Reconstruction Continues

Hey folks,

Ahhh, so the format revamp isn't going like I wanted it to. I realize the "fix" probably didn't fix anything for those of you who don't have extra-long monitors. So...I'll keep working on it. When I have time, anyway.

Here's what I do have time to work on right now, because I'm getting paid sweet green for it:
http://www.wkusports.com/SportSelect.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=5400&SPID=2259&SPSID=28997
If you're wondering what in the world I'm doing poring over the men's basketball roster for Western Kentucky, well, it's my job. A small part of my job. Hopefully I'll get the chance to explain later.

Anyways, shalom out, and here's a Bible passage Lana and I have been chewing on recently:

Do not deceive yourselves. If any one of you thinks he is wise by the standards of this age, he should become a "fool" so that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God's sight. As it is written: "He catches the wise in their craftiness"; and again, "The Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile." So then, no more boasting about men! All things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, and you are of Christ, and Christ is of God.

1 Corinthians 3:18-23 (NIV)

Stop, hey, what's that sound?

What's goin down, tell me what's goin down
You wanna know just what's goin down?
Stop, hey, what's that sound
Everybody look what's goin down
- TobyMac

You just thought I'd never post again.

You might be right.

Naw, I don't intend to call it quits on the blog just yet, but then again, this is my first post in nearly a month. It's a busy life, and I haven't had much time to be on the Internet, much less writing blog posts.

We have made three filming outings for the most anticipated film of 2007, er, I mean, 2008 (it could even be 2009). The result: We have, in the director's estimation, completed over half of the remaining filming. We still probably have four or five days of filming ahead of us at least; don't even try to make my math match up, just trust that it does.

Three-fourths of the film is edited and I'm dipping my proverbial toes in the water with the score. Once the filming is finished, it's still going to be several months at least before we finally unveil Hunted to the world. But I believe that we will unveil it, and I'm excited about that.

FtF is less than two weeks away, and I'm pumped about what the Lord has for us this year. Pray for our group; there's a spiritual war going on and I pray that God, not Satan, wins this battle. And please come out prayerfully and expectantly on Saturday, August 23, and share this exciting day with us.

I have a new job, and hopefully I'll get a chance to post more about that later. Working on transitioning from The Solid Rock to this new thing. I'm slightly scared and really excited, because I know that it's what God has for me.

So that's a little bit of what's goin down, for now. Shalom out.

hee hee hee....

This is Luke's wife posting for him, before sister Nan starts to remind how wonderful blog posts are :P
And no, he didn't ask me to, but no, I didn't hack in :^D

Well, what's up with Luke: he's busy working 31-39 hours a week, exercising (almost) daily with his wife (at her request) eating a lot of homemade food (and raving about it), and doing various other things that married life involves.
He's learning to be the head of his own household, and doing a marvelous job. He's set up a budget that we're working with this month, he takes good care of his wife and makes sure she drinks lots of water and takes her vitamins and supplements. She needs a lot of reminding. Once this weekend, he cleaned up the mess after his wife gagged on her supplement drink (and it choked it up all over the floor). She nearly cried to see him bent over mopping it up, but then she laughed b/c she felt like a baby who'd spat out her formula.
Oh, I teased him the other day b/c 'we've got a teenager in the house', but he's a really strong, God-fearing man. and I love him a lot.
Other news... Luke got a raise last week! We were very excited. And we celebrated with pound cake, which was wonderful and also exciting :^)
He'll be home in about an hour, and of course we're both looking forward to it.
Miss you, my love!!!
You can delete this post if it bothers you, but I was trying to sign into my own account on your laptop, and it put me to your dashboard, so.... :^P

HE POSTS

Hello chums, just a quick word from this side of the universe.

Sorry I haven't posted in a long long time. These days, usually the only time I have to write about what's going on in my life is when I'm penning e-mails to my beloved Lana. And, you can ask her, even those don't come everyday.

Busy busy busy...

But it is now one week until the biggest day of my and Lana's lives. Hard to believe; just another blink and we'll be married.

Unfortunately this blink still seems rather lengthy to me...

