Apomo

I’ve been sick w/the flu all week. It really kicked my ass on Mon-Wed. Anyway, yesterday afternoon I started to feel nauseous and thought I was going to throw up. So I went to the bathroom and positioned myself over the bowl ready to hurl. The nausea went away but all the sudden I got this really strange feeling that I’ve NEVER had before. My whole body got weak, I got cold and clammy, my skin felt tingly, and I almost felt as if I was having and out of body exerience. I looked at myself in the mirror it was like looking at somebody in a dream. I literally felt the blood drain from my head and literally was almost as white as a sheet, even my lips. I got really scared after about thirty seconds when it didn’t go away and only seemed to intensify which is what really scared me because I was afraid of what the climax might mean. I figured I was having a heart attack or stroke because I’d read that many people have heart attacks/strokes and don’t even know it because they think it’s heartburn or indigestion. I didn’t even have enough presence of mind to call for my wife. I started praying “God, I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. Please don’t let me die.” I really thought I might be dying right here in my bathroom. At least i wasn’t like Elvis and taking a dump. I was so scared I couldn’t even cry. It was really weird. Then after a few more seconds it started to go away and I called my wife. I was lying on the couch when she came and and when she saw me she started freaking out because I was so pale. She said I looked dead. She ran to call the ambulance but I stopped her. Within an hour I felt back to normal and felt strong enough to got to school last night. But it was really, really weird. I think that maybe the flu meds I’m taking w/my heart meds didn’t agree w/each other and that maybe I didn’t have enough food in my stomach when I took them and it caused a sudden drop in my blood pressure. That’s what it felt like. But I’ve never had it happen so suddenly like that.

My wife is due to have our third kid in a month. But up to this point I’ve not really been all that into the whole idea of having another kid. Maybe it’s because of all the changes in my life lately and the getting back into school thing that has distracted me. Maybe it’s the daycare thing. I’ve even felt guilty about it, but truth is I haven’t been able to gin up the emotion for it and I’ve been almost in a small sense dreading it. But yesterday I was holding one of our little daycare babies and she gave me that “I love you” Puss-N-Boots look that only babies can give you and all the sudden I got excited about having another bambino of my own. Whew, I guess my soul isn’t seared after all. I’m still human! What a relief. haha. Anyway, it’s countdown time and I’m getting excited. Gotta admit though I’m not really looking forward to the actual delivery. I’m over that “excitement”, as is my wife I’m sure. I could never be a doctor, especially an OB/GYN. It’s just gross. For that matter, I couldn’t be a woman either. To think of pushing something that big oughta me just makes me want to push up my appointment with my therapist. Anyway, I hope this one looks better than the last one did when he came out. He looked like Mike Tyson has used him as a sparring partner. It took about three weeks before he looked like a baby and not a piece of meat. He was so ugly I wondered if he was my kid. No matter what though this is the last one for us. My wife has decreed that I am to be neutered. I wonder how much different that is than being emasculated? Ok, enough of this. Back to studying theology and trying to discern the difference between supralapsarianism and infralapsarianism. Your guess is as good as mine.

U2 3D
Whoo hoo! Wow, it was totally amazing! We had dinner at Chili’s w/some friends and drove up to Sac to the Imax Theater and saw the late, late showing. OMG! It was so good! It some ways I can imagine that it was as good if not better than being at an actual concert. Better probably because the sound is better and you’re so much closer to the action and you don’t have to smell sweaty bodies crushing you in the crowd. They filmed this concert in Argentina and there were probably 100,000 people there. The crowd was unbelievable. Bono was off the hook! The 3D thing is crazy, I’ve never seen that before on that scale. Most of the time Bono and the boys were so close you could actually count the whiskers on their face and it felt as if you were right there on stage w/them. The first time they did a close-up of Bono I actually reached out to try to touch him. It was almost creepy. Anyway, the setlist was a good mix of old and new stuff and they closed with Yahweh. Absolute sensory overload when they did “The Fly” and very emotional when they did “One”. Lots of 3D graphic stuff going on that was layered and totally cool. Anyway, I’m planning to go and see it again. Even if you’re not a huge U2 fan this would be hugely entertaining. If you’re a U2 fan, like me, it’s a must see.

