Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Cool Commercial
Love Came To Town from Bill Coffman on Vimeo.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Looking for something to do to kill time at work?
Try this:
1. Call a local grocery store
2. Ask for the meat department
3. Ask whoever answers the phone if they carry turducken
Better yet, try doing the above in person. I guarantee you this is the reply you will get in either scenario: “A what . . .” and/or “A turducken . . . hold on”
It’s great fun!
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
The CCC Compost Pile
So, I built a compost pile at my house the other day. As I was building it I thought to myself “Self, Community Christian Church is kind of like a compost pile”. Basically a compost pile (or at least the one I did) works as follows: You start off with a bunch of tree limps, branches and the like. That forms your base. You do this so that air can flow under the pile, which speeds up the process. Then you make a “nest” out of leafs and grass clippings, that sort of thing. This allows for airflow from the sides. (Doing it this way you don’t have to turn the pile). Then you pile in your garbage, which is just about anything but meat and dairy. I think I had some egg shells, a few bananas, some lettuce and other various vegetables and bread product. After you put your trash in the nest you cover it up with leafs and the whole process starts over. Nest, trash, leafs. Nest, trash, leafs. Etc. Then the soil heats up, the bugs and microorganisms do their thing and before long you have great soil for your garden, to make things grow. Then the stuff you grow eventually ends up back in the compost pile and becomes fertile soil for next years garden. It really is amazing how it works. You’ve got all this worthless left over table scraps that are magically converted to rich fertile soil. Is the Church any different? No, if it’s working right, not really. We’ve got our base God. Then we surround ourselves with a nest or support system: small groups, serving teams, friends that will help us. Then we put ourselves in the nest. Now, I won’t go so far as to call us “trash”. But let’s face it, a lot of times there’s not much going on in us that isn’t trash, or I guess I’ll call it sin. After we’re in the next we cover ourselves with Jesus and God’s amazing grace. We learn to love God and love others. And before long we develop into a rich fertile Christ follower. Then we can remove ourselves from the pile and go out and help others grow. And just like soil we eventually end up back in the compost pile, because we are always changing and growing to become even more like Christ. CCC, bring your trash and compost with the rest of us!
Monday, October 20, 2008
Shameless Plug
Here is a link to a blog hosted by my good friend Andrew Marshall. Of course, as I type this my guess is the same 6 people that read my blog probably got his e-mail about his new blog. Then it dawned on me that we have quite the little incestuous blogging community. Then it dawned on me that didn’t sound right. What I meant to say is that there are about a dozen or so people that just all follow the same blogs. And then it dawned on me all the people following the same blogs see each other all the time and could just talk about stuff instead of blogging about it. But then it dawned on me that it’s more fun to be literarily cleaver on the internet then it is in person. So my final dawning is that blogging is a good thing, no matter how incestuous it is. Wait, that sounded bad again. Well, you know what I mean. Go look at Andrew’s blog, it is always entertaining.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Pass the potatoes
I thought this was interesting. And I always thought my mom cooked us dinner because she loved us. Come to find out she was just trying to ruin my teenage years. Darn Her! Guess my daughters (and son I guess) can expect home cooked meals from now until their 40.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Anonymous Comments
I want to thank the anonymous commenter to my last blog. It's always nice to know that someone reads my mindless babblings. However, you will notice I didn’t post your comment. I’ve made it my policy to not post anonymous comments. They’re usually very negative and sometimes nasty and obviously posted by people that have WAY too much time on their hands. And I’m a positive person and try to avoid negativity if at all possible. I’m not given to such things as anger and rants. Give peace a chance is what I say! Ok, those last three statements are a lie.
Anyway, I started to post the last anonymous comment I got, because it was positive, but thought that to be a double standard. I mainly don’t post them because I’m the type of person that doesn’t mind expressing my opinion and doesn’t mind people knowing it is me that expressed it. And, yes, that does sometimes get me in trouble, but I’m a pretty transparent guy. I understand why some people comment anonymously:
1) They are too scared to put there name
2) It’s my mom and she doesn’t realize she can leave her name
3) It’s my mom and she doesn’t want people to know I’m her offspring
3) They don’t want people to know they wasted their time by reading my blog
4) Their name may in fact be Anonymous
So, to the 4 people that read my blog, keep sending in those comments, anonymously or not, and I’ll read them. But if you want to share your wisdom with the world (or the other 3 people reading the blog) you gotta leave your name.
