I'm working in the hobby store today. I took this job about six months ago not as an additional source of income (this job doesn't even support my coffee habit), but mostly for a challenge. I wasn't feeling comfortable with the Christian clique that was being formed around me. Now don't get me wrong, I love Christians. It amazes me that wherever I go in this world I'll never be alone...not only do I always have Jesus standing next to me, I've got his people too.

There is something to be said about outsiders though. Outsiders simply meaning people outside my Christian clique. I get a great dose of them in the hobby store. Most of my customers are over sized boys who didn't have enough shiny toys growing up and they're trying to make up for it now. These men curse and joke in ways that would get someone thrown out of the church. I think they look at my tattoos and just assume it's cool with me. It is cool with me. It's even cooler with me when they begin to see a better way that's out there. Maybe they somehow absorb the music I've got playing in the background right now?


So as I sit here in my retail experiment I can't help to look over at the radio-controlled trucks and recall a strange childhood memory. It comes up every now and again when I see certain types of Monster Trucks. Grave Digger is the one in particular in case you were wondering. My mom bought a Grave Digger radio-controlled truck for my step brother John as a birthday gift. John was a real twerp. Anyway, we were riding in the car and the truck was sitting in between my feet on the front floorboard of our 1985 Chevy Wagon. I was beginning to feel carsick and I told my mom. She said I would be fine, but as we pulled into the driveway of our little trailer home I ralphed right before I could get the door open. I got some puke on the Monster truck and my mom freaked out. She screamed maniacally and cussed like a sailor at me. Whoops, my bad.

On another note, I'm currently on steroids and I think they're making me a little crazy. I keep feeling manic depressive and irritable followed by euphoric. Poison Ivy stinks.

Hell hath no fury like this twelve year old boy. That's my thousand-yard stare...

I am 25 years old. I am also a pastor. These two things conflict sometimes. Now while I'd love to tell you that I feel with certainty I've been given a Divine Vocation or that there's some "calling" on my life, I...um...I can't. Sorry. I was thrust into ministry. Having come from some pretty rough places growing up, I fell pretty hard for Jesus shortly into my adult life.

I was addicted. I was addicted to the life that the bible promised me. I was addicted to the power of the Holy Spirit. I was addicted to the love I was receiving from people who didn't seem to care where I had been. I was addicted to Jesus. So I began to serve. And I served and I served and I served. I was good at serving. God was using me and I was letting Him. So I served some more. I couldn't quite figure out what I was good at so I tried everything. It got to the point where my regular job was getting in the way of my serving with the church. The church recognized this and so they offered me a full-time position. My title? Associate Pastor.

I was 23 years old and I was going to be caring for hundreds of people. I had no idea what I was getting into. Two years later I still have no idea how I am in the position I've been given. It's somewhat surreal, but isn't God?

There are a lot more challenging areas in the realm of leadership, things I was not ready for. What do you do when people continually assume that you're the Student Ministries guy? The answer, "Nope, I can't stand teenagers." can only work for so long. What do you do when someone declines your council for input from "the REAL Pastor"? Everything inside me wants to hide in the corner and cry, but I think I read that's unacceptable in some John Maxwell book or something. I feel like a poser. I feel like I'm the wrong guy for the job. I feel completely and totally inadequate. All of these feelings are only sometimes, but when they're there...they're there.

The most challenging thing for me would have to be the battle that rages in my mind. When your head pops out of the foxhole that's when you get shot at. Sometimes I feel like my hole isn't dug deep enough and there's a target on my dome. Satan lies to me and I agree with him more often than I'd like to admit. I'm happy to report that I've recently been stomping on Satan's punk face though. I'm able to quickly fall into the serving man rather than God category. Thankfully, God has been reminding me that He looks at my heart rather than my outward appearance. (1 Sam. 16)

So there...I admit it. I don't really know what I'm doing. God sure seems to though.

* Disclaimer * The following post is from a personal experience of mine. It's about a specific person and while I normally don't "out" people as a pastor, I am this time. I want you as a reader to know that I have permission to share the following information from Pete himself. It is of utmost importance to me to keep the confidentiality of my friends / family /and cohorts. Sorry about the disclaimer...I just want you to know that you don't have to worry about me "sharing your stuff". * Disclaimer over. *


I met Pete somewhere around 2 years ago. Maybe longer, it's fuzzy.

