It hardly seems fair sometimes, this life we lead.  As I’ve mentioned before, this last month has been so crazy, I almost can’t believe it.
It’s been 3 days since I’ve been able to find a place to go online, 3 days since I’ve eaten anything, and approximately 3,000 miles of driving.

When I last blogged, I mentioned how I was going to watch part of our service online when Carie and I arrived into Birmingham, Michigan (a suburb of Detroit) from Fremont, Ohio.  We were attending church at my grandfather’s church and had about 15 minutes of viewing time before I had to pack it up and head to service.

So I looked up all the Panera Breads on our route and found that there was one on our path.  This good news brightened my day.  And as I drove toward my destination, I noticed that there was a section ahead on Southfield Rd. in Southfield, Michigan without power.  “Poor peeps,” I thought to myself, knowing the horrendous nature of being without power in these wintrous days.

And then I realized that the Panera Bread I needed to use was also devoid of electricity.  We had to drive another 10 minutes out of our way to join Fellowship for about 8 minutes.

After service and a delightful lunch with my grandparents, Carie and I headed back to Indiana where my parents live.  Another 5 hour drive that turned into 6 because of an accident on the freeway.

On Monday, Carie and I developed two different kinds of sicknesses.  This was hard because we couldn’t really take care of each other, though we tried.  Almost the entire day was spent on the couch attempting to not get more sick than we had been.  “Please God.  Please?”

Tuesday marked our travel day home from Indiana to Massachusetts.  Carie’s health improved, and mine grew worse, keeping me from eating anything except seven french fries to test my future.  We arrived home at 11:00pm on Tuesday night, making our trip about 13.5 hours long.  We were overjoyed to be home in Massachusetts.

And this morning, I awoke cheerful and ready for the day, with only a bit of hunger panes, and …alone.

Carie awoke about 2 hours earlier and she could hardly talk or walk and had been hit hard with the flu bug that she’d been flirting with for the last several days.  Currently I’m trying to take good care of her, but I’m not a good cook, and my own hunger is pretty ravenous.

I say all this to share with you two things:

First, our open invitation New Years Eve Party we are having tonight has been cancelled.  Carie and I have hosted a party every year since 2002-2003, but the sickness this year, compounded by the snow, has devastated the party plans, and we just cannot have it this year.  My apologies to those who were attending, and I hope you have a safe and happy New years!

Second, despite all the stuff that has happened, and despite my focusing on all the negative stuff via my posts (really just because they make for better stories), I am quite confident that God is amazing, and that in 2009 in my life and in the life of the Holmans and Fellowship Church, He is going to use us to bring in His Kingdom!

“Thank You God!  Thank You!”

All year, one of the coolest things about my team at Fellowship has been their ability to step up and get the job done in my absence.  The person speaking has done a phenomonal job, and nothing suffers as I leave to go away for the weekend.

I love what our church is becoming and I’m quite pumped about watching tomorrow mornings service online at http://fellowshipholden.com.
Jeff Campbell will be addressing “Elevating Community” and the band will rock the hizzy!

So for those of you Fellowshippers who are reading this, enjoy Sunday’s service, and I can’t wait to see you all next week!

Peace!

Carie and I are travelling for Christmas to Indiana where my parents and most of my family live.  In spite of the craziness that marks life in December 2008 Massachusetts, we decided to make our way west.  We considered cancelling the trip more than once, but I started and brainstormed  an idea to have a Facebook school reunion at my alma mater for the 27th of December and figured it would be in poor taste to back out now.

Travelling west felt like desertion of my friends and chrch family members who have gone through so much over the last two weeks.  I’m sure there have been places and times in history and even in recent history where people have gone through worse, but from a devastating ice storm that knocked trees around like javelins to the twin snow storms this last weekend, more than one person I know have gone through dynamic trials.  Even as recently as Tuesday (Christmas Eve Eve) two families I know from Fellowship had been without power since two Thursdays prior.

So Carie and I departed Massachusetts on Tuesday afternoon after her knucklehead school decided to “rough out” the remainder of the school year.  (I know I’ll be happy about that in June, don’ t remind me)  Our trip was great for the majority!  No problems.  No major traffic issues.  And all was well.

When I gave up my driving seat to Carie late in the evening, I decided to take a quick nap as we headed toward our final destination for the evening, Erie Pennsylvania.  Before I napped, Carie mentioned that there were several sand trucks out, and she wondered if they were looking for a storm ahead.  When I woke up, I received a text from Phil Kenney, admonishing me to drive safely.