Working on doing my part for the ceremony (which certainly isn't much at all, compared to what my bride and her mother are doing) and planning the honeymoon, which is fairly delightful. And, oh yeah, I have a job now (PRAISE THE LORD!); hopefully you've read about it on Lana's blog. Christian bookstores are the bomb, I love the atmosphere and the people and all the cool stuff that's lying all around the store.

Tonight Lana and I are going to a blessing party, just for us, put together by some dear friends of our families. Just having the party alone is a blessing to us, but they have invited our parents and a few other couples that we know, and they are going to bless us verbally. How awesome is that? Praise the Lord; it should be a wonderful evening!

Well, I'm going to go to bed now, then get up and go to work, then off to the blessing party and getting to be with my beautiful fiancee.

Shalom out, my Hebrew homies. See you next Friday (at least, I might see you before SHE enters the room).

Where I am right now

I really haven't posted in a long time, have I?


Going to Lana's church tomorrow. I'm looking forward to it; should be a pretty different style of service than what I'm used to, and that's a good thing. And of course, I'm just excited about getting to be with Lana and her family.

Then, that afternoon at her church, we have the second of our wedding showers! Yippee great and glorious joy! The one last Sunday, at my church, was a blast, and now we get to do another one! Pretty cool to think about getting presents from a bunch of people most of whom I've never met.

Heading into the home stretch with school; three weeks of class left. It's strange, the way semesters go by. You get situated in your new classes, then you get used to them and they just become a part of regular life, then before you know it they're wrapping up. Cannot wait to bid this semester farewell and head into what promises to be the greatest summer of my life.

Forty days left till marriage. Sounds very surreal, yet for some reason it isn't, to me. It just feels right, to know that I'm spending my last few days in my family's house, that I will soon leave it and not come back (except to visit, of course), that I will begin to live with Lana and continue living with her for the rest of my life.

As I prepare for that, I'm still looking for one key component -- my job. The company that I have been working for had to downsize this year and I probably won't be working for them again in the foreseeable future. So I'm exploring options and trying to find a job. My personal goal is to have a job by the end of this coming week, so please pray that God will guide my search and lead me to the job He has for me, in His time.

That's all for now. Sorry for the length of time between posts; hopefully I'll be able to post more frequently in the future. God bless all of you.

My darling princess, and, my second day of work

Hello everyone,

First off, please pray for Lana and myself. Last week I was the one with a dilemma to resolve; this week it's my sunshine princess. I'll let her tell you more about it if she chooses, but basically it's an opportunity for her that has some definite pros and cons that need to be weighed. I honestly don't have a clue about what to do right now; I'm glad we have wise parents who can give us godly advice, and I know that God will lead us to the right decision. But we really need your prayers.

I love her so much and I am so proud of her. She wondered tonight why I'm proud of her, when she's struggling with this issue. Oh, darling, do you want me to start trying to list all the ways you make me proud? I would have no clue where to begin; I could talk about the way you love and support me, the way you love and support your family, your hard work for school, your passion for Christ, your example to fellow believers (me, first and foremost, but also others), just the fact that you're drop-dead gorgeous and look good no matter what you're wearing or how much sleep you're riding . . . uh, yeah, I guess that's the beginning of a general list of sorts. But hopefully, at least for now, you get the point.

...

Second day of work is in the books, and it went more smoothly than the first one. Yesterday I had so much stuff to take in; today I've got most of it down (I think), so I can focus on actually doing the job. And it's not too bad, thus far. Parts of it I enjoyed, parts I didn't enjoy, but boy did it feel good to get to the end of my shift, log out of everything, and call my bride-to-be. Now I've got some homework to do, and then maybe I'll have a bit of free time before bed.

Free time is good; I can't survive without having at least a bit of it every now and then. Of course, I'm having to make do with considerably less than I'm used to, but it's cool; had to do it at some point, and this is as good a time as any.

Well ladies and gents, I'm gonna bounce, take a shower, do said homework, e-mail my princess, and maybe go to bed here in a little while. Shalom out, my Hebrew homies. I love you, Lana, and I'm proud of you, and don't you forget it.

Video reactions, and, a new job!

