Christmas Light Rock

Looks like an eccentric guy down south has been spending huge numbers of hours each year putting together displays of synchronized christmas lights timed to music.

Carson Williams has 16,000 lights on his house, linked back to a computer and animated to music. Anyone outside of his house can tune in to a short-ranged FM radio transmitter set up to hear the songs as they're played. Check out this awesome video of his house performing Wizards of Winter from the Trans-Siberian Orchestra.

And if you're really daring, you can even build your own light display.

Another potentially great Christian reach out, if handled properly. Thnk about it... wild and crazy lights going on and off, and cars lining up for miles to see the show, and tune in to your selected christian music. (perhaps David Crowder, DC Talk, or Newsboys?)

Photoshop Tennis

It's a pretty simple idea, really: One player emails a Photoshop document to the other containing a single layer. Each player progressively adds a layer until the match is over, either by time, withdrawal, or mutual consent. A guest adds comments in real time and the people watching vote for a winner. - Read at G4

Started by Croudal Partners, this deceptively simple concept sounds like a sport I would definately be interested in! It's taking the design community by storm, and is a fantastic way to promote creativity, collaboration, competition, and plain old fun.

Begin with a randomly chosen image or set of images, and start the game. The artists take turns manipulating the previous layers, and adding one new layer to the mix. The only rules, are that you can only add one layer, and you can't completely cover the previous layers (so you have to use elements from the previous rounds).

Anyone have any ideas on how to use this as a ministry/evangelism/discipleship tool?

I'd love to give this a try if I can find anyone as crazy as me.

Coudal Partners - started Photoshop Tennis
LayerMatch - great examples of battles
G4 - video minidoc

Bye Bye Government

I've just witnessed the making of Canadian history.

Just a moment ago, I watched the non-confidence vote on television. The Liberals have been deemed no longer fit to run the government. The house of commons voted 171 to 131 to holding elections in January.

I am not surprised at this development, since the unveiling of the Gomery Report has already judicially proven that many of the leading members of the Liberal Party, including the former prime minister, Jean Crétien, have led a bout in organized crime that has literally stolen hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayers money.

Not to mention the biblical and family issues and values that the Liberal party has destroyed over their previous terms:

• abortion and partial-birth abortion
• gay marriage
• prescription of marijuana
• law against reciting in public or printing certain verses from the Bible
• equal justice for all not like how Svend Robinson, who was then a premier, was only given a slap on the wrist even though he stole a $6400 ring
• complete failure to ensure the safety of Canada through military
• refusing to stand up for international safety and peace

... and so much more, like the newly uncovered scheme of illegal insider trading amongst Liberals.

Elections are coming January 23rd! Be sure to vote for your premiers who represent the one party who stands up for what's right, moral, legal, and biblical.

Passion Toronto

Yesterday, about 20 of us from Celebration! Church in Ottawa drove on down to Toronto to join in the first Passion conference in Canada!

It was a fantastic evening of prayer and worship... lead by Louie Giglio and his all-star team of worship musicians, Charlie Hall, Chris Tomlin, and David Crowder.

I was fortunate enough to be able to attend the Passion 05 conference in Nashville, Tennessee earlier this year with 7 others from my church, and it was amazing to see it finally come to Canada.

The new 268 Blog
Passion 05 photos

Passion Toronto photos coming soon here.

Panorama

Building Tech Teams

Found a great article over at anthonycoppedge.com about building strong tech teams. Great ideas, and great principles. Such as event-specific lanyards, or setting the standard that all new volunteers, no matter how much experience they have, must start with the basics (wrapping cables, cleaning, etc) to show that they are capable of committing to such an important ministry!

-|Read|-

Thanksgiving

Canadian Thanksgiving holiday!

There's always plenty of things to be thankful for. Like health, good friends, loving family, a special someone (or lack of?), etc.

And you know what we did to celebrate the weekend?

Celebration! Church put together a huge free thanksgiving dinner on Sunday evening. They spent the previous week with a mission team from South Carolina walking around campus, and inviting university and college students. Many who were not able to spend thanksgiving with family, or even international students, some of which have never heard of thanksgiving before.

Turn out was pretty good, around 60-70 people to consume most of the food. 2 turkeys, hams, chilis, chicken, side dishes, 12 pies, cakes, brownies, cookies, and lots of softdrinks.

We even had about 5 homeless people come in, which we then invited to eat their fill.

A great evening of thankfullness, food, games, making friends, and reaching out to the community.

Teaching

This past weekend was an altogether new experience for me. I had my first chance at teaching to an audience.

I've already spoken, danced, or just had fun on stage in front of a few thousand people. I've also tought various outdoors skills to groups. But this was my first time teaching leadership skills and values, even if it was only to a hundred or so people.

Over the weekend, my family was brought down to Michigan to speak at a business conference being held there. We were given a chance to share our faith in God, our values, our experiences, and our love for family and ministry.

I covered two topics during my time there. The first, was about a youth leadership conference I attended some years ago (and consequently became a Christian). Then, I tought on the subject of integration. The fact that we need to openly combine all aspects of our lives. You can't only be a christian at church, you can't only be a parent when you're with your child, and you can't only be in business when you're at work!

A great example of integration, is driving down to a business conference a couple of days early, with your family, to see the sights and make a short vacation out of the business trip.

The whole weekend was a great experience for my family and I, and we are incredibly humbled that they would want us to go down there and share with them.