UP

Pixar is awesome.  They never fail the movie going public.  Sarah and I had a date last night and so we went to dinner and a movie.  First, the dinner:

We went to Longhorn on Clemson Blvd in Anderson.  We’ve never been there before but the in-laws say its wonderful.  So off we go.  Sitting down, it was a nice place.  Texas themed (yawn) but still quite nice.  It wasn’t the throw your peanuts on the floor Texas themed, it was a classier Texas theme, which was new to me.  It was not cheap.  It wasn’t expensive either, just pricier than a Texas Roadhouse.  They had Sam Adams on tap which told me this place must be good.  Sarah and I each ordered steaks which when we did we were told by the excellent waitress that their steaks are never frozen and instead arrive fresh and aged to perfection.  I had aged steaks from a butcher before, and the sound of the words “aged steaks” is like Pavlov’s bell to me.  Needless to say, once the food arrived, we were very pleased.  Sarah wanted desert, but then decided against it until the waitress said the words that are like Pavlov’s bell to Sarah: “Fried Cheesecake”.  It was delightful, best I’ve ever had of it.  Oh, and before we were served we were asked if it was our first time, we said yes.  At the end of our meal, the owner/general manager of that one came to our table and thanked us (shaking my hand) for coming and gave us a coupon for a free appetizer next time we came in.  We will definitely be using that.

For the movie:

Amstar in Anderson (or I guess it is The Grand Theatre now) has upgraded nicely.  Now, inside there aren’t movie posters on the wall for the coming attractions, but flat screen HDTV’s turned sideways on the wall giving the poster of the movie with the trailer rolling as well, very cool.  Maybe these are common now as we just haven’t seen a movie in a very long time.

Anyway, we chose to see the 3d version (who wouldn’t).  The tickets were more expensive but I account the glasses for the price jump.  I paid $10 a ticket since I had a student discount.  Once we were seated, the previews started rolling, all of which were in 3d.  Toy Story 3 was announced (June 2010).  The previews made nice use of the 3d, especially that gerbil or hamster movie whatever its called.  But the movie itself did not make ostentatious use of the 3d.  Sarah was a little disappointed in this.  I however was thrilled.  3d is coming a long way, you no longer need the cheesy red and blue lenses that made you a bit sick after too long.  The NFL has been experimenting broadcasting live NFL games in 3d at select theaters across the country (sadly Anderson, SC is not a big enough market to land this yet).  Perhaps 3d is the next logical progression for movies.  Perhaps this progression is like adding sound, or adding color to movies.  Yes the first ones that did such made great use of it.  The first color movies used vibrant colors in order to show you the development and make your eyes feast at its splendor (think of all the colors in the Wizard of Oz).  And 3d movies are no exception.  Most make things jump right into your face for the thrill of it, the excitement of seeing things in 3d.  But once color caught on and was common, there was no strong desire to throw it in your face, it simply strenghtened the already good movie.

Up is like this.  It doesn’t throw the 3d in your face, making you jump back because “wow, I thought that was going to hit me”.  The 3d simply and wonderfully gives visual depth to a visually beautiful movie.  I took my glasses off from time to time to see the difference.  It was night and day.  Even though they did not throw things at you with the 3d, just the advantage of depth made me shun the flatness of 2d.  If one day, all movies are in 3d just as all movies have sound and color now, it will heighten the movie going experience tremendously, especially if it doesn’t make a spectacle of the 3d.  I guess, what I’m saying is, at no time did I think “wow this 3d is awesome” while watching Up.  I thought “wow this movie is awesome, and the 3d increases my enjoyment all the more.”

The movie itself was fantastic.  It’s now one of my favorites of all time.  I don’t want to say anything of the movie other than it is more than just entertaining, it is moving.  Up has serious heart, I cried two and half times during the movie (the half was just a time my face scrunched up and my throat hurt but no tears rolled down my cheeks).  I tried holding it back in the movie, but I’ll readily admit it here.  The movie was just beautiful.  Go see it with your spouse, and take the kids if you have any (they won’t cry at those parts, its not like the Lion King when Mufasa died when I had to turn the movie off and go sulk in a pillow when I was a kid).

End of Semester

The semester has ended (yay!).  I had to take an incomplete though (boo!).  So it’s kinda-sorta over for me.  I’m taking a class this summer: Evangelism.  I’m excited about it, as long as they don’t show us how to make tracts and pamphlets.