Monday, October 6, 2008
Hellfire and Brimstone
Two things stuck me during and after our conversation. First I was reminded of all the times I’ve lied when I’ve sinned. I’ve lied to others and I’ve lied to God, as if you can really do that. I thought about all the great men in the Bible that lied to and tried to hide from God. We lie and hide because of fear. Fear of the consequence of our actions. I came to the realization that my son’s first instinct is to think of me in terms of punishment. Yes, there should be punishment for actions. But at the same time there should be grace and forgiveness. Now, by no means am I comparing myself to God, but I do believe He uses instances like these to give us a small glimpse of what He is like. He is able to dish out any punishment He pleases, and we deserve it. But instead, if we go to Him, He comes to us with love, grace and forgiveness. I could have severely punished my son for his actions, he deserved it, but I realized that instead of punishment he needed relationship.
And that brings me to the second thought I had. I thought about all the people out there that won’t set foot inside a church because of the fear of the consequences of their actions. They are so far from God that they 1) can’t imagine God accepting them, and 2) if He does except them, what form of punishment is God going to cast down upon them. And if that doesn’t get them then there is the fear of how others in the church will view them. There are broken people out there that have no hope of becoming whole because of fear; fear that has been put into their head from Christians and the church. Because the God that I read about is not known as a god of fear, He is a god of love.
If my son continues to view me only as a father who only dishes out punishment I have no hope of training him to become the Godly man I know he is. There will always be a great chasm between us. In the same way, if people only think of God as a person only interested in dishing out punishment they’re going to stay away from Him and the church. Trust me when I say that God is much more interested in having a relationship with you then punishing you. Yes, there are eternal consequences for your actions, but we must first give people the opportunity for relationship. Let’s present the God of love instead of the God of punishment. How do I know He would want us to do that? Because He did it. When we deserved nothing more then an eternity in Hell, He sent Jesus. He had every right to send punishment, but he sent love. God is love. No matter who you are or what you’ve done, God is love.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Monday, September 15, 2008
Who You Gonna Dunk?
How was your weekend?
Help two of my best friends
Hang out with a bunch of people dedicated to God and reaching those who don’t know Him
Watch a friend get married
Help another friend set up a baptistery so a person I don’t know could get baptized
Direct and eat biscuits and gravy at the same time
Have a teenager tell me they want to get baptized
Pretty good weekend if you ask me.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
My Presidential Endorsement (as if you care)
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Monday, August 25, 2008
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Monday, August 11, 2008
Guess Who?
In order to form an immaculate member of a flock of sheep one must, above all, be a sheep.
I think for me, as a long time Christ follower and now as someone who gets paid to work at a church, I loose site of the fact that first and foremost I’m a sheep. I get so tied up in doing my job I forget that I’m a sheep. And since I grew up in church I take a lot of things for granted. I’ve read the bible plenty, why should I do it EVERY day. Or, I just spent all week writing a sermon and three different DVD teachings, I think I’ve studied enough this week. I’ve got to remember that I must live a life that I’m inviting other to live. My goal in life is to be like Jesus. But in order to get there I must be the best follower of Jesus I can be.
Thursday, July 24, 2008
TV For The Rest of Us
*Editor’s Note: I personally like the song I Surrender All (not the version I linked to). But I grew up singing it, so it stands to reason I would like it.
Monday, July 21, 2008
Board Monday Afternoon Thought
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Really Good Post
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Anything for FREE food
Monday, July 14, 2008
Oh, and we stored some stuff at my parents house, but they’re my parents, so they don’t really count. I mean, if you can’t store stuff at your parents house where can you? That’s what parents are for. Besides, they don’t even know what a blog is or how to access one, so they’ll never see this!