We were fresh into the new church we started and eager to help anyone we could. This isn't a bad thing at all...it can be dangerous though. Several of us somehow got connected with the Mt. Airy Men's Shelter and tried to serve them as best we could. The shelter was essentially just a drug/alcohol rapid rehab center for guys who can't manage life on their own. Mt. Airy houses anywhere from 55-65 guys at any given time and they take them through stages of progress to get them out on their own.

That last paragraph makes Mt. Airy Men's Shelter sound better than it really is. It's a bit of a dump honestly. We've continued to maintain a connection with the guys who come in and out of there. Each week anywhere from 8-15 guys show up at Vineyard Westside and we love that they're a part of our body. To see the homeless sitting next to the wealthy and they embrace one another...it's a beautiful sight. It breaks down the Us and Them mentality.

Pete came from the men's shelter. His name was Arthur, but he always went by Pete. He had been at the shelter for a couple months and was now moving on to live in an apartment by himself. He wasn't ready for this kind of responsibility, but the system doesn't worry about what people are ready for. He went through the program...now it was time to kick him out. That's just how it works.

I connected with Pete more deeply through a Saturday morning men's group that met at Panera. This was just a group of guys, totally messed up, who were looking for the things God was trying to teach them through their everyday lives. Pete wanted to go to the Panera group, but he was without wheels. Me and a couple other guys took turns giving Pete a ride to the group as well as other places. Sometimes Pete would come home with me to look through books I had or to get something to eat. I got to know more of his story and he got to know more of mine.

My wife Allison already knew Pete because he took a class where she was Pete's table leader. Pete was an amazing singer. He could belt out Negro Spirituals like no other I've heard. We always encouraged him to use his secret talent and most of the time he would start sweating profusely and escape before we forced him to sing. Pete was somewhat like a giant teddy bear. He seemed so child-like and innocent in so many instances.

I looked up Pete's police record online because I'm OCD, nosey, and that's just the kind of thing I do. I knew that he had been in trouble with the law on and off for a while. I found out that he had been arrested some 30 times in the last 5 years for offenses such as Drunk and Disorderly Conduct, Physical Abuse, and Public Nuisance. It seemed old Pete couldn't keep himself out of the slammer for more than 30 days at a time. He explained to me once that jail was a safe place for him. He couldn't get drunk and he spent most of his time reading the Bible and devotionals. He was a better human being when he was incarcerated. Some kind of a "gauge out your eye if it causes you to sin" mentality was at play.

Our relationship progressed and it seemed that Pete felt comfortable to share more and more of his chaotic life with me. He told me about the scars on his face and how they were from his mother and sisters. I remember vividly how he described them. He sheepishly admitted to me that his sisters all held him down while his mother hit him repeatedly with a baseball bat saying, "I din't want no boy! I din't want no boy!".

Pete called me one day and he asked me if Allison and I could come over to his apartment so he could talk to us. We said sure and we headed over there after church one Sunday. We went inside Pete's tiny efficiency apartment and had a seat on his couch. He thanked us for always helping him out and told us that he'd been reading the bible and he felt like he needed to tell us something. He said, "I'm going to hell. I'm going to hell and I'm scared." We asked him why he thought he was going to hell and he told us that he had been reading the book of James in the bible. It said that he should confess his sins to his brothers in Christ.

He began sweating like he always did. Pete sweat like no human I've ever seen when he had to talk to people. It would just start pouring from his bald head. As the sweat beaded down his face he looked at us and told us the story of how he had killed someone. He explained that he had been drinking with some guy all day several years back when they got into some kind of argument. Pete told us that he had stabbed this man to death and that he just ran away. He'd been running for some time now.

I remember when he told me I began praying immediately in my head. I asked Jesus to keep Allison and I safe as we prepared to respond to this confession. I opened up my mouth and I wasn't sure what was going to come out. If I said the wrong thing, Pete was capable of panicking. Maybe he immediately regretted telling us...what then? What if we freaked out? What could Pete do to us? As the words formed in my mouth I just grabbed Pete by the shoulder with a reassuring touch and said, "I think we should pray."

We prayed for a good long while and I can tell you that when you're in that situation your prayers are very real. We stayed with him for maybe an hour, we hugged him and thanked him for telling us the things he told us. When we drove away...we didn't know what to do. We went to some friends' house and let them know what Pete had told us. I didn't feel comfortable being the only two people who knew about this. So we told our trusted allies and we went home.

