I had lunch today with Bob Cottrill, Pastor of Worship at North Park Community Church. This is the second lunch I’ve had with him (even if he doesn’t quite remember the first one!), and I had a great time. Bob is a very intelligent person, has a lot of vision and great ideas that I feel I can latch onto. However, what impressed me even more in our conversation was a bit of the story of North Park, where they’ve come from, where they’re at, and where they may be going. To better understand the past and the future, let’s look at the present first:

• North Park currently has 4 weekend services. One on Saturday night and three on Sunday morning, one of which is a more “traditional” service.
• Approximately 2500 people come to North Park every week. Each service can hold 700 people. For those who may be mathematically challenged, that’s a maximum capacity of 2800. They are at 89% of their maximum capacity.
• North Park does not take an offering. They set up a few boxes at the back of the auditorium for people to give, and have automatic giving through the bank. Even with this method, they consistently have a surplus in their budget from year to year.

Now, a lot of church leaders have asked how they got to that point. They ask about their strategies, their targets, their goals and visions. Here is how they did it:

• North Park started out of the Brethren church, a very anti-institutional group. They were very grassroots, and very independent. Their two church plants, Byron Community Church and Community Bible Church, were launched and continue independent of North Park.
• North Park has never set growth targets. They have not put together strategies to grow their congregation. They do not advertise through local media, and very seldom will they create promotional materials. Their focus has been great teaching and great music. North Park has never had a “target demographic.” They have been open to those outside the church, inviting them into the North Park community.
• They have on several occasions expanded their facilities to accommodate the people that come. The most recent in 2004 cost approximately $2.23 million. Today they are virtually debt free.

While it’s cool to see where they have come from and see their grassroots beginnings, it’s even more intriguing where they are going:

• North Park has made the decision not to expand their auditorium. This could mean that in the next year, they will reach and/or exceed their current maximum capacity. They currently do not have plans on how to deal with this.
• They are planning on integrating more with the community around them. If someone is doing something in the community that is compelling, whether Christian or not, they want to partner with them. They have already done so with the London Food Bank, and plan to continue with more groups.
• They want to learn from the community, whether Christian or not. They want facilitate a conversation where they are able to learn from other religions, rather than only preach at people.
• They want to get out of the way. Today, church is not relevant to people. Rather than put a band-aid on the situation, they want to get out of the way. They do not see the institutional church as the only gateway to God. They would like to simply be a place where people can be energized to live their own lives, rather than try to program the lives of the congregation.

I may have some of this wrong, and if so I apologize. However, with as big of a church as North Park is, this is exciting to me. There are going to be some huge changes coming soon, that could rock the foundations of their community. The reckless side of me cannot wait to see it. The leader side of me can’t wait to be a part of it. Maybe I will end up sticking around.

I mean, they do let me play guitar.

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So, it seems that the new direction my blog has been taking has caused me to lose a few readers along the way. Since I’ve started blogging about some of the questions I have about church and religion and God, my readership has gone down 27%. However, the average amount of time spent on the site has increased quite significantly (an increase of approximately 250%).

I just want to say that I am on a journey. I’m trying to work through in my head and my heart a lot of issues I’ve been trying to struggle through for several months now, and am inviting you to join in. If I learned nothing else during my time at Connexus, it’s that this life journey is best walked side by side with friends, and this is why I’ve made the decision to publicly blog about my ideas and questions. I do not expect everyone to agree, but hopefully we can have some meaningful discussion. I’ve already seen some amazing comments and emails come in from these recent posts, and look forward to seeing more discussion happen in the future.

So, for those who are sticking around, thanks so much for being a part of this journey with me. I don’t know where the road leads (if it even is a road we’re walking). But for me, personally, the destination matters much less than the company.

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So I agreed to play at North Park this weekend, even though I generally like a lot more notice than I was given. They were in a bind so I agreed to help out.

They sent the list of songs and mp3’s for a couple of them. However, one of the songs really caught me off guard. It’s a song called “We Are Hungry.” I sat listening to this song, thinking about how I had just eaten two slices of pizza and a bowl of frozen yogourt (it’s my free day today!). I also thought about how I can prepare food days in advance, thanks to the technology we in North America have. I then thought about the billions of people who do not have the luxuries that we in North America have, and wondered what they would think if they saw us driving in our SUV’s to a multi-million dollar building, singing along to amplified rock music “We Are Hungry!”

And materialism aside, the rest of the song makes me question something else even more. “Lord I want more of you / Living water rain down on me / Lord I need more of you / Living breath of life come fill me up.” Again, really? We feel like we need more of God? Don’t we already pretty much have a monopoly on him? We claim that our way is the right way, and that he is our God. Evangelicals are even worse, claiming that even those within our own camp don’t have it right. And all while we hold tight to this “commodiety,” (Trademark!), we still claim we want more? How is it that we’ve turned spirituality into a corporate takeover? We’re like big oil wrapped in scarlet.

When does this hostile takeover of God end? When do Christians begin to “give freely”?

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I’ve had a lot of thoughts run through my head over the last few weeks. I’ve shared them with a few close friends, but for the most part have kept them to myself.