Well, I hope you guys enjoyed the exclusive first-time-on-planet-Earth Hunted previews. I definitely enjoyed putting them together and letting you see them. It's really exciting to have something official, something anybody can see; it encourages me since the film is a long way from being finished. Anyways, thank you for all the nice comments; I really appreciate them.

As Meggy noted in the comment section, we've got a few more videos (unrelated to Hunted) over on YouTube. I hope to put many more on there. You can find our official channel at www.youtube.com/hobbbottomfilms. Right now, in addition to the two Hunted vids, we have posted the short "Silent Movie" starring Daniel and Trevor, as well as the "Woe-Be-Gone" commercial starring Trevor and the other Daniel from our youth group.

I think YouTube is way cool; it provides us with an awesome opportunity to let lots of people know about the film. Please, if you know anyone who you think would like the movie (based on what little you know about it, anyway), send them a link to the YouTube videos.

And now for the actual subject of this post. I have a job. A new job, at any rate. I'm still really not totally sure how it came about, but I know it's an opportunity that God has given me, so I'm really thankful for it.

Our friend and former homeschooler Brannan gave a comment on one of my posts from last week, telling me about a job opening in the company she works for. I applied for the job, did a writing test, and got accepted!

So what is this job, anyway? Well, it's for a group called On Point Advocacy. They are involved in political grassroots activism. Basically, my job as an "Advocacy Coordinator" (sounds spiffy, don't it?) is to be given a particular issue (like fuel economy standards or something boring like that, for example), call voters who have expressed interest in the issue, and ask them if they'd like me to write a letter to Congress on their behalf about the issue. Then I write the letter, assuming they want me to. It's a bit more complicated than that, but that's the gist of it.

I'm not totally excited about the phone aspect of it (I'll take writing over talking any day), but the pay is very good and it has a lot more hours than my previous job. And I get to set them as I want, within certain boundaries. So that's really nice.

I start next week, and I don't know whether I'll like it or not, but I'm excited because it's an opportunity that God "dropped in [my] lap", as my future father-in-law put it. Hopefully, it brings me another step closer to the day when I'll be ready to provide for myself and Lana financially. And that, as you may imagine, is really exciting. Thank You, Lord, for giving this to me!

So I ask you to please pray for me as I start this job, and continue to pray for me and Lana as we continue on the path God has laid out for us. I could not make it without her, by the way. Even though we're not married yet, she is fulfilling her calling as a help-meet to me, and I thank God so much for her. I can't even describe how much it means to have her with me, helping me, loving me, praying for me, telling me she's proud of me; you guys'll have to discover it when you find your future spouse. I love you so much, Lana.

Midterm week, and, discussions, and, Sunday night class

It is the midterm week at dear old U of A Fort Smith. Doesn't seem possible. Before you know it, my Lana and I will be staring finals in the face, and then, ho ho ho, it's on to Christmas we go!

Yesterday I discovered a fact that many of my readers have known for a while (apparently): my darling sister Hannah has two blogs. One for spiritual musings and one for everyday happenings. A Smeagol and a Gollum, as it were (sorry Emy, you won't get it till you read LOTR, mwahahahaha).

Not that there's anything wrong with having two blogs. But there's no way I could ever keep up with it. It's hard enough to post on this one, thank you; plus, I would probably forget which blogs was which and wreak some form of havoc in that ignorance.

So I think I'll stick with Warrior. It's nice, it works, even if I only get to post three or four times a week.

Speaking of which, we've been having some lively discussion in the comment section of the previous post. My bride-to-be and I have been ganging up on our dear Emy on the issue of violence (don't worry; we haven't hurt her, at least not yet). Makes me wonder if perhaps we should start up a discussion forum, like on Ezboard or something like that. They're free and don't look pretty, but they are much more efficient and organized ways to discuss. Plus you can talk about whatever you want, whether or not it relates to a blog post. Of course, some of you seemingly do that already; while reading comments, I constantly see references to stuff I know nothing about -- apparently it relates to some other area of cyberspace that I have not penetrated.

