Mark Driscoll in Athens

Oct 8th go get your tickets ASAP!

http://www.gotothehub.com/liveevents/lovelife-2011/

9 things for 9 years

9 years ago today 'me' became a 'we' and I thought I would share 9 things for 9 years:

1. I still feel extremely lucky that she said yes.
2. My failures in loving and honoring my bride have not defined our marriage, Grace has.
3. She still makes me laugh harder and more regularly than anyone I know.
4. I knew she would be a great mom but she has surpassed my expectations BY FAR!
5. I still like to hold her hand.
6. She is always the 1^st person I want to talk to when something good or bad happens.
7. She is an incredible friend to her friends!
8. Somehow she is still my biggest fan.
9. She is more beautiful today than day I met her.

33 things in 33 years

1^st thanks for all the birthday wishes on facebook, text message or phone call. I thought I would write a few things that I feel like I have learned in the past 33 years.

1. my character is found only in Christ. In my life I haveI thought I had strong character because of what I could do. It was never true. The older I get the more immaturity I see in my life and my need for the character of Jesus to stand in front of me.
2. I can grab a baseball across the seams correctly every time I pick one up. An I wasn’t a great ball player after 13:)
3. I still suck at spelling
4. Since I am dyslexic and ADD, having the internet read the bible to me has changed my life.
5. Money can’t fix everything but money sure can make it more fun.
6. All dads should wear a cup when wrestling with you kids.
7. It’s always better to order a side of avocado than guac. They typically give you more.
8. Sonic has the best Coke.
9. HD tv is really that much better
10. The minivan wins.
11. If I could afford it I would have a massage every morning when I wake up.
12. I love being a dad as much as I thought I would.
13. I can learn a song pretty fast. I can lead most songs with a chord chart after hearing it a couple of times.
14. I love live concerts.
15. I still am thankful Camille said yes. Love her more than I show her. That’s sad.
16. Always open your dates car door. Always let your date walk in front of you when you are in public. Unless your not proud to be with her. Instead of letting her walk in front of you, break up with her. If you don’t like someone enough to show her off as you walk in, get out. She deserves more.
17. It is crazy hard not to let your failures define you.
18. Most people that get incredible results, work incredibly hard.
19. If you don’t learn how you work best you will end up wasting most of the time you are supposed to be “working”.
20. I see things differently than most people. I look at broken things and tech things differently. It’s a blessing and a curse. It’s a curse when I get frustrated when folks don’t see things the same way I do. Again my character blows.
21. I love espn.
22. Not much makes me happier than laughing with my kids.
23. My favorite dessert is banana pudding. Which my bride made me tonight.
24. Friends can work together. I can work with my best friend because of Gospel conversations. They are hard but can make it possible.
25. I really enjoy leading music with my friends. Over the past 10 years I have made some great friends and led some incredible music that made much of Jesus.
26. Rural Pond and friends does excellent wedding music.
27. I have a heart for our city. My friend Andy and I are coaching our boys again. Trying to plug into this community.
28. When you move into a house you MUST know what to do if a water pipe breaks.
29. Kids toys take up way to much space.
30. Working with younger guys can be one of the most rewarding and frustrating things ever. I can’t imaging how Mike, Cyndi, Collins, Keith, Paul, David, Asa, Bubeck, and MANY more put up with my arrogance and immaturity.
31. I am a late night person. I prefer to stay up much later than I do. BUT I have to wake up every morning because we have kidos. I miss sleeping in.
32. I am trying to encourage my friends and verbalize my love for them.
33. I don’t deserve for people to love me and say some of the stuff they have today. I have failed many of them and many others. If not for Jesus everyone would have been done with me a long time ago. Thank you to everyone for loving me.

Full Heart

it's been a while. probably not here for long but here for today. here we go.

Today I played music for the funeral of a friend of mine. We were not best friends BUT i feel like I knew Stewart Hay and that he knew me. I love his son Alastair Hay and his wife Lexis. I don't know his other 3 kids as well. I have led worship with Al, MANY times and Lexis provided the food for many of the retreat we did at FPC and I had many great talks with her on those retreats. One thing stood out about Stewart Hay: people he loved knew that he loved them. I want to be like that. I'm not like that.