However, there are a few things that have changed in the way I think now, and I’d like to share them for the sake of sharing and possibly starting a discussion. So, here goes:

1. I have no plans on going to church. I’ve been burned too many times, and while I’m not saying I’ll never go back ever, I know that for right now, I won’t be. Also, I have no plans to work at or in a church. I don’t see that changing.
2. I’m pretty fed up with the North American Jesus. I’m tired of Corporate Jesus, and Institutional Jesus. I don’t know what I believe about him right now, but I have some ideas. I think Christianity, and by that I mean North American Christianity, is very far off the mark. I think there’s more of a reason that 9/10ths of people in Canada don’t go to an Evangelical church than “they don’t think it can do anything for them.” I think it’s more along the lines of “I don’t want it to do that to me.”
3. I’m tired of believing that 5/6ths of the world is wrong.
4. I’m tired of believing that I’m somehow loved by God more than the majority of the world. And, no matter how much we say “God loves everyone,” we don’t believe it.
5. I do know that I’m on a journey, and that the journey is going to mean some major life changes. I’ve decided to actually walk this path I’m on, rather than simply chart it out like I’ve done in the past. Christians are great cartographers, but lousy navigators.

I don’t want to offend anyone, but I am going to ask tough questions. I’m hoping to meet new people, have conversations, and try to discover how God is revealing himself to the world, and not just to the one’s who call themselves His (or, call him Theirs).

I know this may come as a surprise to many of you, but a some of these are thoughts I’ve been having for months now, even as far back as November of last year. I’m just trying to be honest, and hope that those who read this will know that I’m simply trying to navigate through life and truth and everything else.

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So a couple of weeks ago, after playing at North Park, one of the other musicians and his fiancé gave me a pet mouse. The mouse is really small, and really cute. He runs on his wheel really well, and generally just hangs out.

I have had friends in the past who have owned rodents, and my sister used to own a hamster. From those experiences, I had a preconceived notion of what owning a mouse would be like. For the most part, it’s been very similar, except for one thing. To me, one very important thing.

My mouse does not like to be held. I will try to put my hand in to put him in my palm, and he will run frantically around the cage to get away. I had a trick where I would get him to start running up the cage walls, which made it easier for me to grab him, but he’s figured that trick out. I’ll even put treats on my hand for him - cheese, cheereos, sunflower seeds - and still he won’t come. The odd time when I can manage to “catch” him, he runs all over my hands and arms, in an attempt to escape. He won’t eat the snacks even when he is on my arm. I usually have to place them in his wheel for him to eat.

Anyway, it’s been a fairly disappointing experience. Maybe next time I’ll stick with fish (who, surprisingly, also don’t like being held).

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It’s been quiet around here lately. A few things have been happened over the last week:

• Found myself a job! I’m working at Images in London. I’m working on web and print design. So far it’s only been one day, which included 90 minutes of shoveling snow. Fun.
• Tried to finish the portfolio. I ran into some major issues (thanks Internet Explorer). Hopefully will have those worked out soon. I’m learning a lot from this design, so hopefully the next redesign will go a bit quicker.
• Finally unpacked. I’m kinda sick and tired of packing and unpacking, and hope that this will be the last time for a while. I don’t mind packing for traveling, but when you’ve got 3 guitars+equipment, furniture, clothes, a bookshelf of books, etc - not as fun.
• Started a new design for this blog. Don’t expect to see it too soon, but I’m already a little bored of this one. When I get closer to finishing the redesign, I’ll be sure to include a post as to what works and what doesn’t in this design.
• I am getting more and more eager to play music. Talked to some people about that. Things could happen in the next couple months. Keep your eyes pealed.
• I checked out North Park Community Church in London. The service wasn’t as “pro” as I had expected. They also had some guy come from New York who I described as “the Christianer/fatter version of Enrique Iglesias.” I didn’t say that to his face.
• I moved my gym membership to a London club. Hopefully get back into that again soon.
• Bought a new pair of pants. When I started this whole “getting fit” thing in December, I was 265-270 lbs with size 40 pants. Today, I am about 230-235 lbs with size 34 pants. Take that, Jenny Craig.

I will try harder next week to be here. In the meantime, go to my twitter. It’s hot.

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I forgot to mention something a couple of weeks ago.

As I’m sure many of you know, my blog was featured on cssmania.com a few weeks ago, generating a much higher-than-usual visitor rate. This was really great for exposure, and I am pretty sure led to my blog being featured at smashingmagazine.com’s article “45 More Excellent Blog Designs.”

Well, the massive spike in traffic put, as you can probably guess, a huge dent in my bandwidth, so much so that by February 21st I had gone over my limit of 1 GB/month.

Now, I have to tell you something about my web hosting.

A few years ago I was just starting out building websites, primarily for my band. Back in those days, there were several web hosting companies that provided free, ad-free hosting. However, very quickly into my web designing journey, these started phasing out their ad-free services. This forced me to make a decision: deal with the ads, or somehow find a way to afford web hosting (I was in high school at the time, and all my money went to cafeteria food and guitars).

