And so it goes....

Okay, first of all, I DID PASS my chanting final (pays to pick the text you know from worship, eh?), and I am now back to being at least tri-lingual. The Hebrew exam has passed (and so have I) but there are translations and papers to do. Tonight I'm working with Greek again, oh joy! Important things to remember:

1) We read Greek text from left-to-right
2) We read Hebrew text from right-to-left
3) We must not confuse these two things lest our translations of Scripture be the source of much ribbing by classmates
4) It is really, really, really important to have Accordance Bible Software on the laptop, yea Apple computers!

A lot has happened lately, Lorice's great aunt (and she was a "great aunt" who was a pen pal for Lorice for years) died at 82 after not ever (as far as we know) seeing a doctor. She had massive amounts of cancer in her liver and such. She was a sweet lady even at the end. We promised to care for her cat (code name Speedy) and so we brought the cat home to our house where we promptly learned that Speedy had feline aids. For the record, we kept Speedy in isolation for fear of just this thing. So, the vet recommended putting Speedy to rest, which we did, to the tune of $200. So, we go back to the house from whence we procured Speedy only to meet a neighbor out front who said, "you might see my cat in the house, Louise (aunt's name) kept him in there and fed him, just boot him back outside when you find him." ((gulp)) Lorice was able to keep her poker face. How the heck do you tell someone 1) your cat had feline aids 2) we promised to take care of the cat for a dying woman 3) we paid $200 for the privledge of killing your cat ????

So, now we are waiting for the official okee-dokee before going back to the house and cleaning it out. Perhaps I'll post some pictures one day soon, just for your enjoyment.

Until next time, have a super groovy day. :o)

Another day, another Hebrew exam passed...

So, I'm really psyched right now having successfully negotiated my last Hebrew language exam at seminary! This was a source of much angst and anxiety for me and now it has happened and I received a lovely 81% score. In about 18 minutes (as of the time of my writing this post) I am going to face another challenge, the final for "Chanting" and I know what you're saying, "how do you do a "final" for chanting? Well, on an individual basis we have to "chant" the leader parts for one of the worship settings found in the Evangelical Lutheran Worship book. I chose a classic holdover from the green book, setting three. Let's hope my confidence based upon familiarty doesn't bite me.

On another note, it was great to see Shana yesterday at school, she was visiting the library to check out a favorite book and I was studying or something fun like that. Then, as a bonus, I saw her again at my house later last night. She dropped by with some cinamon bread from Sinsanowa Mound (is that how you spell Sinsanowa?). A double bonus day for sure.

I continue to work on materials for a retreat in Florida, keep me and that group in your prayers friends. Peace to you now and always.

Hangin' in Tampa with my friends

Hey gang,
I'm in Tampa this weekend for the ELCA Youth Ministry Extravaganza, what a great event! It's a homecoming of sorts for me since I'm from St. Petersburg (across Tampa Bay from downtown Tampa). I'm working for the Center for Youth Ministiries and Wartburg Theological Seminary. The group that came with me includes Heather (director of admissions), Tim (fellow student), Nate Frambach (prof for youth, culture and mission), and Kris Stache (new director of the CYM and associate prof for youth, culture and mission).



Monday night I return to Tampa and go back to class immediately, then it's back to the grindstone for class and to the fun stuff, prepping for the Metro Confirmation Retreat where I will be the keynote speaker in March. I'm working on a new web site and there may be some other cool stuff on the horizon, but we'll see as time goes by. Enjoy the SuperBowl (can I use that without paying the NFL?) as I will, though I am torn between rooting for the Bears and the Colts.