Christian Volunteers

Received an email from Evan Donovan asking me to mention this on my blog. It looks like a great idea so if you are looking for volunteers or wanting to volunteer somewhere - check it out.

ChristianVolunteering.org is a free directory with over 2,000 volunteer opportunities in ministries serving the “poor.” The site’s partners include the Salvation Army, GospelCom (BibleGateway.com), World Vision, the Association of Gospel Rescue Missions and over 1,000 ministries serving under-resourced communities. In addition to volunteer opportunities for individuals, you can also search the site for opportunities that might be appropriate for church small groups and for short-term missions trips. If you just type your postal code, you can get a listing of the volunteer opportunities in your region.

Daily Verse Rings True

Psalm 61:8

Then will I ever sing praise to your name and fulfill my vows day after day.

Had a bit of a weird day - a duel with a car salesman that I think I lost, and then this is the daily verse on my facebook page.

Thanks for the reminder!

Dad

Hey all.

For those who know my Dad I thought I'd give you an update.

Dad's had a heap of neck pain for a fair few years, and finally it was decided the only way to stop it for good was to perform surgery.

It had gotten to the point where Dad could hardly use his right arm due to the nerve damage that was being caused by inflamed vertebrae in his neck.

The surgery was yesterday, where surgeons removed fluid from the vertebrae relieving the pressure and inflammation. Obviously anything round the neck is dangerous, but Dad's come through the surgery ok. He's back home today - was suppose to be tomorrow so that's a good sign. He's in a fair bit of pain still, but looks like he'll recover fully.

Thanks to those who have been praying, and the people who provided meals last night and tonight, that took a lot of pressure of mum - and kept Brett and I fed while mum's been out so much :-P

Haha thanks

Schoolies Round Up

Well it's been over a week since I posted... so some of you may have started to wonder if I'd been trampled to death by a horde of schoolies.

Close... but not quite.

I was totalled after the long hours and stress of Friday, but Saturday was much much worse. I got up to set up all the laptops - we'd only allocated 10 laptops to assign wrist bands, and 14 for the schoolies to use who hadn't registered yet. I also had 10-12 laptops for use on the beach for the event entry scanning, and as I'd said in the previous post, they weren't working.

So my first job after setting up for the day was to cart those 12 laptops up to my apartment, and set about reimaging them from my self made imaging server (another laptop) and hashed up network set up on the dining table. I worked all day until they were ready to go, when I got a call from the MBC that things were banking up and getting out of hand, so they needed extra laptops to do the wrist band assigning. Event Entry went out the window and I used the extra 12 laptops at the MBC... in the end I jumped on one and started handing out wrist bands myself (we had 12 extra laptops, but not 12 extra people to use them).

At about 9pm the line for wrist bands was about a kilometre long, and 10 schoolies wide! I think it even made the news, as some schoolies were waiting up to 6 hours in the line - there was no coordination with the event staff and crowd control was horrible. In the end the inevitable happened and we had ourselves a mini riot.

The police shut the line down saying they could get onto the beach without a tag for the Saturday night... but for a few moments there it was very scary. A thousand or so schoolies surging forward ended up with the table I was sitting at pinning me against the MBC (so hard I had a bruise on my belly the next day), and when I went to get up I timed it really badly and stood up just as some drunken, ticked off kid decided to throw something at the truck.

It hit me in the head... it hurt... I don't know what it was, but I was really light headed and ended up falling over as I tried to get out of the area. I was helped into the truck and after 5 minutes or so and a bottle of water I was fine.

Eventually the crowd disbanded as police moved them all on - I'm amazed they didn't start hurling the laptops around or vandalising the Mobile Business Centre. A few of the cars around the MBC were kicked and stuff written in the dust... I'm quite grateful my work car - a silver Commodore Wagon - looked a lot like an unmarked police car... it was untouched, and when I went to leave people were getting out of my way quick smart.

Things could only get better after that and they did... on Sunday the IT manager and a couple of other IT staff came down, bringing an extra 25 laptops - we ended up with 50 laptops doing the wrist bands and registration combined... again I spent the day registering and assigning wrist bands, but with some proper crowd control in place everything ran very smoothly. The decision was made to cut the event entry scanning - which sort of made the wrist bands useless - but meant I didn't have to worry about setting laptops up on the beach every night.

By Monday the registrations had started to settle down - new problems arose like rain... and kids wanting replacement wristbands all the time (we found out they were selling them to toolies for $20 each!), so we had to come up with ways of solving these issues... but I've never been verbally abused so much in a week as I have this past one.

By Tuesday I was able to set up in the mornings, go have a swim, catch up with some friends, swim in the afternoon and then hang out with some of the friends I'd made at the MBC from Red Cross. Friday night I went and hung with some mates who were doing Red Frogs, it seems they had a much tougher week than I did.