I posted my situation on a website called christian-web-masters.com, an online community of Christian graphic designers. A user by the name of Nexonen (Andrew) had a small web hosting company he and a friend had started over in the UK. He offered to give me 10 MB of space, with 500 MB of monthly bandwidth, all for free. I was so blessed to receive this offer, and set up my site on his server.

Over the years, every time I had a technical problem, or needed any support of any kind, Andrew was always courteous and helpful. After a year or so, I had run out of space (we hosted mp3’s on our site back in those days), and Andrew bumped me up first to 20 MB, and eventually 50 MB of space. He also increased my bandwidth to 1 GB/month, which really helped out a lot.

When I first began my blog, the only people who read it were friends and a few people who found their way through Google or other searches. However, this quickly changed when my blog started being featured on several different sites, including CSS Mania and Smashing Magazine. Very quickly, my 1 GB of bandwidth was no longer sufficient for my site.

I sent Andrew a quick message asking if there was anything he could do to help. He was not sure whether he was even going to continue in the web hosting business, so I knew that this may be the last straw before my free hosting was up.

However, to my great surprise, Andrew increased my monthly bandwidth to 20 GB/month, perfect for the increase in traffic and readership. I was so blessed to have someone who was able to provide for me in this way, and do so quickly and efficiently. My site was down for a total of about 5 hours, which was only because I didn’t find out until about 4 hours in that I had even been featured.

So, all of this to say that there are some really great people in the world, and Andrew, my friend from the UK, is one of them.

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I went to the dentist today. A couple months ago I had gone for a check-up in Orillia, and was told that I’d need two root canals, and have my 4 wisdom teeth removed. In the midst of all of my life-transition, I had to put it on hold. Finally, today I was able to start the process of fixing up my pearly whites.

I went into the dentist expecting one of two things. The first was simply to get some newer x-rays taken, and then scheduled in for a future appointment to tackle what needed to be fixed. The second was that I would have the x-rays done, and then have at least one if not both of the root canals completed.

What ended up happening was that the x-rays were taken, and then the dentist started the root canal on one tooth. After doing a bunch of drilling, the dentist added a temporary filling and that was that. I didn’t feel any pain, and was glad to be on my way to getting the work done.

That is, until the freezing started to wear off…

For a solid two hours tonight, I laid in my bed, writhing in pain. It actually felt very similar to when I was assaulted, as there was a small amount of numbness sensation left, while the rest of my face felt like someone had stomped on it several times with a boot (which, in the instance of the assault, had actually happened).

Hopefully tomorrow some of the pain will subside, and I’ll be able to continue on with my job search.

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So, you may have noticed over the last couple of weeks a lull in my blog activity. Not only that, but the launch of my portfolio has been delayed. As much as I wish I could say it’s because I’ve been incredibly busy and haven’t had the time, unfortunately that’s not the reason.

Two weeks ago I was working away at a design, when I noticed the charging indicator light on my macbook power cord wasn’t on. I figured somehow the connection had been knocked out of place, so I checked the wall and found the plug still in place. I wiggled the cord around in my computer for a while to no avail.

Once my computer had run out of juice, I brought it and the power cord to an Apple Reseller, where they determined that indeed, my power cord was pooched. They said it was under warranty and should be no problem to be replaced. They put the work order in and told me things should be good to go in 3 days.

That Thursday (5 days after the first visit) I went to the store and was told that my warranty was up. Apparently I did not register my macbook when I purchased it in July 2007, and so the purchase date was still set for December 2006. Because of this, according to Apple my computer was no longer under warranty. I was told that this could be rectified if I fax my receipt from Future Shop to Apple, and have them re-set my purchase date.

So, I went to Future Shop to get a new receipt (I have now moved 4 times in the last 2 months… I’m not quite sure where my original is). They printed off what looks to be a copy of the Future Shop warranty (which does me no good), so now I have to find my receipt, or just buy the cord. But, it’s kinda expensive. So, in the next two days we’ll see…

I’m starting to realize that pen and paper don’t require power cords…

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Yesterday Sara and I went to visit Cindy at the hospital. I was a bit nervous before going in, as I wasn’t sure what to expect. However, when I first saw her, I felt a huge sense of relief. Her face has healed from the surgery so well, she looks as good as new. Aside from some tubes, casts, and a neck brace, she is looking really really great.

She seems to be having some short term memory loss. She’s feeling pretty lonely (as she’s normally very outgoing). It was hard to see her cry when they took the trachea tube out.

She sat in a chair for the first time since her accident, and even though she was uncomfortable, she seemed to be doing well. She is going to see a speech pathologist today to help with her talking. Once the trachea tube was out of her throat, her throat was very weak and it was hard for her to speak.

I’ve been so blessed to have a friend as amazing as Cindy, and she was so amazed at the love and support that a lot of you have been showing. She didn’t know about the 50+ people that had come the first few days, she didn’t know about the fund created in her name, she didn’t know that literally thousands of people have been praying for her. She was so appreciative of all the friends she has.

She has asked that I come back on Saturday, and hopefully I’ll have some more updates then. Thanks for all your continued prayers. We aren’t through yet.

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