Sacred Digital: Chuckk Gerwig

I got back from Alabama in one piece, nice place, nice people and great chicken wings! 

Tomorrow will be fun.  After church I will be jumping on my Harley and heading for San Francisco's Golden Gate Park for the 40th anniversary celebration of the Summer of Love . 

A special treat will be that my friend Omar Spence will be lead singing for the resurrection / reunion of the SF band Moby Grape.  Omar's dad (who is deceased) was the legendary and tragic Skip Spence of Moby Grape.  Skip Spence was the American incarnation of Syd Barrett. Omar will be taking his dad's place in the band, it will be really special. 

There will be a great line up of old hippie bands, now balding and grey making the groovy scene in the old cosmic park.  I imagine I'll witness at least one old codger taking off his oxygen mask to hit a joint as his bald spot burns under the hot afternoon sun.  Find out about the concert here. 

Peace baby.

 I have a love affair with hippies and the Summer of Love Generation so today was a special day.  Bullet points of an interesting day =

- 100,000 people showed up for the concert in Golden Gate Park, it was GREAT!

- I arrived just in time to see my buddy Omar Spence play with a reunited Moby Grape to 100,000 people 

- Jefferson Starship blew me away, they we amazing - NOW I know why people liked that band so much

- A girl took a hit of weed bigger than her consciousness would allow and passed out, I had to pick her up and carry her out and help reviver her

- I had the best Thai food I've ever eaten in the Sunset District tonight

- Warming up with a hot cup of coffee and friends at Cameron's Pub in Half Moon Bay was sweet

- I was blessed with a great sunset Harley ride down the coast highway with my pals Billy and Nate from  the BACA, motorcycle club

- Thanks Jesus, it was a special fun Chuckk style day today.

Here's me in the Big Hair 80's, cute huh?  At the moment they shot this picture I was NOT thinking "hey one day I wanna be an agent of change by engineering and pastoring a 21st ministry".  Who woulda guessed?

Anyway...We have Thrust!

Here's the big news: God has brought us a new Student Ministries Pastor, Allen Coleman.  This prayer saturated search was completed in just a few months by God's Grace - further confirming my move into Elevation.  The locating and hiring of a new Student Ministry Pastor was a KEY event in starting the countdown to the official Elevation Launch because until we located and hired the right man I have been committed to giving my all in Student Ministry.   A long search would have greatly hindered Elevation's launch.  Allen will start October 1, this means I will be able to gain traction on Elevation planning and prep this month and will be the Full Time Pastor of Elevation in less than 30 days allowing me to focus every moment on more Thrust. 

Current next steps are: I will be continuing to interview possible Elevation worship pastors, write job descriptions for the worship pastor and admin positions and will be getting the Student Center technology upgrades finished as I also transition the Youth Ministry.  I'll also be on staff retreat for a few days this month and be taking some vacation time to rest up after the wild summer of events and missions. 

Plan on a late October Elevation Sunday night preview service (date TBA), we'll also have one preview service in November and another in December.  I plan to have Elevation fully launched with weekly services in January, God willing (and Worship Pastor arriving).

Keep your eye on this site for info on what's next for Elevation and how you can get involved.

I was in a couple of airports last week.  Airports are strange; if you travel alone, even though you are surrounded  by throngs of people there is a  certain loneliness.

Loneliness in a crowd is a sad thing. 

For many folks coming to church services or visiting a church is a "lonely in a crowd" experience, they come in sit alone, are un-recognized, un-embraced, alone  -in a crowd.  There is usually a cold empty seat or two between them and the other people in the room - the 14" gap of sadness.  

A friend of mine mentioned that she recently visited a new church and felt "like she had been invited to someone's home for a meal and was then completely ignored". 

Promotion minus hospitality = loneliness in the pews.

How could this be different?   ...begins with One

Apple just released a new touch screen iPod without the phone, it's called the iPod Touch.  People will likely call it the iTouch... The name gives me the creeps, it reminds me of the old Divinyls song " I Touch Myself", ewwww. 