The only other painful part of the week was getting stuck in the elevator of my apartment block. I'd just ducked out to grab some Indian take-away, and jumped in a lift with 4 other guys who seemed really rough round the edges... then the lift got stuck between the 1st and 2nd floor!

We rang the security, and one of the roughies swore his way through an explanation of what had happened... he annoyed the girl on the other end so much she threatened to leave him in there all night (which is when the others told hit to shut the %^$^%# up and that there were other people in here too). The conversation was not the least bit pleasant... and one guy had just had his nipple pierced and it was bleeding everywhere.

Oh these weren't schoolies either... men probably in their 30's!!!

Eventually after 30 minutes or so the repairman arrived at the apartments, reset the lift and we were free. I finally got to my room on the 24th floor, and enjoyed my somewhat cooled Indian dinner.

It was certainly a week of very different experienced... nothing like what I was expecting, but in some ways something I'm glad I went through, because it's taught me to deal with a lot of very different stuff out there in the real world... not that cushioned world us Christians sometimes find ourselves in.

Schoolies Day 1

I am gone... exhausted... flat... spent... buggered... knackered... etc etc...

I started at 7am this morning in Brisbane, and was on the Gold Coast by 8:30am, I finished tonight at 9:30pm. What a long non stop day.

We had all the laptops at the MBC (Mobile Business Centre) set up in time for the 10am media conference, and got the Skoolies Self Registering ones up not long after that. We then spent the rest of the time trying to sort out hat was going on with the Beach Event Entry laptops where half seemed to work and half didn't.

I checked into my room - a two bedroom apartment I'm sharing with the MBC Driver, on the 24th floor of an apartment block right on Surfer's Paradise beach. The view is AMAZING, but I don't know what chance I'll get to enjoy it.

At 6pm we started setting up the Beach Entry Laptops... and none of them worked. We realised they'd been set up wrong, and were connecting to the network in the MBC, but not the one we'd set up on the beach. The other issue is that sandy beaches work quite a bit like a Radar Jammer... the soft and absorbent surface of the beach literally eats radio waves... so our laptops on the beach were having a hard time finding the network.

Then there was a power surge and it blew 2 of the laptops up... and then some of the bar code scanners wouldn't work. So my simple laptop set up turned into an all night troubleshooting exercise as one after another things went wrong.

So it's 10pm, I've finally got dinner... and I feel like I'm about to die after 15 hours of the most stress filled work I've ever done.

And all the guys at work thought I was getting a holiday on the coast... I wish.

Sitting Around Waiting

We're not very patience are we!? I mean we may think we are, that we can put up with a lot, but when pointless waiting comes upon us, we don't usually handle it very well.

I'm sitting in the Ipswich branch at the moment. Since I live in Ipswich, I get most of the jobs in this branch, I just do them on my way in of a morning. This morning I'm swapping out one of the Travel Agency PCs. One of the other guys built the PC yesterday, but was unaware that there are a few extra functions this user completes that means they need some extra software.

So here I sit, on a slower branch network, waiting for a large install of Oracle to come down over the network and install here. Something that would take 5 minutes at the Head Office will take (has taken) at least 30 minutes here.

And I'm a little annoyed... not at Shane who couldn't have known this software was needed... not at the user (who should have told Shane the software was needed - but she's fairly new so probably didn't know better), but just at the fact I'm sitting here waiting.

I can be patience enough to listen to someone's problems, to put up with someone I know has a few issues and acts strange... but sit me at a desk watching a little status bar slowly creep from 0% to 100% and I go nuts!

It's funny how it's the simple things which we have to wait for that really bug us.

What is it for you? What really aggravates you and highlights your lack of patience?

This Week's Photography Assignment

Topic: Everyday Artifacts.

A fond memory of my childhood was mum cooking eggs and soldiers for dinner. This consisted of a soft boiled egg and toast cut up into strips (the soldiers). I'd love dipping the toast into the egg.

So my first thought for everyday artifact was an egg cup. However it's been a while since I was a kid, and I actually had to run out and buy a new egg cup for this assignment.

I haven't had a soft boiled egg in so many years, that not only did I enjoy photographing this assignment... I really enjoyed eating it as well

Scat - Digs Christmas

It's getting close to that time again, and Scat-jazz have been working on a new album... Sick of hearing Mariah belt out a carol? We'll Scat's got something a little more snappier.

Maybe being mates with the band makes me biased, but I think many people around Queensland have probably heard of Scat these days (most people in the 'Christian Scene')

I'm really looking forward to getting this album, and in true Scat style, they're posted a zainy YouTube ad for their new album

Check it out.

Understanding of a word.

I posted this as a comment on Hamo's blog: Terminology but thought that I've fleshed it out enough to be a stand along blog here... and was interested in your thoughts so here it is...

I think my ideas on the terminology of the word ‘church’ is what’s been evolving for me this past 12 months.

