world’s first bearded super hero

Having spent all of four weekends back here in College Station at my beloved church, Living Hope, this weekend the powers that be decided it was time to put me back in a skit. I’ve been in a handful of skits at the Hopester over the past few years, but only once have I played a super hero. This was super hero week.

I was “Trial Man”, the superhero who swoops in to your everyday situations to alert you that you’re currently in the midst of a trial. The kind of trials that James talks about in the 1st chapter of his best-selling book. How does Trial Man warn unsuspecting believers that a trial is coming, you ask? Well it’s not by words. I have to work my way up to the point of playing skit characters with lines. See the air horn in his right hand? That’s how he warns the masses.

A brief note on the costume: It’s pretty simple. All you need is the outfit you wore to church, a yellow shirt with a “T” on it, a pair of XL Sponge Bob boxer shorts, a red cape, and (this is important) a piece of poop slice of red fabric with two eye holes in it for the mask. It needs to fall apart more and more as you make your way through three services.

You’re probably thinking, man, D.O., that’s great. I’m glad to see you’re involved in the children’s ministry at your church, I bet those kids thought you were a riot. Well thanks for the encouragement, but no, this wasn’t a kid’s church skit character… Trial Man was for big church. This was the skit for the adults. Only at Living Hope…

[Edit 09.17.07: Photograph's background was necessarily changed from a skit closet to an American flag. Keep that in mind when reading comments. Thanks, odfm mgmt.]

olives part 3?

I think this is the third installment of my “olives” series, but I wasn’t entirely sure, hence the question mark. While I’m prefacing the post, just a reminder, I’ve now entered in to code-mode in my blogging, and you should too. That way I won’t get kicked out of China any time soon after I get there.

Right around the time I was refreshed in College Station, I had also made my mind up that I would no longer be going to the club I’d been going to. You recall, the one that I made mention of in olives part one and all the club’s minions came out to post comments on the blog they’d never previously read? You know? You good on what club is? LHBC is one if you’re still confused. Good? Great.

Also around that time Father had put a small handful of people in my life in very random and essentially non-eventful ways, and each of these humans were pointing me to the same place: Highland Park Presb Club. Well this was an easy club for me to reject right off the bat simply because of it’s location. I’m not a big fan of HP. Haven’t been ever since high school when I competed against their gymnastics team and realized that their men’s coach was a jerk.

Nevertheless, I bit the bullet and visited. While listening to the announcement portion of the meeting, I learned that they had a 40 Hour Haying event coming up. (Oh, not sure about “haying?”… change the “h” to a “pr”… and that was your last hint). I figured that any club that was willing to let their visionary young people set up a tent in the front yard of a HP neighborhood was okay with me. I went ahead and signed up for a time slot for the tent. I showed up and suffice it to say, I had a good time hanging out with Father. He’s a good Dad, and He likes it when we hang out with him. The tent pictured above is the tent of which I’m speaking, in case you were curious.

So say all that to say, I now find myself regularly attending and getting involved in a club at which I never in my life thought I’d be. Not a big HP fan, and not a big denom…tion fan, but that’s where Father’s lead me. He is, quite certainly, one of the weirdest dudes I know. But He’s good, and He’s got good plans for us, so even when he tells us to do weird stuff (or at least what we think at the time to be weird), if He’s telling us to do it, we can trust He knows what He’s doing… because He does.

olives, part two

Be warned: This post probably won’t be funny (which I’m sure you’re used to by now) and long. Just pretend like you’re at the Hendrick blog and that you need to set aside 20 minutes to read a single post.

Some of you may recall the post entitled “olives.” If you don’t remember, and don’t feel like clicking the link to remind yourself, suffice it to say it was a honest reflection and lamentation of my search for a local church here in Dallas. I named a particular church in that post that I will repeat here because apparently said church’s members frequently browse the web looking for mentions of their church on google’s blog search. I gathered this little gem of information when I received no less than three posts from total strangers that went to that particular church. Now, by not repeating the name of the church, I can accidentally say something that may be interpreted as negative and not get in trouble, because nobody (other than a true reader) will know what I’m talking about.