I was very honored to play a small role in the funeral honoring his life today. And the Hay family is in my prayers. I remember the feeling of loosing my dad. It's HARD.(old post) I love you guys. I am thankful for the life of Stewart Hay.

I was able to have lunch before the funeral with one of my favorite people in the world, Les Saunders. Les is one of the many reasons that I am who I am today. He pushed me musically and was never afraid to tell me i was off or wrong. After lunch we set up our guitars and mics and played music. It had been 4 years since we had played together but it literally felt like yesterday we hung out and played together. we played well today. We sang well. it was good for my heart to play music with one of my great friends. If we have jobs in heaven and if I find my self making music, I want you in my band Les or I want to be in yours.

After the funeral I had to jet kind of fast in order to make it to Perimeter to lead worship for the Camp All American Staff. One of my roommates from college is a director of CAA and we were able to go have dinner before I led. Again Brent Curl(earlier post) is one of the people that has made me who I am today. He makes having real conversations easy, he always has. Thanks for being someone that lives out the Gospel as well as anyone I know.

Then I was able to see Andy Nelson, a former member at our church, now Youth Pastor in Boca FLA. I miss him and want him and his bride to move back to Athens one day. I am glad to call him friend.

My final thought of the day is this: It took a ton of people to love me and help me get where I am today. I failed A LOT along the way. I hurt people, I failed people, disappointed people and most of all didn't really know myself. Now at almost 33 I see that I have really needed people to love me through my immaturity and poor/irresponsible choices. Brent and Les (the full list is WAY to long) are a couple of the people that did that for me.

Tonight my heart is full because of great memories and people that helped me in the growing up and becoming a man.

"clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose."-coach taylor

How I became a guy that leads people in musical worship of Jesus pt. 2:

If this is your first time reading this check out part 1 first.

That retreat I mentioned would easily be one of my most embarrassing moments EVER if there was video from the music I played. I probably only had 8 songs to play that weekend and I remember them asking me to play a couple of well known songs like “I’ve got the joy joy joy joy down in my heart”, “I am a C-H-R-I-S-T-I-A-N” or “MILK MILK MILK DRINK THE WORD WORD WORD” and I didn’t know any of them! I made up chords. Somehow they didn’t think I was a joke. No clue how. Regardless how bad the songs were the weekend was incredible. I was hooked on FPC and I think they were hooked on me. I interned there that summer, worked part time during my last year of school and after I graduated I went to work there full time. My last year of school was probably the most beneficial for me. I played a lot of guitar that year. I had a handful of folks that taught me nuggets of guitar and really helped me. Those folks were: Dad, Brent Curl, Bethany Sherrill Mason, Les Saunders and Kai Bassett. All of these people gave me some tools to make me the guitar player I am today. I started to put together a couple of pieces to my puzzle and to explain them I have to go back in time a bit.

-I spent 4 summers working at a summer camp in Servilleville(sp?) Tennessee growing up. One of my friends (Mark Miller)was a few years older and he was getting a degree in classical guitar and he would lead all of the music for the camp. I remember singing one night out by the camp fire. I remember something stirring inside of me during our singing that summer.

-my forth year of school there was a tour that came through Berry called “road to one day” I had no idea what it was I just knew I liked singing. To set the stage I was between a girl I had once dated and a girl I had a bit of an awkward friendship with. I started to shake because of the weirdness and somehow forgot they were there. At one point I opened my eyes to realize that I was standing on my tip toes with both hands reaching to the sky. I immediately sat down and asked my self “what in the crap are you doing?” As I wrestled with this for a minute I finally decided they didn’t matter this was a genuine expression of what my heart wanted to say.

-Shane Barnards record “rocks cry out” has a live section of worship songs. I still love that section. I remember listening to it and saying this is how I want to lead worship. To me it was more than just leading his songs and walking off stage. His songs all blended together and basically told a story. That is what I wanted to do. I wanted to tell a story that connected to the deepest parts of people. So what better story to tell than the story of Jesus.

I was not and still am not the best guitarist but even from from my camp days I have always felt something inside me towards music and how it connects me to God.

What’s next ? me realizing I don’t suck any more.

hope this might be helpful for someone out there.

How I became a guy that leads people in musical worship of Jesus pt. 1:

So, I have been thinking about a blog post I have been wanting to write concerning my job and this is the first one.