The odd thing about this text was that he sent it quite late.  If I know anything about Phil and his wonderful wife, Leslie, I know that they go to bed early most nights.  So now it was my time to wonder:

Did our final hour have poor weather in our future?

Sure enough, about a half hour outside of Erie, the roads transformed into a slushy ice skating rink, and speeds of 65-75 became 25-35 in 1.6 seconds.  This transformation, coupled with my GPS placing me in the wrong part of Erie, made for a final hour of hysteria on the part of the Holmans.

Discouraged and tense, we arrived at our hotel safely around 2am.

I have been pondering a post about my lack of Christmas spirit this year, (with  both good and bad ideas throughout) but this adventure, coupled with what we’ve already experienced in weather, tipped the scales a bit.

I have more I’d like to write, but alas, I must go.

Please give me  a Christmas gift of reasons why you are in the Christmas Spirit this year.

By the way, as I’ll explain later, please don’t mistake my lack of Christmas spirit for negativity.  I’m actually feeling quite positive about most things right now, just not in a Christmas like way.

Bible passage – Haggai
I really dig this book and have enjoyed reading it over and over. Not to mention looking into the history of the Jewish prophet.  Can you pronounce his name?

Book – Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
Ever wonder why Two people can have an equal amount of intellectual brilliance or have an equal portion of athletic prowess, yet, one is “successful” in their careers and one is not?  Read this book and find out.

Music – Mike Dunn and the Kings of New England
I heard about this band from my boy in Atlanta (ironically enough) Dave Huey, and love their sound!  Good stuff.

Times of solitude
If you know me, you know I like to be around people and entertainment.  This little storm we’ve gone through in Massachusetts has allowed me to learn the value of getting away from the noise and spending lots of time in solitude.

Carie
There’s nobody cooler in the whole world than my wife Carie.  She’s amazing!

I saved the best for last.

This has been the craziest week.  I’m trying to recover from an ice storm, and especially no internet.   I think I’m a carrier of bad luck even.

This morning I drove to my ne favorite place to hang out to study and write and read.  This week’s message focuses on the book of Haggai in the OT, and I’ve been thrilled to be able to do some research and study on some of the insights this prophet offers to the people of Israel.

Anyways I drove to my new favorite place called “Jumpin’ Juice and Java” (from here on out, I’ll affectionately call it “Triple J”) and parked my car.  The ice on the path didnt agree with me though, and I slipped and fell. It was kind of embarassing, but not as embarassing as the time in 8th grade I hit a 3 pointer, jumped up and down in celebration, and then strode backwards all by myself with a “how you like me now?” smirk, only to fall on my butt so hard I had a bruise for days.

Then I walked into the Triple J ready to do some work, complete with a chai tea (usually ice, but probably hot today), but the computer wouldn’t take my card.  The cashier was friendly and apologetic, saying it was not my fault, it was theirs.  Unfortunately I didn’t have any cash, so I meekly asked if they had an atm, to which the employee answered, “I don’t know.”

“Ummm, ok,” I said to myself, and thinking to myself, “How does one not know whether there is an atm in there place of business?”

So no big deal, a friend of mine would be joining me soon anyways, I’ll sit down and enjoy the internet.  What?  No internet?  The computer problem equals no internet.  That does not bode well for a sweet business that gets a lot of its business from people using lap tops.

So I read and studied, which was awesome.  Thanks Haggai!  And thanks Charter for now ruining the internet at my home, my church, and now, my Triple J.

I’m really thinking that my problem is not bad luck, but I do think I should probably stop reading the “Twilight series” and getting all of Bella’s bad luck.

What?  Did I just tell the world I’m reading those?  It’s Carie’s fault.

I’m in a new coffee shop in Worcester,and there’s this lady that looks just like Ron’s mother, Mrs. Weasley, in “Harry Potter” and her accent sounds amazing! So I thought I’d use the new quickPress feature on Wordpress 2.7 and tell you.

Thanks for reading me.

The last several days have been an incredible whirlwind here in the Northeast. A million people have lost power, which means they’ve lost heat, and many have been without water as well.  Here’s the Lowdown:

Thursday night brought hard rain with 31-33 degree tempreatures, causing ice to form around every piece of grass and every branch of every tree (including bushes).  After driving home from an amazing concert, Carie and I were wet and cold and tired, inspiring us to hit the sack.