Over the few weeks I gently coached Pete that he should turn himself in and he agreed. During this time, however, Pete started drinking again. He began getting in trouble with people and he was calling our house late at night with strange requests and threats. He would leave drunken messages on our answering machine cussing us out and then telling us he loved us and then telling us he was going to kill himself. Things were getting out of hand and I was sitting with Pete's confession in the pit of my stomach. I didn't want to turn Pete in...I wanted Pete to turn Pete in. While God forgives us even the most evil transgressions we still have to be accountable to the law. I sat on it for a few more weeks. Things got even worse.

I found out that Pete had been getting rides to different places from young women. He also spent Christmas with some friends of ours who have 4 kids. They had no idea what Pete had done. The final straw came for me when I found out that Pete was going to stay at the friend with 4 kids' house when he got kicked out of his apartment.

I called my father-in-law. He's a judge. I asked him what I should do and he gave me the steps to turn Pete in to the authorities. Allison and I had to go and tell our story to the Norwood Police and they had to investigate it further. Everything checked out and they solved an open case. Pete had indeed killed a man 8 years ago. They arrested him and He's now in prison.

You can read a small bit of news story here ----> 1998 Norwood Murder

I don't know how to end this post. I still feel so icky about what happened. I haven't been in contact with Pete since he was arrested. I was told it wasn't a good idea and that's given me a great excuse not to face him again. I feel not right about that part.

I know I had to do what I felt was right at the time. I've replayed it over in my head a thousand times and I'm not sure what I would do differently if it happened again.

That's all I got...I'm officially wiped out.

Below is a video project of people ages 1 to 100 drumming a drum. I'm not really sure why, but I feel a wide range of things when I see it. It conjures up many thoughts really. The humanity. The diversity. The shortness of life. So many stories.

I cleaned my aquarium the other day. We were having a party and it looked a bit on the disgusting side. Ever since I worked for an aquarium maintenance company a couple years ago, I've had a hard time keeping my own little piece of indoor ocean clean. Rebellion? Laziness? Yes.

Whenever I clean my aquarium it causes me to think about odd things related to it. For a moment, I think about the inconsiderate and mindless ways in which I pulled together a few thousand dollars to get it. I worked my butt off, but I also stole, lied, and cheated my way into owning that aquarium. I look at it's beauty and I remember the person I was. And then I look at it for a few more seconds and I remember the Jesus who came to forgive me and restore me...thank you Lord Jesus. Thank you for leaving the ninety-nine to come and get me.

Looking at a beautiful saltwater aquarium also brings up some really offbeat memories. I can distinctly remember the first time I laid eyes on a marine aquarium. It was brilliant blue with bright orange Clownfish and gorgeous Anemones. There were Blue Hippo Tangs and amazing corals ebbing and flowing in the current. My face was glued to the glass as I watched the Volitan Lionfish prowl through the crystal clear water. I was hooked. At that very moment, even though I was only 9 or 10 years old, I vowed to myself that when I was older I would own one of these marvels. This amazing and majestic mini-ocean was sitting in a man named Phil's basement.



Phil was bi-sexual. I say that because I am certain that he was "with" my mother and I am also certain he was "with" other men. I'd rather not go into the details. Phil was one of the random scumbags whom my mom would drag my sister and I to stay with. To this day I still have no idea how she met these people. She would go over there to get drunk or high while my sister and I would try to keep ourselves entertained. Phil was one weird dude. I remember he always gave me the creeps and I never wanted to go over there. My dad would go to work and during the summer mom just took us wherever she went. We would tell her we didn't want to go over there and she would convince us that it would only be for a little while and she would buy us something or take us somewhere we wanted to go. Many times a couple of hours would turn into a couple of days and World War III would take place when dad finally found us. It was a mess.

As strange as this Phil character was, he didn't hold a candle to Dave. Dave lived directly across the street from Phil. Dave had a repugnant house that made me want to vomit every time I was in it. It smelled of urine, tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, and death. There was garbage everywhere. He had two gigantic Great Danes and a sofa/love seat combo that were covered in thick plastic. You wouldn't want the furniture to get all messed up in a fancy place like that now would you?