I come from a long line of men that played guitar. My grandfather played in many bands and toured with a band (playing upright bass) that toured with Johnny Cash and was jam buddies with Buddy Holly. My dad was also a great musician. Dad learned guitar from my grandmother and became a great musician. He played saxophone as well and played electric bass for Jerry Lee Lewis.  Dad also played music in the church at some point. Dad could really play the guitar!

Somehow I wasn’t destined to follow in the family footsteps musically, at least that’s what most of my life said. I learned how to play a G chord my third year of college when  I was 20. I would hold a G chord and play songs. Strumming came naturally but I didn’t pursue the guitar. The next year (in June) I heard a song called ‘I will not forget you’ and I said to one of my roommates, “that would be fun to play”. He said it was only four chords and that I could play it. I was hooked after that. I sat in front of the TV and went from G-D-Em-C over and over again. Most of the time I wasn’t even strumming. I was now about to turn 22 and decided to learn to play acoustic guitar.

I had a pretty big issue that summer.  I sucked at playing guitar. I was confident in strumming but it started to be bad. I was living with my grandfather and working at camp all-american. The guitar just wasn’t happening. I couldn’t even play ‘Light The Fire’. Sitting by the pond behind my grandfather’s house I had a come to Jesus meeting with Jesus (these usually don’t go well). I said “God if I am not better in a month I am quitting. You have 4 weeks to make me at least be able to play ‘light the fire’ well. If you deliver I promise I will make much of you with this instrument.” A few of things you need to know here: 1) I have never tested God like this 2) I wouldn’t recommend it 3) I am physically pained by not keeping promises 4) I am not uber spiritual 5) I have no clue why God delivered, but he did. After four weeks I was able to play ‘light the fire’.

In the next month I was a completely different guitar player!  In October I led music for BSU at Truett McConnell. I knew three songs well. That night was the 1^st time I closed my eyes and played guitar. I remember finishing that song and thinking “THAT JUST HAPPENED”. It was a big day for me. The next Feb. I led a retreat for FPC Marietta and after that retreat I started to pursue figuring out what it meant to lead people in musical worship.

More of my story to come but this was the start of my journey of becoming someone that leads God’s people in musical worship. 

The rant of the last 6 weeks.

1)    my girl is six weeks tomorrow and I haven’t blogged since she was born so I figured it was time.

2)    After having bay # 2 I think I have a realer(if that’s a word) sense of real friends.

3)    I think our community group is pretty awesome. They have been an incredible help to us.

4)    My fantasy football team has more I juries than you could imagine. I had 6 guys on the bench, 5 were injured and 1 had a one guy on my starting line up on a bye week. It sucked.

5)    My boy is crazy sweet to his baby sister.

6)    We put up our 1^st tent in the back yard. It was fun. But the amount of time L played in it didn’t match his excitement about putting it up.

7)    I am excited about oct 24^th

8)    I have enjoyed watching flashforward

9)    I love making music with our band at church

10) One day I will record again. Not sure what but I think the day is coming sooner than later

11) My buddy Les and his bride are having their 1^st baby this Friday, pray for them

12) The next few are very selfish wants of mine

13) I desperately want an iphone. The new droid phones give me some hope that Verizon can compete. We will see at the beginning of next month when they release them.

14) I also really want to add on to our house or some how have someone buy us a bigger house. We need a bit more room for kids and hosting folks. Praying for this one.

15) Praying that in the next year God will provide another car for us. We are doing well with just one car but I think its almost time for us to have 2 cars again.

16) I want our church to have our own building. Seriously praying for this.

17)  I really need to go to bed because L keeps waking me up early to go to the bathroom. So I have more to say but I am off to night.

Bella Grace Slaten

So today we have a baby girl in our family. I am writing this a few days before her birth, which makes this a bit strange since I haven’t even met this girl who I am writing about.

Her name is Bella Grace Slaten.

Let me explain where her name came from. One night we were in bed trying to figure out what we were going to name this baby and I threw out the name “Bella.” Camille said, “I saw that name today. I like that but didn’t think you would like it. It means ‘my God is a vow’.” I responded, “I like it, is that her name?” After that we prayed about it and we knew that this was the name of our daughter.

In Hebrew Bella means ‘my God is a vow’ and Grace is Camille’s maiden name and it means ‘the free and unmerited favor of God, as manifested in the salvation of sinners.’

