2 years ago…
Happy Anniversary Theresa! I'm blessed to be married to you!
I promised to be the best husband I could be to my wonderful wife Theresa. What a blessing it’s been to be married to her. It is truly an honor to be able to call her my wife. Posted on August 25th, 2009 by howie | No Comments »
How many families do you know like this?
Wow… This is incredibly powerful for me to see. It’s very convicting.
Casting Crowns – Slow Fade
Casting Crowns – Slow Fade teaching video
What to do now?
So I have officially been out of work for a week. Now what?
I’m not sure. I have a couple of options laid out in front of me. One, I could try applying for jobs all over trying to get work. Two, I could try starting up my own consulting firm. Now there are a few drawbacks w/ both options.
Timing
As some of you know, I plan on returning to school in the winter and I am not certain how long I can guarantee an employer that I will be able to work for them. That immediately makes me not a very good candidate. We could be leaving as early as November or as late as January. No guarantees at this point. Plus, I’ll need time off to go down to Portland and find places where we’re going to live and establish new jobs down there.
Lack of jobs in the area
I was the last of my friends to become jobless. All of them are all still out of work and unable to find new jobs. Who am I to think that I’m going to be any different? Most of my friends are a lot smarter and better at what I do anyways; If they don’t have a chance, what chance do I have?
Where does that leave me?
Not 100% certain but more than likely I will be trying to start up my consulting business. I am not certain I can make enough money at it to be able to pay all of our bills. It requires some time to build a client base and as I stated above, I don’t have a ton of time to do that. We’ll see what God does next.
Posted on August 22nd, 2009 by howie | No Comments »Path from there to here
On some level, I do consider myself a worship leader already. God has put me in a place where I am consistently leading worship and being asked to plan and lead music outside of just Sunday’s at church. I believe this is a God called position and I am walking in the path He has laid out for me. I am not certain where that path leads beyond going to school to be better equipped for it.
Music is becoming a passion of mine again. I thought I had lost that passion. I used to have to have music playing all the time. I have learned to live without it and be in silence. I think that is what God has been trying to teach me over these last five years. I had been going to school at His Hill in Comfort, TX and I was shown that God did not want me doing music anymore. I ended up coming back to Spokane and going to school for computers. I got a job in the computer field and got an associates in computer networking.
I spent a lot of time working on computers and even got to the point where I was in charge of running LAN parties for SpokLAN.net, a local computer gaming group. It was at this time (end of 2008) that I was asked to step into a position of leading music at my church. Our worship pastor had been called to another church and we were in need of people to step up and lead the church in music. I was one of four men asked to be music leaders for the church.
Trying to lead worship and plan LAN parties for SpokLAN simply wasn’t working out anymore. It was too much stress and it made me realize that a choice had to be made: Computers or music? While I loved computers and enjoyed working on them, I did not believe they were my passion or something I wanted to be my career. Music, was once my passion and is becoming my passion again. I spent countless hours in the music building at my high school. It is something that makes me truly happy. I want to continue to pursue it. I also know that it is something God was calling me to.
In the end there wasn’t really a choice. God also seems to have made that choice quite clear for me as well. Removing me from my computer job frees me to be totally focused on Him and what He wants from me. God has almost completely removed anything computer related from my life. I now have nothing more to do than think on Him and where He wants me to be. This is a great and scary time for my wife and me but I believe it is a great time for God to do some amazing things and show off. I leave you with a song from David Crowder Band that I love. It will be my anthem through this jobless season. I am excited to see what God will do.
Posted on August 19th, 2009 by howie | No Comments »God has a plan
I’ve been dreading writing this post all day but I know I need to. If for no other reason than because I need to write it for me. I need to put my thoughts into words.
Photography
Not my work but a neat picture
I always thought it would be neat to be a photographer. Or at least have a camera and go out and take the artistic photos. It’s a weird desire but I long to be artistic and expressive. I’ve been way too afraid to though. I’m hoping this new life will put me in a place where I have the courage to express and let myself be artistic. Part of me thinks that I have too much of the views of the world still in me and caring what other people think. I know I say I shouldn’t care what other people think but a bit part of me still does. It’s a sad reality that I am trying to break. Because really in the end, the only opinion that matters is God’s. And I know where I stand with Him. So anyways, in honor of my desire to become an artist and be artistic, I have created a flickr account. I don’t know if I’ll ever use it or do anything with it but I have made one and I am going to try and use it. Flickr Photostream: http://www.flickr.com/photos/howie23/
Flickr Profile: http://www.flickr.com/people/howie23/ Posted on August 12th, 2009 by howie | No Comments »
Worship Planning for August 16th, 2009
Hopefully this will be a single post regarding the planning of the service. Through thought and discussion with others, I decided that we should have a hymn sing Sunday. A lot of hymns that I personally haven’t sung in a very long time.