(funny story: At Chili’s I saw an old friend from my former UPC church. Ultra-con chick with no brains, and her husband. Anyway, I got little perverse kick out of telling them we were going to see U2 and made a point to show her my U2 T-shirt I was wearing. She acted liked she’d never heard of U2. I mentioned that he was really instrumental in bringing attention to the AIDS crisis in Africa. Without missing a beat she immediately crinkled up her face and said “Do they have a homosexual problem over there? I heard they have a Bi problem too.” I almost burst out laughing. Her husband is a little more balanced and gave this look like, “Dude, just let it go. I know, she’s dumb as a rock.” He winked at me when I walked off. haha.

I’ve been wanting to go see a counselor for quite awhile. About five years ago I finally realized that I was a pretty screwed up guy due to a somewhat dysfunctional family, the pressure of being the district supt.’s kid, and spiritual abuse issues. I think I worked through alot of the more obvious and major stuff on my own in the last five years, especially as it relates to the spiritual abuse stuff. But I’m know there’s more stuff that I can’t see and having a pro help me out would be beneficial. Plus, I think it’s a good thing to do for all people wanting to be in ministry. I’m more into a holistic approach to preparing for ministry in that you should prepare yourself intellectually through some sort of formal theological training, spiritually through your own spiritual formation process, and emotionally through counseling. Well, that was part of my plan but who do you go to? You don’t want a quack and I wanted a counselor who was familiar with my Pentecostal background. Hard to to find that combo. Oh, and affordable too. I can’t afford $100 an hour. Well, as it turns out there is one of those around here. I carpool to school with a couple of Marriage and Family Therapy majors. As part of their training they have to go to a counselor themselves for something like 40 hours (why do wannabe counselors have to do that but wannabe pastors don’t?). One of the girls said she found one near where I live and said this lady was incredible. I asked for her number and called her yesterday. Turns out she and her husband counsel together, they’re both Pentecostal and actually used to attend the church I now attend. They’re affordable, $50 for 1.5 hour. It looks like the perfect fit for me. I’m going to schedule an appointment today and see what happens. 

I registered for my Spring term classes today. I signed up for 10 units which is alot. I may end up dropping one of the classes before the term starts. We’ll have to see what the homework load is when the syllabi come out.

The classes are:

Interpreting the New Testament - Epistles (by the same cool prof that is doing my Gospels course)

Religions of the World

Pastoral Counseling

Theology II - Sotereology

The two classes in the middle are intensive elective courses that each meet on two different weekends, not every week. The first and fourth are classes w/regular meeting times and would be the meat of the term. These particular electives are only offered every 2-3 years so I want to take them if I can. We’ll see if I can handle all load though.

$3800 bucks for these 10 units though. Man, that’s a lot of money.

I’m debating whether I ought to take a logic and philosophy class this summer at the local junior college or if I ought to just read three or four books about them. It’s useful information when reading these theo books because they refer to various philosophies and rely on rules of logic rather heavily. I’ve had no formal training in either of these two subjects. I need to brush up on my English grammar skills too in order to help me handle Greek and Hebrew which I’ll be taking beginning next year. I’m worried about those classes. I’ve not ever had an aptitude for foreign languages. I’m skerred.
I’m leaning toward reading a couple of books on philo and logic and then buying some sort of computer program tutoring thing to brush up on the grammar stuff. Then I can take a class or two from seminary in the summer to make up for this term where I only took 6 units. If I take four units in the summer then when next Fall term begins I’ll be right on track to graduate in three years total as I will have exactly 1/3 of my units required to graduate.

Oh yeah, we have a baby due in April. I almost forgot about that minor detail.

