Imperial Valley Christian Center

I was so impressed with the labor of love that is the website, Drummerworld,  that I wanted to share it with you. This is a noncommercial website dedicated to playing the drums. The most impressive part is the videos of the great drummers the site hosts. Well over a hundred drummers are listed including all of the greats, jazz drummers, rock and roll drummers. You can watch Gene Krupa playing, Sing Sing Sing and whose that playing the clarinet, Benny Goodman, Wow. Buddy Rich and his band playing Carioca at the Montreal Jazz festival. Even I had to get up and dance to that. Gene Krupa and Buddy Rich doing a drum battle on the Sammy Davis show from 1966. I think Buddy Rich gets the better of it.  Then you can see Buddy Rich doing a drum battle with Jerry Lewis on the Martin and Lewis Show from the 1950s. A brief biography is included for each drummer. The drummers include Mick Fleetwood, Phil Collins (I didn't know he played the drums.) Lionel Hampton, and Ringo Star whose page includes a clip of Ringo playing with Eric Clapton and Carl Perkins. The love this site was put together with is what impresses the most. Check it out.

What I really started out to talk about here was the importance of meditating in God's Word. By meditating I mean muttering a scripture to yourself while thinking about its meaning. There is a tremendous power in meditating God's Word. It renews your mind, it builds God's Word into your sprit and it makes it possilbe for you to take control of your thought life. The battle we wage is not a physical battle waged with physical things, The primary battle for the Christian is a battle of the mind.

This is the Sunday, June 4 service it last about 50 minutes, whew!

Audio: MP3    Large (Good for burning a CD)    Small (Good just for listening.)

A few months ago while browsing the webosphere I came across an ad for Nationwide Insurance in which they were promoting their, Life Comes At You Fast, advertising campaign. The promotion was that if you sent them a picture from your life they might put it up on their New York, Times Square, electronic billboard. So I sent in a picture of Chrisy from her 7th brithday just for fun and they ran it on their Billboard. Coool! That's a shot of Chrissy on the billboard above. Below is a wider shot of Times Square. The billboard Chrisy was on is the right hand side. Here's the link to the site if you are interested in sending in a photo.

Guy Kawasaki has posted a video version of his, Art of The Start, talk a previous version of which I summarized here. This would be a good place to start for anyone thinking of starting anything.

Okay this is too funny. According to this BBC story, An English artist, David Hensel, had submitted a sculpture entitled, One Day Closer To Paradise, (That's it to the left seated on it's stone base. You can see the wooden support under the neck.) to a show sponsored by the Royal Academy of Arts. When his exhibit arrived the sculpture was somehow separated from the stone base it was to sit on and a small wooden support he had quickly carved to hold the sculpture on the base. The Royal Academy, not realizing what had happened selected the stone base and the wooden support for display and rejected the sculpture. This is obviously a case of the Emperor's new sculpture. Hat tip to Michael Barone.

Why did Jesus come? Why did God have to send Jesus? What is Christianity all about? Jesus said he was sent to… preach the Kingdom of God. If this is the reason Jesus was sent then this must be the most important idea in Christianity. What did Jesus mean by the phrase, "Kingdom of God"? The kingdom of God means the reign of God. Where God is reigning is where the Kingdom of God is. Where God's will is done that's the Kingdom of God. Where God has his way there's the Kingdom of God. Where things are the way God wants them to be is the Kingdom of God.

Jesus went around causing God's will to be done in people's lives. When he healed the blind he caused God's will to be done in their life. When he made the lame to walk he caused things to be the way God wants them to be. Jesus went around causing God's reign to show up in people's lives. Jesus went around causing the Kingdom of God to show up in people's lives. That's what he wants us to do and to that end he has given us supernatural authority to cause this to come to pass.

This is the Sunday, May 28, 2006 service. It last about 40 minutes. I give this one an 8 for content and a 7 for delivery.

Audio Mp3:    Large file ( Good for burning a CD)    Small file (Good just for listening.)

Stumbled on a really nice karate site the other day. It's put together by the Prefecture of Okinawa, a prefecture is basically the same as an American state. It's very nicely put together. Includes pages and video files relating to the history of karate, the different styles of karate, even has a page with the top karate guys, the so called, Intangible Cultural Asset Holders. These are all the 10th Dan, i.e. 10th degree blackbelts for the different Ryus, i.e. schools or styles, of Okinawan Karate. There are 9 of them listed, but the main reason I bring it up is because number 1 on the hit parade is Shugoro Nakazato, (That's him to the left.)who is the head of our style of Karate, Shorin Ryu, Shorin Kan. There's even video of Sensei Nakazato doing a kata. Pretty cool stuff if you have even a passing interest in Karate. Nicest site I've seen on the web about Karate.

Tikkun Olam is a hebrew expression which basically means mending the world. That's why Jesus came into the world, to mend it. That's what Jesus went around doing. That's what he taught his disciples to do and that's what he expects us, his followers to do, to work with God in the mending of the world. To this end he has given us the right to exercise authority on the earth.

This is the Sunday, May 21 service, lasts about 46 minutes.
Audio MP3    Large File (Good for burning a CD)    Small File (Good just for listening.)