Baptism Cannonball

This video has probably been floating around out there for awhile now, but I just ran across it today.



Lately I've been running into a lot of blogs from angry Christians. They seem to feel that their ministry is to point out everything that's wrong with everyone else's ministry. I'm not going to link to any of their sites here because, well...I don't want to give them any more traffic. They don't deserve it. The first thing I thought when I watched this, after I stopped laughing, was how a bunch of these folks would probably think this is horribly sacrilegious. I might have even thought that a little myself. But that's wrong! We should all be so excited about showing that we stand with Christ that we would cannonball into the baptismal! It's an exciting thing, after all! This kid obviously made that whole church smile, and I think God probably smiled biggest of them all.

Children's Church Coolness

The last several weeks have been pretty busy for me. I had several puppet festivals to be at. They all went really well, and I got to see a bunch of great children's church facilities at the churches I visited. Here are some photos of some of the creative stuff I got to see.

First up are some shots of the children's church set at Flint River Baptist Church, which hosted the Huntsville, AL puppet festival. The set featured a boat, dock, and beach hut. The boat has a time machine on the deck and that's real sand on the ground by the hut.

The Oklahoma City area puppet festival was hosted by Crosspointe Church in Norman, OK. The entire children's church area is decorated like a castle. The theme is carried through all the rooms and hallways.

After the Oklahoma City Festival I got to stay over long enough to visit one of the LifeChurch.TV campuses in the area. These photos are from the Oklahoma City Campus (which is actually in Edmond), this is the campus that Pastor Craig Groeschel preaches from, the message then goes out via satellite to the other campuses. I made arrangements several weeks ago to get a tour of the children's church facility, so I got the grand tour.

This is the check-in area. It kind of reminded me of the self-check-in system that United Airlines uses. Parents have a card that they scan, then the computer lists all the kids on that account. They use the touch screen to check-in the kids that are present, the computer prints the name tags, and they are off to children's church.

My favorite way to get into children's church was this one. The 1st to 3rd graders enter the room via slide. Way cool! Beneath are some shots of the set.

Here's a shot of one of the pre-school rooms. All the decor was done by Wacky World Studios.

The facility for the adults ain't bad either.

Second Life Church

Though I haven't ventured into it myself yet, I have been intrigued by this Internet phenomenon of sorts called Second Life. It's a virtual world created by the users, kind of like an extreme version of The Sims. People buy and sell land and products and can create just about anything they can think of. There's also a lot of nasty stuff that goes on in Second Life, from what I hear. One church, however, has decided to create a presence in this virtual world and has already seen people saved as a result. LifeChurch.TV is a church I've been following lately. Their Pastor, Craig Groeschel, is an amazing speaker and now you can hear his sermons at LifeChurch.TV's Second Life campus. Pretty amazing. Check out this story about a life that was changed as a result:

Second Life just had its second weekend of video experiences, and already God has used this tool to change lives. Troy found LifeChurch.tv in Second Life and God found Troy right where he was. Troy shares his story with us.

Troy's Story:
hello everyone i'd like to tell you a short version of my story so maybe you can pass this along to help others who may be in a situation like mine: im 41 years old, i've been stuck in my parents basement for 6 years, i basically lost myself after choosing to leave my family, because of lots of mental issues so i imprisoned myself and let myself basically give up..i've faced some hardships with my mental and physical health including a heart attack at the age of 39.
Ok ,so enough of my woes, i just wanted to tell you all how i got here. Last Sun. after a small argument with a friend i felt bad and was walking along (virtually mind you in second life) and saw an Ad sign for lifechurch, i clicked on it and landed on this beautiful island. i looked around and found the mysecret area and sat down and watched the vids i was moved to say the least in my tears.After watching and praying with craig i raised my hands confessed my sins and gave myself to jesus for the first time in my life.... what a wonderfull feeling to be free of my sins, to find out how to get rid of my bitterness, most of my fears, to understand how i've been holding all these dark crazy things inside me for so long and now learning how to follow the path god has for me, to give myself to jesus..what a wonderfull group of pastors you all have, with craig at the helm, each of you inspire me, move me, make me feel where you came from and I now thank you so much, i look forward to learning everything i can from you all. thank you and god bless you...troy.