I was asked by a guy tonight what church I attend, and I was unable to answer other than saying that I’m not sure yet. He asked if I’ve been shopping around (not a phrase I’m particularly fond of in referring to churches) and I retorted back that, in line with the shopping analogy, I was shopping for something in particular and going to every store that I can imagine would possibly have it, and finding out after looking around every aisle that in fact, that store doesn’t have what I’m looking for either.

So a logical question would be, what’s on my “shopping list”… like how I’m staying on the very analogy I dislike?

Well being the critical mess that I am, my list is pretty long. However I also feel like I’m a realist, and I know that no church will ever meet all the requirements I dream up; even if I planted it myself. Some core bullet points on my shopping list are a church that is:

- Biblical (which isn’t too much to ask)
- Alive (which is biblical) and
- Actually making a difference in it’s community (also biblical, the way I read Scripture)

So that’s that. My little list that goes unsatisfied week after week.

I’ve been going to the church from the “olives” post pretty consistently for weeks now. Not because I think it fully meets any of the things on my list, but because I am so hungry for community that I’m essentially settling for a church that isn’t heretical, one that allows me to meet with Jesus even if the people sitting around me aren’t.

In a week I’ll be attending this church’s membership class. I decided tonight that the membership class for most churches is a thing where you go and listen to the staff tell you what they want you to think that their church is all about. I imagine it’s also where they tell you what they actually want the church to be about. I’m afraid, however, that it can easily take a year or more of actually attending and serving in a church to find out what it truly is about. So next week I’m going to sit through a three hour program telling me the first part of this process, and some time later I’ll decide if I want to be a part of pursuing the rest.

I’m having a very hard time right now trying to decide if I’m being too critical – like the girl who wants a boyfriend so bad but all she sees is each boy’s faults – or if I’m actually going about this the way Jesus wants me to. I know that He has very big plans for his bride, and that He wants her to look a certain way. I’m also quite confident that I don’t fully have a grasp on what that bride is supposed to look like. I’m pretty sure I think I’ve got a better idea than I really do. That right there, the doubting myself on my whole approach to this situation, is what brought me to sign up for the membership class. That and my unquenchable hunger for a group of believers who I can love and who will love me and we can all just spur each other towards Jesus.

That’s what I want so badly.

That’s what I need. The Bible says so. It is not good for man to be alone.

That’s it for now. If you read this far, God bless you you sweetheart.

Stay tuned for the continued olives saga.

olives

[insert picture of olives]

Three months into this Dallas gig, and I’m still an orphan when it comes to churches. I really wish that my opening statement only applied to me, and not to the countless other people to whom I’ve spoken since I’ve been here. Scores of people are in the same boat I am, living in a new place, and missing the church family they grew to deeply love back in their college towns. Some of my boat-mates have been in it up to three times longer than I have. This is a problem.

I’ve visited a number of churches since moving to Dallas. There are no shortage of churches to visit here, as I’m sure you can imagine. I’ve been to some that are big, some that are small. Some that emphasize community, some that emphasize relevancy. Some that are firmly founded in Biblical principles and others whose pastors forgot to use the Bible in their entire sermon. Some with sound theology and some with… well… questionable theology.

As of late I’ve been visiting Watermark Community Church. At first I was hesitant of this particular body because upon reviewing every single line of their entire website, I learned that they were building a new facility to accommodate their growth, and that the building was to include a coffee shop. For some reason I’ve never liked coffee shops that were built in churches. I’m sure I’ve got some decent reasons for my dislike of said shops (perhaps one being that I don’t even like coffee), and I’m sure that many of the churches who’ve included shops on their campuses have good reasons too.

My second week at Watermark the guy sitting next to me learned that I was a visitor, and he immediately wrote down his email address and encouraged me–genuinely, not obligatorily–to contact him if I ever wanted to go to church with someone as opposed to flying solo. (Now keep in mind that I don’t really fly to church, I drive in my car. If I flew to church every week, then my having a problem with the church putting in a coffee shop would be the least of my worries.) The single act of “Chewy” (that’s his nickname) giving me both a sincere invitation and an email address spoke volumes about the church. It really did. That kind of stuff should happen 1,500 times more than it does.