Anyways, commenter people, let me know if you're interested in doing something like that; I could set one up pretty easily. Of course, you'd have to pick and stick with a single username; that could prove bothersome for some of you girls who have a multitude of names (yes, I'm talking to you, Nan/Sarah/Hannah/who knows what else; just kidding; it doesn't *really* bother me). But I think it would be cool, if you guys are up for it. Then again, it'd be one more spot on the Web that you visit regularly, so if you just want to limit yourself to blogs, that's okay too.

Nothing due tomorrow; hurrah! Please pray for me as I am currently applying for the job Brannan mentioned in previous comment sections; I don't know whether it will work or not, but the opportunity can't be a coincidence and so I'm looking at it.

Last night we finished going through Ephesians 5 in youth class. Well, I say finished; we actually didn't get to the end where it talks about husbands and wives and such; but I think we'll cut it off where we stopped. We'll probably do specific studies on marriage roles in the future; I think it's so crucial for young people to learn that while they're still single. I'm still struggling with the whole teaching thing a bit, so pray for me. For a while we basically had a formal lesson where I pretty much lectured the whole time. Lately we've been doing a discuss-through-passage type thing where I kind of lead and everybody has an opportunity to chime in. We've gotten some really good stuff out of that, but I'm not sure that some of our younger believers are getting a lot out of that. So we'll see. I really enjoy getting to do the class and lead in studying the Word; if any of you Branchers have any suggestions, let me know.

Time to lock up and go home; let me know you guys' thoughts on doing a messageboard. If you don't want to, cool with me; it's just a thought.

On the Nature of Posts, and, Fan the Flame

As you read this blog, you'll soon notice that some posts will be outrageously long, while others will be short ditties. Some will be movie updates, some will be grandiose musings on life and God, and some will be quickie capsules of my life.


Right now, I'm sitting at work -- an AT&T authorized agent store in Charleston, Arkansas. It's been a fairly uneventful day of work, but I'm looking forward to getting off here in a couple of minutes. Tomorrow we have an afternoon and evening of filming lined up, all stuff involving the villainous Gang.

Picking up this post again at home now. I love Blogger, BTW; automatically saves your drafts so you can pick them up again any ol' time you want. Amazing Stacey.

I'm about to go work on a Sunday night lesson for my youth group. I part-volunteered, was part-enlisted, as "Sunday night coordinator" for our youth at First Baptist Church of Branch. It's been a pretty cool opportunity so far. I've been doing a series of lessons recently on the biblical monarchs of Kings and Chronicles. We go through each of their lives and pick up on the lessons to be learned from them. We started with Solomon, who took a while, and have finally moved on to Rehoboam and Jeroboam.

This week and in the next few weeks, we're going to take a break from our study of the kings and do some special focus lessons as we lead up to Fan the Flame, our annual youth event that will take place on Saturday, August 25. This week, the lesson is on fasting. It's not an issue we've addressed in our youth for a long time, and I think it'll be a neat chance to teach them. I plan on emphasizing that while putting away the eats is the most popular form (and one of the most effective forms) of fasting, it is by no means the only one. It's gonna be good.

And Fan the Flame, you ask? It's a pretty special day. I think it's fantastic that a church our size can put on a youth event like this each year. Of course, God gets all the glory for it; we're merely earthen vessels. It kicks off at 1:00 pm and ends somewhere around 9. We have two worship services, one in the early afternoon and one in the evening. I am privileged to be able to lead worship, along with the rest of the members of our youth group's band, Singled Out. Our speakers are my partners in crime in youth leadership, Chris Russell and Dusty Wright. It's an awesome day, and we believe this year's event will be the best one yet.

The whole point of Fan the Flame is to get a whole bunch of people together (they don't even have to be all youth, though that's our target group) and experience the moving of the Holy Spirit in a mighty way. We've seen some truly amazing things through this event in the past, and, again, we think the best is yet to come.

So yeah, I'm pumped about that. Band practice is tonight, and I'm really looking forward to what we can do as a band this year. We're going to introduce some new songs and hopefully branch out a bit musically.

Dude, I am getting seriously psyched just sitting here typing. To all my readers: Please pray for this event; we can do nothing without the effectual fervent prayers of the righteous men and women of God. Also, if you haven't heard about it yet, please plan on attending and invite some friends to come with you. It's going to be a phenomenal day. Go God!

Now I'd better go work on my lesson a bit.