I woke up at 4:00 am the next morning to no electricity, and the sound of crashing trees every 5 minutes or so.  It didn’t help to look outside, because there were no lights to be able to see anything.  Looking out a window meant looking into blackness, and simply hearing the sound of crashing.  Very intimidating indeed.

On Friday morning, Carie’s school hadn’t cancelled school yet (the “super” has the same reputation as a baptist pastor in the midwest on a Sunday morning when it comes to cancellations), so I told Carie I’d go out and put some gas in the car for her, and in the process let her know if the roads were safe enough to go to her school, a 25 minute drive through backoads and lots of trees.

I thawed the car out (oddly enough the pavement on the driveway and on the roads were fine) and backed out, eventually taking a right out of the driveway.  I drove approximately 10 feet before I could no longer drive through the large tree branches draped across the roads, not to mention the power lines daring me to “see if I was man enough.”

I was not.  I backed up back into my driveway, then decided to take a left toward Holden.  I drove approximately 20 feet before I could no longer get through the trees.  (yes, there were literally trees across th road)  I told Carie that I was her new superintendant, and pronounced school to be cancelled.  Any other day this would have been a day of glorious celebration, but the house was already getting a bit chilly at this point, so it was time for further decisions.

Friday night we, like so many other families in Ct, Mass, NY, NH, and Maine, left our house which was devoid of electricity and heat, and headed into Worcester.  For whatever reason, the large city in our vicinity had major pockets of electricity, and Carie’s mother lived in one of those pockets.

Friday night a pastor from Connecticut, only about 30 minutes from Fellowship, called me, and asked me via voicemail why I never answer my phone.  I was only mildly amused at his  humor.  I called him back on Saturday morning, and he explained to me about some event he was having at his church in January.  Then he asked me how I was doing.

“Ummmm”, I said slowly.  “I’m in the midst of a major problem where no one has any power in the whole of my town, and we’re looking for shelter and tree removal help.  People are freezing, and a lot of people can’t get out of there driveways.”

“Oh”, he said shocked.  “I had no idea.”

Then on Saturday afternoon Carie and I helped prepare some food at a shelter in Princeton, an area that was hit particularly hard, and when we returned to our house, our power had returned, 40 hours after it removed itself from our presence.  We rejoiced, then made arrangements for church.

Church on Sunday morning was quiet, though we had about half our attendance.  Few in Holden and the surrounding areas knew that we had church, because email was non-existent.  Phone calls were made, but not everyone could be reached.

But we utilized our service as an opportunity to connect people and resources.  On Sunday evening, we had sent out meals to shelters and fire departments around the area.

An amazing thank you should go out to all the power company and tree removal workers who have worked tirelessly and throughout days and nights to get people’s electricity back on and ultimately there heat.

But I’m writing this to let you know, there are still tens of thousands of people who do not have heat and electricity and we are going into a weekend of 10 degree temperaures.  As some friends of mine said once,

Much prayer, much power.  Little prayer, little power.  No prayer…

Marty is sitting on the beach, thinking about all the people who have wronged him in his lifetime and then sharing with everyone else how horrible thse people are via my status messages.

I love it when people use their twitters or the status in their Facebook messages to make a passive aggresive statement that something or someone needs to change.   It’s like, “I’m going to let you know what you are doing that makes me so mad, I can’t even stand it, but I’m not going to actually tell you.  What I’m going to say is :

_____________ hates it when people talk about me behind my back.  They are stupid.

or

______________ doesn’t like people meddling into his life.  Stay out, and I’ll stay out of your life.

Thankfully no one that I know of has written these referring to me, but I have seen them, and everytime I do, I think…

“Man, that person’s got issues.”

This week at Fellowship Holden, we’re going to be talking about the noise in our lives, and how it keeps us from hearing the message of Christ.  The noise is everywhere.  Sometimes it seems as though you can’t shut it out.  So let’s try to list all of the things that constitute noise in our lives.  I’ll start, then I’m going to need your help.

Music – This is a huge one for me.  I listen and listen and listen, until I can’t stay in silence any more.

Television – Gotta have my DVR!

Blogs – I suppose blogs are a visual representation of noise.

All right, your turn.  What’s the noise in your life?

I’m quite proud of my dad.

He made his town paper this last week because he travelled with a group from his church to Hong Kong to share his faith.  Here’s the big write up from December 8th.

Check out this message my dad preached at our church on November 30th.  It’s the first message on the page, and it starts (unfortunately) two minutes after it “starts”.

When was the last time you were “in the paper”?