So after the service that week I filled out the ever-dorky visitor tab of the bulletin and put it in the tithe box for lack of other places to put it. I expected to hear back via a generic mass email or something within the week, but no such email ever found its way to my inbox. Tonight, three weeks later, I got a letter in the mail from Watermark with a hand-written note apologizing that the email failed to get to me. The girl who wrote the note actually printed the email and sent it snail mail style (which is certainly the first time I’ve ever received an email in my house mail box) with a note stating that she’d tried to send it before, but it continually failed to send. How’d that happen? Well apparently I have unintelligible handwriting, because Watermark thinks my name is Derrick Olives. They think my email is derrickolives@gmail.com, and they are wrong on both accounts. I am thankful that my last name is Oliver, and not Olives.

wow

I’m not going to write anything on this post. I’m going to post two pictures and label them, and let you talk amongst yourselves.

This is the pipe organ:

At this church:

NYC – conquered

As most of you know, I spent this past weekend in New York City with some close friends and perfect strangers. Well, really just one close friend, and five perfect strangers, but one of the strangers was the sister of the close friend… irrelevant. It basically boils down to this: six girls – not to be confused with the six chicks – were gracious enough to let me crash their New York party. We had high times at all of, but not limited to, the following: the Today Show, The Light in the Piazza, The Producers, Times Square, subways, Brooklyn Tabernacle, Empire State Building, and the village.

In debriefing the trip on our way back to College Station, I shared one of my favorite moments of the trip being the church service at the Brooklyn Tabernacle, where it just so happened that I was invited to be a part of the Brooklyn Tabernacle Men’s Chorus. Hilarious. That’s right friends, I sang up in the choir loft at the Brooklyn Tab.

Speaking of singing, my good friend Jessica Schmale and I tried out for American Idol during our time in the City. Granted, we were only singing for one of the three judges (Simon) and it wasn’t real Simon, it was wax Simon, but we tried out nonetheless. The outcome: Jess made it, and Simon hated me.

There are many other stories and pictures associated with this trip, but instead of giving everything to you on the internet, which is far too easy and impersonal, I’ll take the liberty of developing my pictures and remembering my stories, so if you’d like to see/hear, then you know who to talk to.

In conclusion to this very long post, I want to sincerely thank the sisters Schmale and co. for allowing me the privilege of joining them on this trip. It truly was a pleasure.

how blessed is D.O.?

well let me tell you. FYI, today marks the one week anniversary of my being back in these United States.

It’s also the Lord’s day, which means I had the great opportunity to go to the Lord’s house and worship Him with fellow believers. I actually also went to the service last night because a friend, Click, wanted to go (Click is my friends name, it’s not a link… you can click it, but it won’t do anything). In the time I spent at church so far this weekend (3 services), I’ve had 5 or 6 different people come up and tell me that they missed me and that it’s good to have me back, and they said it in the absolute most sincere way. About 4 families asked me to come over for dinner and tell them about my trip. I got to hug my pastor Butch and as we held each other he said, “it’s so good to have you back.” Also, many many people told me how they have been praying for me while I was gone. I was seriously just in awe of how amazing the Body of Christ is when it is working the way it was created to. I got to tell people about my trip, listen to them talk about their summers, and just be blown away by how unworthy I am to know these people, both young and old.

After the 11:00 service I went to lunch at, of course, Wendy’s. The blessings continued to pour out from the heavens as I walked in and half the staff erupted with excitement on seeing me. They said they had been talking about me the other day, and they missed me. Then one of the new staff members asked me where I went to church and where it was! The staff always sounds interested in going to church, but they’ve yet to come… I truly believe that some of them are going to come in the near future. God’s so good to use me to demonstrate His love, though I don’t come closing to doing it justice.

And above all, I’m overly blessed to have the Creator of the Universe love me perfectly as He does. Today I thought of the day in the future when I’ll be in His presence, and how He too may hold me in His arms and say, sincerely, “it’s so good to have you home.” Oh man. So tight. Now for a Sunday afternoon nap.