The Life and Times of a Worship Minister

Sermon this morning was a video sermon from One Prayer (usually a good idea). Preacher's been out of town for a few days. Amy and I got back in town last night about 11:00pm. That's all about normal.

Now the bad news: Got to church this morning, and the presentation computer was dead. Of course, we have no budget and no spare cash, so we didn't have a backup computer to swap in. So I was pretty much toast -- no video sermon, no preacher, no song lyrics. Not the morning I wanted to experience coming back from "vacation". Not the low-stress environment I was hoping for.

So, I sent Amy straight back home to grab my laptop, which had the sermon video on it. She brought it back, and I quickly wired it into the A/V system. Thank goodness, I still had the PowerPoint song lyrics on it from my days back at the Fairfax Church of Christ. (Thank you, Dan Cain, for the hard work building those!) So Amy quickly built a basic PowerPoint slide show for 2nd service during 1st service, and also one for the last half of 1st service. We felt pretty lost without our MediaShout rig though.

Long story short -- we all pulled through, the worship was good, though it felt pretty old school. But it looks like it's time I have another discussion with the elders about the need to have a well-defined, structured budget that provides a realistic view of our needs, as well as the close monitoring of our expenditures and spending habits. I'm going to need to purchase a pretty nice computer and software to fill our media rig, and I'm not sure we actually have the cash to do it (even though I pretty much never use my worship budget). We'll see how this goes. In the meantime, looks like it'll be PowerPoint on my laptop.

Hey everyone! A little news update -- The service that sent my daily twitter feed to this blog, LoudTwitter, went down hard while I was in Nashville, and the developer is as yet undecided whether or not he'll fix it. In the meantime, I'll be looking for alternative services to take care of this.

But rest assured, I'm still here! I haven't gone anywhere. As usual though, the best place to find me is on Twitter itself... http://twitter.com/jpaden (or follow @jpaden on Twitter).

Thanks! See you on the datastream!

• 22:25 Drat! Forgot to submit my timecard, and the gov't still uses paper ones. Looks like I'll be going 2 work tomorrow b4 heading 2 Nashville. #
• 22:27 Anyone going to the P&H recording know where on Lipscomb's campus we will be recording? Not sure where I'm supposed to go when I arrive. #

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• 09:29 Good morning, Twitterverse! I am now officially 30 years old. And somehow I've found renewed energy in today's 9am worship assembly! #
• 23:03 Had a great day today. @padenamy did a fantastic job with the party and the cake and everything. Love you, honey! #
• 23:07 God has blessed me with much today. Wonderful gifts (woohoo! a Wii!), a love offering from church, time with family, and maybe a new tenor! #

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• 10:41 Latest I've slept in a while. Doesn't help that I slept from 12:30-3:00, then didn't really sleep again until 6:30. Doggie = sick overnight. #
• 14:16 Puppy's feeling better it seems. @padenamy's out picking up my b-day cake for tomorrow's party at 3:00pm. And we're having dinner at 5:00pm. #
• 14:53 Taking one last look at the Victorious God stuff for Tuesday's recording. Then I start working on memorizing music for performance Thursday. #
• 22:16 Sad to say, by this time next week, we'll be arriving home from Nashvegas. Where did the time go??? #
• 22:24 I think I got all of my work done today. But as I predicted, there wasn't time for anything else, besides dinner. This is usual. #

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• 10:48 Hopefully today will be filled with classwork. I'm so far behind and don't have time to do it at home. Doing good so far today. #
• 19:58 twitpic.com/8f58v - Our dog sure does act like a cat sometimes... (and I like it!) #
• 20:32 Tried to trim puppy's nails again tonight. Didn't make much progress, and got a ripped up shirt out of the deal. #

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• 09:32 I think I've found my new fav thing on hot summer mornings... forget the coffee, I'll have a sweet tea when I stop at Mickey D's! #
• 09:40 Firedrill at work. Fun fun fun. Standing in the humid heat. #

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• 18:16 Just got the Kari Jobe CD for my birthday! And just finished ripping it to the file server. #
• 18:17 The album artwork on the Jobe CD is beautiful! Reminds me of one reason I still prefer CDs to digital downloads. #

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• 15:42 RT @andystanley: If YOU don’t know what it is you are dying to communicate, the audience certainly isn’t going to be able to figure it out. #
• 18:05 twitpic.com/84wum - New MSI Wind for @padenamy! And I'm happy because it came with a restore DVD, so I dont have to make a factor ... #
• 18:08 New MSI Wind for @padenamy! I'm happy cuz it came with a restore DVD, so I dont have to make a factory disk image! twitpic.com/84wum #
• 18:25 twitpic.com/84z10 - I get a present a day until my birthday! I love my wife! :-D #

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• 07:46 Up and ready for church early. I actually get to eat breakfast! Hoping today goes well. #
• 13:04 RT @shaunfitz: "All verbal announcements during church service need to be scripted! Too many words & minutes get lost/wasted!" #
• 20:52 Spent a lot of time on the phone with my parents and grandparents this evening. Happy Father's Day! #

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