I recently got into motorcycling.  I now have a Yamaha XS650 Special.  For those that care, it’s a parallel twin and looks and sounds much like the older Triumphs which I always loved.  In fact, Triumph is making retro-cruisers that are styled after their older (60’s and 70’s) bikes, very cool.  Well anyway, my bike needs some work to make it really nice.  It runs fine (although it stumbles past 5k rpm) and is a blast.  There are just a few small issues that will keep me busy for a while.

Here is a quick shot of it.

I hope to write on here often this summer.  There is just so much going on in my head that I need to write it down.  But alas, I seldom do, so most of the epiphanies I get just fade away.

Exciting Church Stuff, Free Modern Hymns, and I’m Getting Pumped

I’ve not been blogging on here regularly since I began writing on Theophilux.  I need to blog on here more.  It’s good for me to do so.  I need it to get through some things that I’m thinking on that doesn’t have an outlet yet.  So hopefully I will be back to blogging on here soon.

I’m excited about things happening in my church.

• New website (still filling in the pages, but this is a major upgrade for us that we needed)
• New Vision
  • Growing Deep, Growing Together, Growing Out
  • For more info on this, check out our website.  I think this is the best vision statement I’ve ever dealt with.  It is all encompassing.
  • Vision Sunday will be this Sunday.  The Vision will be given to the congregation.
  • The implementation of the Vision will be handled in a new organic way
• New Sunday School model
  • Previously, Sunday School (or Sabbath School) was modeled after an academic environment.
  • In case you haven’t noticed, the academic model of a single person lecturing is not that effective especially among children who have been in school for 5 days already.
  • The new model will be more discussion based (or activity based for the kids, and I don’t mean coloring)
  • In fact, its more like a small group; more personal yet maintaining a focus on the Biblical text
  • It will be called Growth Groups (In case you didn’t notice, Growth is the key in the vision statement)
• New Preaching model
  • My pastor has done some wonderful sermon series in the past.  They were topical in nature but they have changed many lives including mine.  But there is a better model.
  • Lectio Continua is the practice of preaching through a book of the Bible as a series.  In full, it is preaching through the entire Bible!  It is a Continuous Lectionary.
  • Preaching is the public exposition of God’s Word.  It contains the words of Life.  Therefore, preaching through the Scripture is preaching life.  And its preaching the way it was given to us.  (Anyone have a pastor that preaches this way currently (or are you a pastor that preaches this way currently)?
  • Currently, the plan is for the pastor to begin a Growth Group on Wednesday nights that focuses on the same book of the Bible that he is preaching through.  I think this will be tremendous in getting people to actively engage in the preaching on Sunday morning.
  • Many more plans are in the works.  Discipleship is the aim, Growth is the goal.

Free Hymns

I found a link on challies.com a while back that was to a ministry that has been recording hymns done in more modern ways, with new verses too.  The link is http://pagecxvi.com/share.  Here is an excerpt from the email I received from them after I downloaded the songs for free (they are free until Wednesday, March 25th):

For all of you who were wondering where our name “Page CXVI” came
from, we’d love to share with you a little bit about it. Page CXVI is
a reference to page 116 of our personal copy of The Magicians Nephew
by C.S. Lewis. It is a poignant passage where Aslan begins to sing
Narnia into creation out of a black void. One of the characters,
Digory, describes it as,

“…it was the most beautiful noise he had ever heard. It was so
beautiful he could hardly bear it.”

As the hymns project began to form, our hope was to wrap the strong
lyrical content of the hymns, with music that portrayed our personal
reactions to the life that God has brought to our “black void.” The
most personal song on the album is by far “Joy” with the counterpart,
“It is Well” was written by Horatio Spafford after losing his son to
scarlet fever, all of his real estate investments to the Great Chicago
Fire, and his 4 remaining children to the sinking of a boat. The
contemplative turn from “Joy” into the lines from “It is Well” comes
out of our own personal tragedy this past year and combines a Psalm
like lamentation with hope. Our intention with all of these songs is
to be a source of comfort and encouragement to all who hear them.

Thank you again for listening and sharing.

Page CXVI

Go download it.  It’s free right now and it’s quite good.

And I’m pumped.  God is faithful to those He loves.  I have no anxiety, only anticipation of what He will do in this age, and in the age to come.  Sola Deo Gloria!