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Here is a quick list of the songs we’ll be singing this weekend:
- I’ll Fly Away
- Take My Life And Let It Be
- Christ The Lord Is Risen Today
- Great Is Thy Faithfulness
- Have Thine Own way Lord
I’m also kind of nervous for this weekend because I am debating about trying to go through the whole service this weekend without a guitar in my hands. I’m not certain how well it will work considering we’ll have a bass as well as a synthesizer. It should be interesting.
I am also torn about the offertory. Part of me wants to have the piano player come up with something and part of me wants to try and do something on my own. It might be fun to try and do something with just the piano player and myself. I’ll have to pray more about this and see what God comes up with. Posted on August 11th, 2009 by howie | No Comments »Worship for August 9, 2009
This morning was an interesting worship service. It was a bit of a learning experience. I learned that “Good To Me” is a great song from my childhood but it really doesn’t have a place in a church worship service. I was convicted by God during communion, that that song needed to not be sung. It did not fit in anyway with the service. The reason I say that is because it’s a song about me and not about God. I don’t want services to be services that worship me or us as people. I want any worship service I’m a part of planning, to be a service that worships God and His amazing grace. “Good to me” doesn’t do that.
I almost changed the song during the service. But I decided not to do it and God confirmed that that was not a song to be played anymore. After the first service, Theresa, my wife, suggested “It is well.” Having heard Pastor’s sermon for the day, it fit with his theme on prayer and how the response to bad situations is to be in prayer. That was the right song. While it was talking about us, it magnified God and what He has done for us as mankind. It also spoke about when trials come, we are OK because we have faith in God. I love when songs sing about the attributes of God. Trying to find songs that sing about those and not about us is a challenge. I hope some day that God will bless me with the ability to write those kinds of words. Posted on August 10th, 2009 by howie | No Comments »Taking a weekend for myself
It’s been a long few weeks. Lots of different things going on that have kept me very busy. Lots of running around and planning things and really a lack of ability to stop. Today, I decided to take a day for myself. I would have preferred a whole weekend but unfortunately, it’s not going to happen (leading worship at church tomorrow).
I got up later than normal (9am); A great change from the 6:15am I usually see on my cell phone during the week. I lounged around the house for a few hours and then I went and saw Julie & Julia w/ my wife. She is a foodie and has been looking forward to that movie for a long time. She really liked it. Meryl Streep did an excellent job as Julia Child. I was quite impressed. What does the rest of the weekend hold? Tonight I will be hanging out w/ my friends Matt & Nick. It sounds like we may go see a movie or go out and do something. Not certain what yet. We may even stay home and play WoW cards all day. :p Matt was the best man at the wedding I went to yesterday for my friend Chris. It was a good ceremony. Lots of people there that I had no idea who they were. One thing they did at the ceremony that I wish I’d done at my wedding was they gave vows to each others parents. Chris vowed to Nicole’s parents to be a great husband and to always take care of her. Nicole vowed to Chris’ parents to be the best wife that she could be and to always love their son. It was really cool to see something like that added to the ceremony. Hardly ever do we see someone honor the parents in the relationship and it was a nice thing that made me smile. Hopefully the rest of today will be as relaxing as the first half of it has been. Posted on August 8th, 2009 by howie | No Comments »It’s Friday!!
Thank God for the weekend! This will be my first time to just relax in quite a few weeks. I’m really looking forward to it. The wife and I have plans to take Saturday completely off and do nothing except maybe see Julie & Julia. The wife has been wanting to see that movie since it was first announced. I’ll probly go see it w/ her and try and earn some brownie points.
Had rehearsal with the worship team last night. It’s gonna be good. I’m excited for it. Unfortunately, only half the team showed up to rehearsal. Granted, it didn’t help that I didn’t call them and remind them, so I can’t hold them completely at fault. I need to make sure and call them tonight and remind them that they’re singing/playing this weekend. My first wedding for the month is happening tonight. My friend Chris is getting married tonight at 6pm. Chris and I went to Jr. High and HS together. I’m really excited for him. His wedding is tonight, and then in three weeks another wedding will be happening in Las Vegas for my friend Matt. I’m in the wedding party for that one. That will be the first time I’ve ever been to Vegas. I’m kinda excited/nervous about it. It should be pretty awesome though. After that is my best friend Arick’s wedding. I’m the best man for that. Overall a summer of craziness that I can’t wait to be over. I’m excited to see my friends getting married and beginning a new chapter in life. Posted on August 7th, 2009 by howie | No Comments »
RT @branthansen: No one expects the 44 Fake Sit play.