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Spending Too Much Time on Youtube
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Prayer
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Monday, June 30, 2008
Down Right Creepy
Thursday, June 26, 2008
I Think I'm In Love
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
CCC Medical Center
Friday, June 13, 2008
Moving On Up
As I was flying to San Francisco Sunday afternoon I was reading my favorite book of the Bible, James. If you have never read it please do. It is slap full of good stuff. Anyway, one of my favorite verses in James is 1:23-25. It’s the whole look in a mirror verse. Everyday I look in the mirror and see all the crap I have in my life. And by crap I mean stuff that I do that I shouldn’t. Sin. Separation from God. I see all that stuff, figuratively speaking, but most of the time I don’t do anything about it. I just can’t seem to let go of crap. I want to, but I can’t. So I choose to take all my crap with me, and sometimes my friends are forced to deal with it too. I need to do better about looking at the perfect law that sets me free. I’ve got to change. I’ve got to move. Problem is, moving sucks!
Monday, June 2, 2008
Who needs Noah Webster when you have Crosby!
Thursday, May 29, 2008
To All My Anonymous Fans
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Miley's Achy Breaky Pictures Part 2
Miley's Achy Breaky Pictures
Ultimately here’s my point. I have two daughter that love Miley Cyrus a.k.a. Hannah Montana. (Now you can argue that I shouldn’t let my daughters watch the show, but that’s a discussion for another time.) Her posing in Vanity Fair made NO impact on my daughters because they don’t read Vanity Fair. They’ve never even seen it. Now does that excuse or make up for what Miley did. No. But I would worry more about the parents that let there kids look at such magazines. I would argue that Vanity Fair is worse then Playboy. Take out the naked pictures in Playboy and all you’re left with is articles about sports and cars. (Or so I’ve been told). Open the pages of Vanity Fair, or GQ or even Seventeen and you see articles like “How to Please Your Man”, “Seven Ways to Use a Popsicle Stick” or “Guy or Girl, The Tough Decision”.
What I don’t understand is how her dad sat there and watched it. That would just gross me out. Of course this is the man that brought you “Achy Breaky Heart”. I think people are just pissed off because they didn’t have the idea to put their 15 year old mediocre singing/acting daughter on the Disney channel to make millions of dollars. I guess I just have more things to get upset about. Like $4.00 gas prices, war, raising my own kids, you know much LESS important things. Maybe one day I’ll get upset at Miley. Until then I guess I’ll have to keep downloading illegal copies of her songs to my MP3 player so my daughters can listen to them in the car. Yes I said illegal! But give me a break, it’s not like I’m letting my kids pose for magazines.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
You're Invited!
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Why Blogs were invented
If you’re interested here is the real history of Blogs. It’s actually very interesting how they came about.
Monday, April 28, 2008
Look, I found God
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Take me out to the ballgame
1. If you have an eight year old son it should me mandatory that you take him to a baseball game. Charlie and I went last night and it was a blast.
2. Boys can last as many innings as their age (i.e. a two year old can last two innings, five year old five innings, etc.) By the eighth inning Charlie was more interested in catching bugs then watching the game.
3. Dad’s should be more interested in taking their son to Tooner Filed then watching the game.
4. Every eight year olds favorite player (if a Braves fan) is Chipper Jones. Not a bad choice.
5. Eight year olds have no concept for what an accomplishment it is to achieve 3000 strikeouts.
6. Drunk people shouldn’t try to start the wave, especially during the singing of Take Me Out to the Ballgame.
7. Don’t worry about spending $7 on a hotdog, it’s well worth the look on your sons face to have a hotdog bigger then his head slap full of chili and cheese (jalapeños on the side for dad)
8. Don’t worry about spending $10 to park right next to the stadium.
9. Eight year olds have a better concept for money then you would think. They understand the logic behind NOT spending $5 on a bag of cotton candy.
10. Talk to your son during the game. Teach him the proper and non-obscene way to belittle the umpires and other team. Try until you’re blue in the face to explain basic concepts of balls, strikes, outs and foul balls. Make sure you do every tomahawk chop, Adam’s family clap and every “Budabubumpbaba CHARGE”. Promise you’ll take a three row, head first, bear handed dive for any foul balls that come close.
Baseball is a great game. There are so many things about it that make it great. Add an eight year old boy and it becomes perfect. Especially if that boy is as cool as my son!
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Who's Your Daddy?