I can’t believe it’s two months since I’ve been on here. When I do blog it’s been on my MySpace page, although even that has been infrequent. Just haven’t had much to say I guess.

Really busy with school. It seems to occupy my days, night, and weekends. It’s a blast. But a big workload. So far I’ve gotten 5 A’s and one B+. The B+ was in Dan Kimballs class and it was because I lost a book that I was supposed to do a book report on and couldn’t turn the book report in on time. Otherwise I’d have straight A’s. It happens I guess. You just gotta roll w/it. Of course I found the book in one of the toy bins three weeks later. What can you do?

How about them Giants? Wow. That was a good game.

The church in Dixon voted on pastor last weekend. I haven’t heard if he got voted in or not. I spoke there the week before the vote and I could tell it was going to be a somewhat contentious process for them. My decision to back out was the impetus to push them toward a vote. I’m glad I could be of service to them in that regard.

I met w/the church board of my church about a month ago. It was just a meet-n-greet and I was able to share my passion for the emerging church. The pastor said it went well. We’ve tried to do lunch a couple of times since then but haven’t been able to hook up. He asked me to write down a few things and I gave him a 30 page paper on my ideas and philosophy. Maybe that’s what he wants to talk about. I don’t think that he’ll have an issue w/any of it because so much of what I wrote in there, at least philosophically, I’ve heard him say from the pulpit since then. He and I seem to have pretty similar visions.

I also spoke at the Sanx church. Rustin went on a cruise and asked me to fill in for him. I was pretty nervous because I wasn’t sure how people would receive me since I left so suddenly and w/out explanation. Turns out there were only ten people there and it went ok. It’s obvious though that nothing new has been added and it’s pretty much dead in the water. It saddened me.

Same w/a phone call I got this weekend from James, my former pastor. That prophet lady we were all excited about a year or so ago has turned out to be a problem. I figured that out about four months after she came to town but its taken them more than a year to accept that and admit it. In the meantime all this damage has been done and friendships injured.

On a more up note, Rustin and I and our wives are going to go to Sacramento and see the U23D thing at the Imax theatre there. That ought to be fun. Next best thing to a live concert I guess.

My brother moved to Houston. Ironically, he is actually driving Michael Strahan’s (star DE of the NY Giants) mothers car that Michael bought for her recently. A Mercede’s 500 series. Brand new. My parents are good friends of Mike’s parents and his Mom has bad knees and can’t drive the car so she offered it to my brother and his family to drive until they get their own wheels. They just moved there from Maui and couldn’t bring their car. Small world.

I’ve been following the Presidential campaigns fairly closely. I’m glad I re-registered as an Independent. Barna wrote an article about me. Well, not about me in particular, but it might as well have been since it applies to me in so many ways. http://www.barna.org/FlexPage.aspx?Page=BarnaUpdateNarrow&BarnaUpdateID=291 ( I don’t know why, but my link feature doesn’t work right. You’ll have to cut and paste the URL if you’re interested in reading the article.) I’m not sure if I’ll vote or not. I think it’s prob better to just support special interest groups like Darfur.com, Amnesty Intl, One and others and let them use your voice to push for the right issues. I don’t think any one candidate properly presents or cares about the issues that I care about the most.

I read “Knowledge of the Holy” by AW Tozer last week. The book impacted me. Very much so. We’re studying about God and his attributes in school and its struck a chord with me similar to how Willard’s book “Divine Conspiracy” did several years ago. Tozer’s book is only 120 pages so it’s a quick read. But he says alot in those 120 pages. He reminds me of Brennan Manning in some regards. Lofty and eloquent and deeply spiritual.

Well, that’s about it. Oh, I’ve lost 20 pounds since after Christmas. Nate inspired me. I hope to lose another 80 in the next few months. I’m just cutting back on burgers and fries and eating smaller portions. Not a big deal. I suppose at some point I”ll have get more aggressive w/it but this in the meantime I’ll do it the easy way.