Dave's pinnacle of weirdness was achieved in the form that he wasn't Dave anymore. Dave had become Rebekkah. Dave saved up his money and had a sex change operation and was now a nasty ugly man with woman parts. Dave's candy...excuse me, Rebekkah's candy was Cocaine. He/She had little brown vials of cocaine all over the place and my sweet mum liked the same kind of nose candy as DavBekkah. I'm not entirely sure, but all signs point to DavBekkah being a cocaine dealer. Both Phil and Dave had children...oh how I'm praying for them right this second.


I believe the most insane memory I have of Phil and DavBekkah would have to be the night my mom had some sort of overdose at DavBekkah's house. As I try to remember to the best of my ability I see myself as being 11 years old. There was some sort of freak party going on and I was supposed to be with my dad. Mom said she was taking me over to his apartment, but we were going to stop at Rebekkah's house first. Mom and dad were divorced by this time and they hated each other a good bit. Dad got custody of me and mom got custody of my sister Amie. I was sentenced to spend every other weekend with my mom. Although I tried to make the most of it each time, there was anguish and a sense of impending doom rising up in me each time dad dropped me off.

Minutes stretched to hours at DavBekkah's house and I continually tugged on my mom telling her we had to go. The next time I came in the room to request our departure my mom was laying on the floor with white vomit pooled under her face. She was passed out and did not look okay. She would shake every now and again and I was freaking out. I remember they wouldn't let me use the phone and I was cussing at them.

All I wanted was my dad, he could make this better I thought to myself. Or at least be a sane person to talk to. I didn't know what was wrong with my mom. I'd seen her passed out many, many times, but this was different. I found my mom's keys in her jacket pocket and I dragged her outside and shoved her into the car. This was a lot of work for a boy my size. I took a deep breath and I started the car. I knew how to get to me and my dad's apartment from there...it was only 5 or 10 minutes away. I weighed the benefits and the consequences out in my mind. I thought about what would happen if I got pulled over by a police officer and I remember I was so mad at my mother I knew I could place all the blame on her. So we drove.

I couldn't see over the steering wheel, but I could see through it. I drove straight to my dad's house and by this time it was 11 or 12 at night. There was hardly any traffic out...I remember this because ever car I saw was an anxiety attack in my mind. I drove 2 exits down the interstate and within a couple more minutes I was pulling into my familiar little apartment complex. Oh how happy I was to see that complex. We pulled up and I noticed that my dad wasn't home. He and my sister were probably out at my uncle's or something...I can't remember. I do remember that I started to drag my mom into the apartment and I decided against that. I left her in the car to sit in her vomit and I went inside. I sat there and cried for a while waiting on my dad to get home and I fell asleep on the couch.


I don't know why I didn't call 911 or drop my mom off at the hospital. I guess I didn't really know how bad that could have been. She could have died that night. The next morning and abstract time period after that incident have all become very blurry to me. I can't quite focus in on what transpired of all that nonsense later on...there had to be consequences for some of it.

I have no resolve or moral of the story for the end of this post. I can tell you that I am alive, my family is alive, some of them more alive than others, and I'm filled with joy because Christ lives in me. Jesus is the opposite of those things I remember and that gives me even more hope for the future. I heard a few years back that Phil died of AIDS. I am unsure about DavBekkah as that was the last time I ever saw him/her. Pray for these people...God is big enough to restore.

Jeremiah 29:11 says, "For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you not to harm you. Plans for hope and a future."

Amen to that.

I'm one of those people who has suppressed a lot of my childhood memories.

The thought of that statement annoys me. I never wanted to be someone with fractured thoughts and memories, but the more I look around inside my brain the more it's become apparent that I've got compartments to be unlocked.

Even when I try hard to focus on the past, I cannot think back to before I was four years old. I've got a couple of memories during that time, but most of my recollection comes in from the time I was five to now. There are many breaks in between though. Sometimes I takes a person mentioning something that has happened or some random tidbit that will spark a conjuring of thoughts.

Allison told me a story the other day about an owl that her dad found in the yard. It was rather large, and in my estimation probably a Barn Owl. It died mysteriously and landed on his property. This caused a flicker in my brain and I began to remember a field trip I went on in the second grade. I would have been seven years old and during this time my mom would have been a full-blown alcoholic as well as a drug addict.

