in a fashionable T shirt and jeans. So who do I want to look cool for? I think I will go with the Don Johnson look, blue jeans, fashionable shirt, tie that has been loosened and the sleeve rolled up on the jacket, that should make everyone happy, except my wife, she will think I look like an idiot...

Just some random thoughts...

Sometimes I think really weird things.
Like,

Why is Weird Al Yankovich famous? All he did was take other people's songs and write new lyrics. He should get sued for "sampling" the music riffs in those songs...

Why is Galahgher famous? You know, the guy who smashes watermelons, honeydews and anything else he can with a sledgehammer? And how do you get that gig anyway? Was he swinging the hammer down on some melons one day and someone said, "you know, you are pretty good at that, you should do that professionally..."

Why do we celebrate Easter with hard boiled eggs that have been died in food coloring, left overnight to dry and then hide them in the yard for small children to find? Do the kids really want to eat an egg that has been died in some toxic formula and left unrefridgerated all night? I don't think so...

Why do we call Mom's who carpool their kids to sporting events "Soccer Mom's"? I have never heard a Mom called a softball mom, or a basketball mom or a football mom or even a baseball mom but apparently there are a bunch more kids playing soccer.

Why do we have to take our shoes off at the airport screeners? Well because a dude put explosives in his shoes that is why. But then it goes to question, what about the guy who had explosives in his underwear...

Remember the days of the Record player? What did they play? Records right? No everyone called them albums. The we had the 8 track tape players and they played 8 tracks. Then we had cassette tape players and they played cassettes. Then we had compact disc players and they play CD's. I am just wondering what the next kind of player might be and what we will call the things that it plays other than what it really is.

My first car was a Mercury Bobcat... rally wheels, four on the floor, sunroof. Sounds good doesn't it, until they ask what it looked like. The only way to descibe it was, "it looks like a Ford Pinto" in whcich people would say, "oh....."

I drive a box, yeah really a Scion XB. No one really told me what XB stood for, I guess I just figured it meant Xtra Boxey. So you see why I have these random thoughts...

I took my brother to jail today...

I took my brother to jail today. I blogged earlier that I was proud of him for entering the teen challenge program to get his alcohol problem resolved. Well yesterday he was going through the entry process when he mentioned that he had a court date in the morning. That got the wheels turning pretty quick as the councilors have to make arrangements to get their students to the courts and with under 24 hours to prepare for a six hour car ride they were a little freaked out to say the least. What freaked them out even more was finding out that my brother had a warrant issued for his arrest for probation violations three weeks ago. Apparently he never got approval from his probation officer to attend a rehab program. When my brother told me he got approval we assumed the courts were in agreement, that was not the case. In doing the due dillagence what we found out is my brother pretty much ignored the court's mandates and was "willingly" entering a program to stay out of jail. Apparently he was arrested last November on a warrant and was given a second chance to take care of the court ordered mandates from the year before. He ignored them once again, proclaiming his innocence (he pleaded guilty), the stupidity of his lawyer and the money grabbing court system getting the blame for all of his problems. After we made the six hour drive back home I told him he had a choice to make, he could keep ignoring the problem that would never go away or he could step up and take care of it. Again he wanted to ignore it claiming that it was not important, his crimes were misdemenors and no one would come get him for those in violation of probation. His plan was to jump state and live with my mom. The only problem is my mom said living with her for the last two and a half years done her in to his problems and he could not stay with her any longer, that he needed to take responsibility for his own self made problems. So then it is back to me. "I guess I can stay with you?" he asked on the way back. "Yes" I said, "for one night" meaning he would in the morning have to make a decision on where he would go. I counciled with him and told him to face his fears (three years in prison) and deal with his issues or keep running and never find freedom. I finally convinced him to turn himself in was the best thing he could do and hope for mercy from the courts. We made the journey to the jail in silence as the tension weighed down on both of us. For me it was a freedom of having to take care of him, plan for him, baby him. For him it was giving up his freedom to face the unknown. It was somewhat bittersweet in that moment when the cell door clanged shut locking him behind prison bars knowing that he was finally taking his first steps to a life of freedom by giving up his freedom.
I pray that he will find mercy in the courts. I pray that he will find help to help him be able to deal with life so he can start over and live a life filled with hope and not despair. I pray that those around him encourage him to take the path least traveled as that is the one that leads to true freedom. I pray that I will never have to take anyone else to jail...