Let wonder replace worry

Driving In the Darkness - A tale of one amazing night.

I am pretty much in the middle of a much needed end of summer vacation. 3 weeks in recovery mode after an incredible, but very busy summer.

Almost 2 weeks ago, I attempted something I've never done before. We were heading down to Salt Lake City to visit some of Nicole's family. Not knowing how Jax would do on the 950 mile (14 hour) trip, we decided I would drive through the night - leaving in the evening and arriving early the next morning.

How was it? Amazing. I would do it again in a second.

Some of my experiences during this night:

3:00pm Car is loaded and everyone is ready to go. We planned to leave at 5 - decide to leave now.

5:00pm Hit the only traffic we would experience. Changing from 405 to I-90 in Seattle. Another big advantage of driving through the night.

7:00pm Stopped for dinner. Nicole moved to the back seat with Jaxson to get some sleep.

8:00pm Alone in the front seat, hearing Elmo playing in the back as Jax was getting ready to fall asleep, I watch as the sun slowly sets in my rear view mirror as we drove southeast. It was an incredible sight.

9:00pm We enter the lonely roads of eastern Oregon. I watch as the first stars begin to appear. One at a time at first, then almost at once, a flood of light as the sky filled with millions and millions of stars.

11:00pm On the dark quiet roads of Oregon, the stars are even more majestic than they were just a couple of hours ago. They shine bright and encompass me as I look to the left and the right horizons, straight ahead, and straight up through the sunroof. I feel small.

12:00am We leave Oregon and enter even darker, more quite roads through Idaho. The moon is exactly straight to my left, out the drivers window. I spend the night keeping a close eye on it.

2:00am The first time I actually yawn. Still feeling strong though. Listening to podcasts, eating beef jerky, drinking coffee, and keeping a close eye on that sky.

3:00am Entering Utah. This hour is the toughest of the night. I soon realize we are no longer in Pacific Daylight Time, but Mountain. It is actually 4:00am. Not sure why, but the realization gives me new energy.

4:00am Those amazing stars I watched appear just a few hours before begin to slowly disappear. One by one, the sky begins to empty and the horizon in front of me begins to lighten. A new day has come. I appreciate it. I am grateful for it. I reflect on how ungrateful I can be every other day as I just roll out of bed. I thank God for it. More than once.

5:00am That amazing sun that gave me such a beautiful show in my rear view mirror at the beginning of the journey slowly peaks over the horizon in front of me. Once again, it puts on an amazing show. I debate with myself the sense of experiencing a sunrise or a sunset verses staring at the billions and billions of stars in the vast, never ending universe. 

6:00am We pull into Nicole's grandparents driveway. After saying hi and very quickly washing my face and brushing my teeth, I sleep.

Summer Plans

Things have been kind of quite around here lately. Blogging has taken on a completely different meaning to me in the past year or so. From the beginning (2004 here and even earlier in a couple of other places) my biggest joy in blogging have been the connections I've made with other youth workers. Now those connections are made through different avenues. Sharing life socially with ministry friends and family all over the world has become an integral part of my life-one I would not want to do without.

However, while the fun links and cool life updates have moved to other platforms, significant value still lies in writing & sharing in more than 140 characters.

So, this summer things will be picking up around here a bit. Some things I'll be writing about-

-For the second summer, I have a summer youth ministry intern working for me. Its been such a great experience and I have some thoughts for other youth pastors looking to hire an intern for the summer.

 -Next Tuesday, I am taking a big group of teenagers all the way across the country to the other Washington for DCLA. Pending a reliable internet connection, I'll be blogging daily about the content, speakers, reflections, and my honest opinions about the event. I am expecting big things and I believe Youth Specialties will deliver. I'll also have plenty of pics & video from my Flip Mino HD and my new iPhone 3GS

-The week after DCLA, I'll be the main speaker at Tall Timber Ranch for the 8th summer in a row. I'm getting so excited for it. I've got one message I wish I could deliver tomorrow. I'll have the Flip & iPhone along as well, so video & pics for sure and maybe even some audio clips of my talks.

-Nicole & I are planning on taking Jaxson on his first road trip later this summer. I'm not taking about a day trip down to Oregon. We're talking Arkansas, with many stops along the way. I'll be taking almost a month off through part of August & September. No doubt, there will be plenty of great stories to tell.

-Besides all of this, I've got a weekend retreat, speaking at several places, (including the National Church Librarian Conference-a little random, but I'm excited for it) and have a stack of books I'm going to get through this summer. This is sure to spark a couple of posts.

If you don't already, you can keep up on our family over at Nicole's blog.

Check in over the summer & see how its all coming along.

Thanks for taking the time-its a honor.

-Justin-

Double Cheeseburgers and Drivers Licenses

Getting a drivers license for a teenager here in Washington is a long process that can take years. They focus on learning and safety for months and months before letting you on the street.

Arkansas has a totally different situation. When I turned 14 I memorized answers in a book and took a test. Passing that, I had a permit that I could do some limited driving for 30 days. Then I went back, took the instructor for a 5 minute drive and was issued a license. It was restricted to only be use with a licensed driver until I turned 16. Then I was free to drive anyone anywhere.

Needless to say, teens here can't believe it when I tell them about that.

Driving also meant I had to get a job. For 2 years while I was in high school, I was gainfully employed at McDonald's.  I did everything during that a McDonald's employee can learn to do during that time and even landed jobs for a several of my friends.

Our best selling item by far was the .99 cent double cheeseburger. Once we raised the price to $1.19 and customers went crazy. It was back to .99 within a couple of weeks. Now 13 years later, I read an article online today saying that McDonald's is finally considering raising the price.

I bet this is one of the only things you could find that's price has not changed since the mid 90s.

People give McDonald's a bad name, but they are alright with me.

What did you do with your extra hour tonight?

Here is what I did:

Grateful for the extra time and surprised it only took a hour.

I've grown quite fond of this spider...

I first noticed him 2 weeks ago on an afternoon I needed to haul some equipment around town. This spider had made himself at home in the back of my truck. I pardoned the spider, destroyed the web, and went on with my haul.

The next morning he was back-and I was amazed at what I saw. This spider had rebuilt one of the most beautiful spider webs I have ever seen. I was so impressed, I decided to let him be. I figured the wind would take him away as I was driving down the road, or the rain would wash his web away.

That was almost 2 weeks ago. This spider has been all over town with me since then. I even found myself telling him 'good job' when I noticed he had a moth tangled in his web.

Now, it has rained all afternoon and evening and I've been tempted to go check to see if he is still there. (A temptation I have resisted by the way.)

I never imagined I'd find myself emotionally invested in a spider.

Not trying to make you jealous or anything...

This is what we look forward to during the rainy, gray winters- and we sure are enjoying it

Nicole's Garden

About 2 months ago Nicole came across 4 tomato plants and for our first time, we decided to try our hand at gardening.

Here is Jaxson and the plants the day she brought them home:

Now, just about 8 weeks later, here is where we are in the tomato growing process:

Although no tomatoes yet, we are pretty proud of ourselves.

This gardening thing is pretty fun.

Worship with a 5 month old

I guess I won't be praying the confession today.

Enjoying the Sunshine

Jaxson loves his sunglasses. He'll get mad if you take them off.

28

Happy Birthday!

Pretty hot for 8 months pregnant, huh?

We got our "pregnancy pictures" done today. Obliviously, this is not one of those. The photographer was much more creative than my "I guess you should stand in front of the fireplace" pictures.

I tried to talk her into pulling her shirt up for a belly shot, but she refused.