Looking at what you’ve been up to, my own journey with Whitehill Church of Christ in Ipswich and getting more involved in City North Baptist in Brisbane, plus looking at WEC and the Muslim targeted church they’ve planted in Sydney really has stretched my ideas on what ‘church’ really means.

Relationships seem to play the key role in the church, not the services, music and people already in the church (how i was brought up). The WEC church plant in Sydney especially has shown me how outer focused the church really should be, how comfortable it should be for the people around it who are not part of it, even if it’s not exactly what the people already in it are feeling.

The idea of the church is to introduce people to Jesus, through doing that we can strengthen each other, but the core focus isn’t strengthening each other, it’s a by-product of working together to introduce people to Jesus (did I just say the same thing twice back-to-front???)

By looking at that it’s really been able to define more clearly the work I’ve been doing at the Drag Track as a motorsports chaplain. That is no longer a ‘outward ministry’, but simply a church I belong to, I and the other chaplains, trying to introduce people to Jesus through being there at meets and simply building relationships with them.

I’d never considered it church before because we didn’t preach, or even very visible outreach. We were just there - people to come and chat with about every day life… people who the guys knew they could vent to, or come to if there was an incident at the track - which has now developed into them coming to us when they have bigger questions on life… like the death of a mate or parent, marriage and troublesome kids.

Suddenly that seems a whole lot more like the church (according to my new understanding of the terminology) than what a Sunday Service looks like.

Car Search Continues

I took the brand new model Mitsubishi Lancer for a drive last night. Wow! I never expected it to drive better than the Subaru, but it out-shines it easily. The Lancer feels sharper, more responsive and more comfortable.


I've been doing a lot of reading of late, and am slowly changing my ideas on a purchase of a new vehicle. Funny enough, it isn't looks, performance or 'newness' that's influencing my choices, but the safety equipment being fitted as standard in these latest model cars. The Impreza and Lancer now come with Electronic Stability Control, Cruise Control, Driver, Passenger, Side and Curtain Airbags and the Lancer even has Knee Airbags and Active Traction Control.

Maybe I've been working for the RACQ for too long, but it's that equipment that is starting to sway me to spend a touch more and purchase a new vehicle. If a second hand car had this stuff I'd probably still be looking at them, but it seems to only be these 2 new models that have been upgraded to such safety standards.

I guess I also find it a little ironic, that the swaying factors in buying a car are functions you hope you never use. The fact the Lancer has every type of airbag available is a selling point, but I know if I ever use those airbags I'm going to be in a whole heap of trouble.

RACQ works kind of on the same principle I guess. You join RACQ to have the option of Road Side Assistance, but you don't ever really want to use it. RACQ has always said they sell 'Peace of Mind', knowing that if something goes wrong, you have the peace of mind of knowing RACQ will come and help solve the problem.

So this extra for a new car??? I think it's just buying Peace of Mind, knowing that if something does go wrong, I'll be in the safest possible vehicle.

However it does mean that I'll have to sell the XR6 privately to get enough money. Trade ins and change overs just make it too expensive... so anyone know someone who'd like a near perfect condition 1997 EL Falcon XR6 Manual?

Bloglines

I've just started using Bloglines to monitor the different RSS feeds and Blogs I regularly read. I must say it's much easier than just following the different links on my blog roll and perusing individual blogs.

I do kind of like the personal effect actually looking at someones blog creates, but Bloglines makes it much more efficient.

So do you use a RSS Feed Reader of some kind? Are there any others out there better than Bloglines?

Reading Archived Blogs.

I've had a couple of people comment over the past week that some of the 'quotes' in my older blogs are hard to read due to the colour.

Sorry, but when I redesigned My Jarrol Spot the old quote colour I used became hard to read (see!!!!) so now I'm using a different colour to quote which is easier to read (I Hope!) - But I haven't gone through and changed all the older posts from before my blog redesign.

So I apologise if you have to work a bit harder to read some of the old posts. But be assured that all new posts will have quotes that are easier to read.

Simple and Effective

Both Hamo and Vawz have blogged on this, but I'm joining them. Made my $1 donation, and hoping to see it grow and grow until the world's changed.

ONEHITWONDER is an initiative of Third Place Communities in Tassie, I like it and hope others get into it as well.

http://www.onehitwonder.org/

Long lost Cousins

COUNSELLORS at an exclusive drug treatment facility in Malibu are scouring Los Angeles in search of Ben Cousins.

Sources close to the Summit Centre in Malibu told The Australian yesterday the 29-year-old failed to check in, as scheduled, on Monday.

They say they are worried for his safety.

"No one has any idea where he is," said a person with knowledge of the situation.

"He's got everyone freaking out because LA's not a good place to be out doing what he may be doing.

"I just hope nothing bad happens to him."
news.com.au Story...

Worrying, but by this point you have to ask, how much is fact, how much is media speculation!?