Monday, April 14, 2008
Top Ten Ways to Get Out of Praying
1. “Dear Lord, I want to first thank you for clearing up that touch of gonorrhea I had last month... “
Ok, so I don’t have ten. But I think that one will suffice.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Great Week of Serving
Now when you look at it we only had 19% of our student ministry (students and leaders) participate; overall, not a great number. I really didn’t have any idea how many we would have. Like I said, we’ve never done this kind of thing before. But here is what I do know. We had 19 students make a sacrifice this week. In our day and time I don’t think we know what true sacrifice is. But to a teenager, time out of school is one of their most precious possessions. And to a teenager giving any of that time up is a sacrifice.
2000 years ago 12 men made huge sacrifices to follow some guy from Nazareth that just said “Follow me”. That guy and those 12 men changed the world forever. Proof that numbers don’t matter; it’s what’s in the heart that counts. Nineteen students didn’t set out to change the world this week, but some change did happen in their hearts. I believe that heart change can and will change the world. Twelve did it 2000 years ago, there’s no reason we can’t do it today. Besides, we’re 7 up on them. Piece of cake.
Thanks to everyone that came out. I love you guys!
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
What's with all the blanking blogging?
Thursday, April 3, 2008
If that’s not saying “Up Yours” I don’t know what is.
I like to think of Community Christian Church as the Hardee’s of the church world. Most churches decide that hunkering down and taking care of their own is the way to go. Sure they like visitors, but only if they look, smell and act a certain way. Oh, and they can’t be sinners either. They say that in order for a church to be “healthy” they need only serve “healthy” people. If we went with the flow and did what most churches do we’d be no different. But, just like Hardee’s is not in the health food business, we are not in the business of serving healthy people, we’re in the business of serving spiritually unhealthy people and letting God make them healthy. We go against the flow. Our church is full of spiritually unhealthy people, from the senior pastor all the way down. And we want more spiritually unhealthy people to join us. It is only through God’s grace that we can one day be completely healthy. And if we don’t provide a place for everyone to get to know God then we have failed as a church. Now, if I could only find a way of getting them to serve the Monster Thickburger after communion. That may truly be Heaven on Earth!
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
HYPE United! Part Deux.
We had our second United this past Sunday night at East Coweta High school. Once again the student ministry team came through in a BIG way. When we opened the doors teenagers just flooded in. I don’t know why that shocks me so much, God is truly at work.
We played Deal or No Deal. The kids really got into it. One stinken’ kid took us for $250 (which was the top prize for that games) in the FIRST game! When I thought up the idea I was thinking “Nobody ever picks the million dollar case”. Opps. Everybody had a great time, including our “Howe” and and the lovely “Case Holding Girl”.
Monday, March 24, 2008
I dare you to find a better job then mine
Sunday, March 23, 2008
I Wanna Be the First to Get the News Out part 2
I Wanna Be the First to Get the News Out
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
I can take 22 five year olds in a fight
22 Oh, and to the person that always gets upset with my post: I DO NOT EVER OR WOULD EVER FIGHT A FIVE YEAR OLD. WHEN MY KIDS AND I WRESTLE IT IS FOR PURE FUN. I MAKE EVERY EFFORT NOT TO INJURE MY CHILDREN. Unless my three year old decides to do a flying knee drop from the sofa on my head, then all bets are off.
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Don't Go To Kroger . . . at least for a while.
Now, you may be saying to yourself “Self, what is the point of Kelley’ little tirade?” Here it is: Kroger dropped the ball. They work all year to get my business. They remodel, they build gas pumps, and they reward me for buying food for them, they advertise, they run specials. I depend on Kroger to come through on what they say. I then I show up and they turn me away as if my needs don’t matter. I was really ticked at Kroger and honestly don’t want to shop there anymore. Here at Community Christian we kind of do the same thing. We advertise, we encourage people that call this their home to invite there friends. But if everyone here isn’t on mission we might as well turn people away at the door. Sure there are times that I want to take it easy, I want to just hang out with my friends and not talk to anyone else. Sure it’s a pain to drag my kids up there at 7:30 AM and have the sit for an hour and a half while I practice a drama or get stuff ready for small group. But I know that there is someone out there that will be walking in the door because of the church’s efforts and we better be prepared for them. Unfortunately the term “comfort zone” just doesn’t exist in our church. If we all stick to our comfort zones the mission won’t get accomplished and people go to Hell. It’s true that only God can turn a person’s heart and once a person walks in the door they have to be open to listing to Him. And if WE think WE did something great when someone makes Jesus the leader of their life we are fooling themselves. But we’ve got to get them in the door and decide that we’re ok with doing things we may not otherwise like to do. Ultimately Kroger has no choice in where my grocery money goes, but they sure know how to entice me to spend it with them. If they do in fact entice me into their store they better sure as heck back up what they’ve said. We better do the same. We say we’re a church for the Rest of Us. Stop thinking about what you and you husband and your kids like, and think about what the Rest of Us likes. It’s not about you, it’s about lost people. It’s about reaching unconnected people and together growing to Christ, regardless of location, time, leader, music and friends. Kroger dropped the ball, but eventually I’ll end up back there at some point giving them my money (need that gas). Unfortunately, people aren’t as forgiving of churches as they are grocery stores.