Anyway  Check out the new iPod here.  I'm waiting for an 80 gig model with removable battery!

On the (touchless)  iPod: Richard Barbieri - Things Buried

How do you "like to think of Jesus"?  It's vital that we see Him as He is and not as we wish He is- here's a great video clip for a sermon and some personal reflection.

I'm off to Lake Tahoe for our annual SCBC staff retreat tomorrow - fellowship Jetskis and fun.  It will be fun to get away with Andrea for a few days; we'll ride the Harley up and back which will make for a nice long ride together.  I love my wife and going riding together is a special time

ELEVATION ALERT: Sunday October 21st will be out first official Preview Worship Gathering - We'll have a couple of these before we launch officially.   Keep 6:30pm - 8:00pm free and come worship with us. Guest worship provided by the great Dave Matsamura Band, message by the sketchy as always me.

Andrea and I just returned from Lake Tahoe and our SCBC staff retreat.  This year the staff retreat was NOT the usual 3 day meeting of doom, we actually retreated and played together this time.   We rode our Harley there and back and had a fun day out Jet Skiing on the lake to boot- play is good!.  Keeping with the "play is good" theme. I'll be riding to Reno Nevada for the Street Vibrations Harley Run next week.  When I return I will be full time with Elevation.

As a result of a very generous gift from my father I have now made the Holy Exodus from Microsoft Land to Mac World.  There is a new Mac Book Pro sitting on my lap, thanks Dad!

Bummer, because of a bunch of bad circumstances the Reno Ride and time away is off.   Oh well.  Now for something new and good to pass on. 

Deezer is worth checking out, it has LEGAL free online music that includes top artists, not just indy folks.

This is a test of the Mac Ecto Emergency Broadcast Network. If this had been a real emergency, like say if I had to return to my Windows machine, you would have been instructed where to tune in your area to get a gun and freaking KILL ME!

Loving the Mac

Actually I'm just testing Ecto on the Mac to make sure it uploads to this blog correctly.

We have the official logo for Elevation! A huge Thank You goes out to everyone who made a submission for the logo. The design we finally settled on was created by the masterminds (and our great friends) at Brandes Portraiture in Southern California. You Guys ROCK!

We had so many great submissions that we are going to keep them all and use them as special headers and other publication pieces when the official logo isn't necessary.

Again thanks to all the talented artists who submitted such great work!

Da Logo looks lika dis...

Video-games are impacting our culture in huge ways... but are often outside the knowledge of many ministry leaders. Many church leaders go out of their way to keep up with current books and films but often are vaporous in the v-game knowledge department. The narratives of games like Halo and World of Warcraft are the frame of reference for many humans (and orcs and elves) in the emerging generation. Guess what, these players aren't just teenagers anymore.

In the midst of many of these games are stories of good vs evil, redemption, sacrifice and greed... sermon-food. For example...

More reason to buy a faster computer or console system as ministry research tools!

Christianity as a religion continues to become less and less respected by the average person on the street. This article at the Barna Research Site confirms what many of us experience in our interactions with not yet Christians. Worth a read.

NOTE: the previously linked article was incorrect. My thanks to the amazingly vigilant Dan Kimball for catching the error! The article link is now correct. TKX Dan.

ht: Thud

Today is my last day as a"professional" youth pastor. The last 24 years have been consumed with high school students and their world, it's been really fun!

This weekend I officiated at a wedding for one of my old students from 15 years ago. Much of that core group of old "kids" were there ( they are now all around their 30's), we reminisced for hours about the wonderful life and ministry we shared together years ago. Many of them are key volunteer ministers and a few are vocational ministers now, what a blessing. God provides just the right conclusions to life chapters. Thank you Jesus - life if GOOD!

Tomorrow starts a new chapter, Elevation. I'm on stoked.