I have a 94-year old Grandma who still lives in a small town in Central Illinois, in the same house she lived in with Grandpa (married over 70 years!), and raised her two daughters (one of them my mother).
She visited us on Thanksgiving, and my sister, brother and I posed for this photo with her.
Hi, Grandma! — You go girl!
Today, my sons lead worship in the Upper Room at Calvary Memorial Church in Oak Park, Illinois. Noel played acoustic guitar and lead the singing, Marshall played keyboard, and Taylor played drums. They were assisted by Eric Guyer on electric guitar, Blake Stratton on bass, and Kristin Hoving on backup vocals.
They did a great job and I am very proud of them, and the whole team.
What can I say? I’m just a proud father!
We have a family tradition. The Friday after Thanksgiving, we all pile in the van and head up to Bethany Beach in Sawyer, Michigan, to the summer home of some friends. When everyone is there, we all drive about 10 miles into the country to a family owned tree farm, and cut down our Christmas Tree for the year. We tie it on the roof and head back to Bethany Beach… sometime stopping at Drier’s Butcher Shop on the way back, to pick up cheese, pepper sticks, and other goodies.
We spend the rest of the day eating, laughing, playing games, singing, walking the beach, and just having fun with our friends and family. Usually we stay as late as we can, and drive back home well after dark. It’s a good way to reflect on all that we have to be thankful for, and get in gear for the Advent season, preparing for Christmas.
Here is what I read at our dinner table on Thanksgiving Day.
Abraham Lincoln, Thanksgiving Proclamation, October 3, 1863
“No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.”
“I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, … to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union.”
Psalm 103 – Of David – Reasons to be Thankful
Praise the LORD, my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
Praise the LORD, my soul, and forget not all his benefits—
who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases,
who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion,
who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
The LORD works righteousness and justice for all the oppressed.
He made known his ways to Moses, his deeds to the people of Israel:
The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.
He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever;
he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.
For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him;
as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.
As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him;
for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust.
As for mortals, their days are like grass, they flourish like a flower of the field;
the wind blows over it and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more.
But from everlasting to everlasting the LORD’s love is with those who fear him, and his righteousness with their children’s children—
with those who keep his covenant and remember to obey his precepts.
The LORD has established his throne in heaven, and his kingdom rules over all.
Praise the LORD, you his angels, you mighty ones who do his bidding, who obey his word.
Praise the LORD, all his heavenly hosts, you his servants who do his will.
Praise the LORD, all his works everywhere in his dominion.
Praise the LORD, my soul.
“Good philosophy must exist, if for no other reason because bad philosophy needs to be answered.” — C.S. Lewis
Digital Punch is a video log (VLOG) that a couple friends of mine have put together for their company, ShopLocal.com. Benjamin Nelson is playing the newscaster role, and Patrick Flanagan is the producer. Both guys are regular attenders of the Upper Room service at Calvary Memorial Church in Oak Park.
Benjamin has also been attending and teaching improv workshops at Second City for a number of years.
This is a fine example of viral video web marketing, which is part of the emerging web 2.0 new media.
Good job you guys! I like the episodes because they make me laugh and that’s good!
According to reports in news media outlets, you are more likely to die from an infection picked up in a hospital than you are from dying from AIDS, a car accident, and breast cancer – COMBINED! The CDC reports that 100,000 Americans die from infections picked up in hospitals every year! That’s 250 a day! This is a serious health problem reaching epidemic proportions.
Causes? One big reason is hospital workers and doctors failing to wash their hands and equipment properly. When was the last time someone put a sterile protector on your arm before attaching that blood pressure cuff? How about that tape they stick on over cuts and stitches and gauze? Does the doctor or nurse wash their hands in your presence before treating you? These are a few examples of actual ways bacteria is transmitted from one sick patient to another. The list is much longer.
Pennsylvania has just passed legislation that will require hospitals to publish their “infection rates.” I think we need more of this truth made available online, for hospitals and doctors!
Bottom line – don’t go to a hospital unless it is absolutely necessary! If you must go, or you are responsible for someone else in a hospital, insist on seeing hospital workers washing hands and equipment! It could be your own life or a loved one you are saving!
Today I sent out an email to many of my friends and family, letting them know of my decision to go on a ministry trip to Costa Rica in January of 2007.
This is a trip I will be taking with 7 or 8 other guys from my church, to work at a training center in San Isidro, about an hour North of San Jose. We leave on January 26, 2007, and return on February 3, 2007
Here is a link to my church website with more information as well!
Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House!
What will she do as speaker in her first 100 hours?
- Boost the minimum wage? The only question is how high, how fast.
- Fiscal discipline? “Remove all doubt. Pay as you go.”
- Research on new embryonic stem cells? Scrap the ban on federal funding.
- Problematic prescription drug coverage for seniors? “We can do something about that.”
- 911 commission recommendations? Approved on Day One.
The list goes on and on of things she’ll get passed by the House and battle to make law.
Now that makes me feel really good and makes it all worthwhile! NOT! 
More Election Fallout
- Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld resigns and is replaced by Robert Gates, former director of the CIA
- Hastert will not seek minority leadership position
Well, the big day has finally arrived. It’s going to be an interesting day as we watch the polls.
I went to my local Precinct 64 polling place to vote this morning. The lady asked for my last name, which I gave her. She flipped through the sheets, stopped at one and asked me, “Taylor?” “No,” I said, “it’s Randal.” She flipped over and tore out my sheet, I signed it, and then I voted on the new computer-based voting machine. No problems.
Then I called my oldest son Taylor, and asked if he was voting today. He said he was just on his way out to do that before work. I asked if he knew where to go, assuming he still had to come into Oak Park to vote. He said yes, they had given him a card and all the instructions for when he registered out in DuPage County! I then realized, that he could actually vote twice, since they had not removed him from the Cook County voter list, and they did not check for valid ID… just signatures.
The inefficiency and out-of-date procedures that are still in effect in government just amaze me. It disturbs me that there are so many ways like this that people actually use to cheat. There will be thousands of votes cast in Cook County by people who are dead, have moved away, or are not even legal citizens.
Sad. Unbelievable.