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Cool HYPE United Story
I just want to relay one really cool story that came out of our first United. A friend of mine has been trying to get a lady she works with to come to church. The woman has a daughter that is in 6th grade. According to my friend, this girl is really into wicken, witchcraft and all that stuff. Now, I don’t know if she’s like a practicing wicken or not, or if she just thinks it’s cool. Point being this girl (and presumable her mother) are FAR from God. Well, she ended up coming with my friend to HYPE United, and she LOVED it. She can’t wait to come back. My friend was so excited! I was too. Now, here’s the really cool thing for me. This young girl happens to go to the same school as my kids go to. This morning when I dropped them off this girl, who I’ve seen several times but has never spoken to me, yells from across the room “Mr. Kelley, Mr. Kelley”, I see her and say “hi”. She then says “That Mr. Roboto video was weird!” At first I have no idea what the heck she’s talking about. Then it dawns on me she’s gone on-line and voted for our upcoming VMAs. Sometimes I get so engrossed in planning activities and worrying about what our regular kids will think about them that I lose track of why we do all this in the first place. This young girl now has a connection to our church because of a silly music video we put on line.
I wonder sometimes, at the end of the day, if God looks down and sees all the stuff we’re doing and says “Well, that’s certainly one way to do it. I guess I’ll just have to use that to get that 6th grade girl I’ve wanted to reach out to.” Here’s the really freaky thing that crosses my mind: Did God put that song in Dennis DeYoung’s (founding member of Styx) mind 25 years ago with the sole purpose of reaching this young lady? I know, that sound like a stretch. But, how else would an individual figure out a way to work the lyrics “Domo arigato” into a rock song?
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Senior High Retreat (Sorry it's so long)
1) John Martin, Nathan McKnight, Zach Boswell and Nathan Martin did an incredible job of leading us in worship. Along with playing for the main sessions they put together an all worship service Saturday night (started at 10 PM) that was amazing. I challenged the teenagers to just show up, leave all their baggage at the door, and just worship the God that created them. And they did. Thank you band. We’ll see you at the next retreat (I hope!).
2) Lawrence Moore put together our fun activities. He did a great job of just getting the kids to loosen up and get to know each other. He did a scavenger hunt Saturday night that took a lot of planning and preparation and the kids really liked it. Good job my man!
3) Cathy Hooker came through again in the kitchen. Truth be told, I only do these retreat so I can get eat her cooking the entire weekend. If anyone came away from this weekend hungry it’s their own fault.
4) Small group leaders. Holy Cow! I can’t imagine doing this stuff without you. I always tell students that the leaders enjoy this stuff more then the students. And we do. Watching you guys play games with the kids, eat with them and lead them closer to God is almost too much for me to handle. I know one leader just sat and talked with a student for an hour or so after our campfire. I think as adults we don’t realize how much of an impact we can make on a young person’s life by just sitting and listening. This leader gets that and did it. WHAT WE DO WOULD NOT BE POSSIBLE WITHOUT YOU. I love you all so much.
6) BJ Parker took some of the load off of me this weekend. He might think what he did wasn’t that big of a deal, but it was. He helped set up the topics every night by leading the students in activities. He did a great job!
7) Becky Martin. Enough said. If you know Becky you know what I mean. If you don’t know Becky you’re missing out. She basically does all the work and I just walk around pissing people off. But we make a good team. I could go on, but I don’t have the time or space.
8) My wife. The main session wouldn’t have happened without her. She takes all the jumbled mess in my head and somehow makes it look like a well oiled machine. I don’t know how or why she puts up with me but I thank God she does.