She wasn't addicted to crack cocaine yet. Crack wasn't that well known on the drug scene in 1989. Marijuana, and "White Crosses", which were amphetamines, were a a daily devotional. Mom would smoke, snort, or gag down anything you put in front of her. Needles didn't fit her style though so that form of Heroin was out. Everyone's got boundaries.

Dad worked for Coca-Cola as a beverage systems specialist and things were rocky at the workplace by now. Mom's alcohol and drug related shenanigans proved to be too much for a regular work schedule. He and mom had already lost the house and the car due to reckless lifestyles and an inability to conform to adulthood. They were party people and they were bad with money. That combo removed us from a nice bi-level in the suburbs to a $300-a-month dilapidated trailer. Oh how I don't miss that place.

I woke up the morning of the big field trip and I was so excited! Dad had taken me to lots of parks and nature preserves, but there's something about a class field trip that gets you all keyed up to solve the world's problems. You're a better human being the morning you wake up for a field trip. You don't have to do actual school work and you get to explore something new...what could be better? Breakfast perhaps. That would have been too much though.

Dad was off to work and mom's sole responsibility was to get me to school to catch the field trip bus. We would be heading to Governor Bebb Preserve to explore some old village and take the lay of the land. It was going to be great. We were going to check out their little wildlife sanctuary and have a picnic and make pioneer toys and learn about different cultures.

Mom wouldn't wake up though. I was awake. Of course I was awake, I was charged for my upcoming adventure. But I couldn't wake my mom up. She just wouldn't get up. I shook her and I yelled and I pleaded and I just couldn't get her to wake up. This happens sometimes when you have an alcoholic/drug-addict parent. You miss days of school ever now and again because they are sick. This happens sometimes. It's expected sometimes and it's not surprising, but it can't happen on the day of the field trip!

I'll be attempting to create the best lasagna ever tonight for my men's group.

I often think about how ridiculous it probably sounds that I'm in a men's group. What kind of group is this? Do you guys participate in naked drum circles in the woods? Is it some kind of a support group? Are you not telling us something about your sexuality?

Ah yes...all of the above. Haha. Truth is, I can't even imagine life without a group of guys meeting with me on a regular basis. It's so hard to do things alone...and often we don't even realize how alone we really are. It is possible to be very alone even in a large crowd of people.

I love the fact that I can consistently expect people I know to show up and be there for each other...whether it's to really help me through something rough happening in my life or if it's just to blow something up and laugh like little girls. I can count on these guys. If I have to call one of them at 3am to get me out of jail I know that they would. That's a good feeling.

If you don't have people like this in your life I would seriously consider asking yourself the question of how to get some good people around you.

I'm working at the hobby shop today. I almost crashed a radio-controlled helicopter into my own face. It was a close call but, I'll be okay.

I’m almost home. It’ll only be a few more hours and I can finally see my babies. I can’t wait to hug and kiss them until it’s annoying. I can’t wait to spend as much time as possible with them until they’re totally sick of me.

This last week has been fairly incredible. I was able to see so many things for the first time and I was also reminded of so many things that I needed to be reminded of. I’m going to miss the Doan’s and all the new people that I met. It’s truly something amazing when you let down your guard and you invite people into your life. If you do it right and you are able to make a connection, they just might invite you into theirs.

Cheers Vancouver. It was fun while it lasted. I’m pretty sure you’re not for me but, I know you’re totally right for so many who call you home.

I’m so glad that I took this week to do something different. I don’t want to be that guy from Cincinnati who has never traveled outside of the tri-state. It’s so funny to think about so many people I know who have never really gone anywhere, never really done anything. I don’t want to be locked away in a little box.

While I am a homebody, I think I have found that I can adapt really quickly to whatever is thrown at me. I can make a home out of a strange place pretty quickly. There are a lot of strange places out there...so I guess I never have to worry about feeling too far from home.

Please do not let me forget the things that I’ve learned and seen. Use me.

I've been reading a book called Holy Discontent by a Pastor named Bill Hybels. It's pretty decent. It definitely has me trying to figure out what my "holy discontent" is personally.

What is it that brings me a firestorm of frustration? I'm not sure.

I've got lots of things that frustrate me. There are so many topics out there that get me fired up, but I'm unsure of the area with which I should focus. I'm kind of the guy who tries to help make something better in whatever area needs help. I step in, I try my hand at improving it, and then I move on. Sometimes I make things better and sometimes I find out that I suck at certain things.

One thing I suck at is figuring out my holy discontent.