For us, Bella is a visual reminder that God has made a vow with His children. She is not the fulfillment of that promise she is merely a reminder that God gives us what we need. Not what we want or think we deserve but what we need and what we need is salvation through Jesus. Our prayer is that her life would point people to that end. That she would live a life proclaiming that Christ is the win, not things, houses, cars, having kids, new jobs, marriage and even us as parents. Jesus is the win and he alone is the giver of life and love to us.

Yesterday I turned 31 and some things in life are just different.

(I started this blog on the 14th and finished it tonight)

Well, I had a birthday yesterday. I was good. I was able to spend the morning with my bride and son. They got me a chickfila biscuit and an ESV study bible. If you read the bible you need the ESV study bible. Then I worked till 5, had preschool orientation then band practice. Got home at about 9:45 from band practice and ate dinner. So the day wasn’t crazy special but it was nice to hear happy birthday from so many friends.

 

It was a different birthday for a couple of different reasons:

1)    this was my 1^st birthday with out hearing from my dad. 30  years of hearing “happy birthday baby boy!” I missed that.

2)    This is my last birthday with just one kid. L made me a great card with dinosaurs and rhinos on it. It will be different with a little girl around here. I am excited about her so please don’t hear me saying that I am not excited, life is about to change that’s all I am thinking.

3)    Our band practice went really well. I hope we can duplicate the sound Sunday.

4)    I played basketball last Wed. night like always and wow I felt old. My body hurts a bit more than it used to when I play ball with college guys. 

5)    I will be waking up earlier this semester. I will see the # 6 and early 7 more regularly than ever in my life.

6)    Jumping on a trampoline hurts my head now for some reason.

7)    The first day of preschool was harder on me than my boy.

8)    I thought by now I would like yard work. BUT NO.

9)    I am much more handy than I would have thought I would be at this age.

10) I feel like I love my bride more today than I did when we 1^st were married.

11) Parenting is scarier than I thought it would be, I knew it would be hard just didn’t expect the fear.

 

So I am 31 and kind of feel like it will be a great year. 

more blogs to come

I started this blog a couple of weeks ago, and i am just now getting it online. so some of it is old. but i am going to post it anyway.

Today was my 1^st day back in the saddle. I have been off for the past 2 weeks. They were incredible. I had a blast spending some great time w/ my bride and my boy. It was so much fun. There are a handful of things I thought I would share with the blog world.

To start; my boy got his first set of golf clubs. Our first night in St. Simons Eli told L “you can have my red golf clubs. I am too big for them.” That kind gesture might have changed our world forever. We hit balls in our yard for at least 30 minutes a day. It’s really cool that we have tons of land for him to hit. He has a couple more years before he can out hit our yard. We went to the park while in Marietta and he hit a ball 68 yards. Really amazing. I love to watch him swing. I love being his dad.

Next: I want to talk a bit about adoption. Strange jump I know. But our friends down in St. Simons are soon to adopt some kids from Ghana. I am so excited for them. Check out their blog here. Also, my brother and sister in-law are adopting a girl from China. This adoption process will be a while but my heart leaps at the thought of God blessing them with a beautiful Chinese girl. I personally think that adoption is the clearest picture of the Gospel. There will be a moment in time when these Ghanaian kids and Chinese girl will gain all the rights of their new family. This sweet Chinese girl will be a Grace and have every right that comes with that name. A home, a mom and dad, a great big sister, she will be loved, fed, held, dressed, played with, really anything you can imagine that comes with a loving family. At that moment these Ghanaian kids will gain brothers, a house miles from the beach, a trampoline, a dad that will dote over her, these kids Ghanaians will be totally loved. I remember hearing that they were going to adopt, as I imagined seeing them come up the escaladers at the airport I cried. I cried because I love the picture of Jesus rescuing me. I can’t wait to see my niece and these Ghanaian kids!

Fear is next in line: watching L play with the Fritchy boys freaked me out. Watching him try and keep up with an almost 7 year old and 8 year old boy is frightening. L really is growing up and I am learning daily that he is not my kid but God’s kid.

Next up: Fight Club 09 http://www.fightclub09.com/ I helped lead the music for this and it was a great time. It’s was a packed house and fun. 350 men making much of Jesus good times.