Mine is Around about Here

Poetry Club

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 12:55:00 +0000

Happily the temperature has gone up
Out performing the rest of this poor summer
Time to celebrate by sleeping in sweat
No air con in my room
I'm glad I have no lover
Girls sweat too. Yuk
Humidity breeds beds of bacteria
Time to celebrate by sleeping in sweat

Humilitas

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 12:40:00 +0000

On Australia Day I decided to read a book. I read this one. The whole thing. All 183 pages. I know, I'm pretty much a book reading demigod, the freak child of Socrates and Mrs Zeus. Aside from how awesome I am with my computer-like, pentium II speed of comprehension of words, the book was about humility which I didn't really need to know about. I read that book like I would read a book about thrifty home maintenance of secondhand washing machines, it's an interesting insight into a skill which is only important for those people who have much to be humble about.

Actually, surprisingly, it did feel relevant. For one, I had been struck during the week but how incredibly prideful and stupid I am. For two, my constant desire for recognition and glory is always tempting me to self-congratulations, which is especially tempting in the line of work that I'm in. Though I guess, pride is not exclusive to the arena of those who find themselves regularly standing in front of large groups of people.

The book is a pretty easy read. It's written in the style of a leadership book and it seems to be pitched at business leaders. I had just finished Great by Choice which is also a business leadership book (it was pretty fantastic by the way), so I felt like I was in the right genre frame of mind. It wasn't going hard on the Jesus stuff like a lot of Dickson's stuff (not that going hard on Jesus stuff is bad), though Jesus did make a solid appearance.

Dickson leads us through the history of humility as a virtue, gives the reader some historical examples, tells us why humility is a good idea and finally gives us ideas on how to be cultivating humility. One of the things that struck me reading the book is how much more you admire humble people over proud people. So I think to myself "I want people to think I'm great, I'm going to be humble", which seems like the wrong reason to cultivate humility. However Jesus did say if you want to be great you need to be a servant, so it's not as if it's wrong to strive for greatness through humility. But I guess it's a redefinition of greatness. Greatness is about not people thinking you're great, but being able to move beyond self-love and self-promotion and into other-centredness. That's where true greatness lies. Unfortunately I worry, were I ever to reach that greatness, I would be so humble and other-centred I wouldn't notice how great I am. The great humble person's dilema.

Still, I am convinced that humility is a better path than pride. When I'm self-obsessed and prideful, I will constantly be worried about how I am being received and how good I look in the eyes of others. Yet when I'm more concerned with other, and using my gifts, position, power and abilities for the benefit of others I'll be so concerned with others that I won't even worry about myself, I'll be at ease, the same thing I was striving for in my pride. It's an interesting flip, which seems counter-intuitive, but is also totally obvious.

It was a good book to read. Challenging, inspiring and not condemning and accusing. I know I've got plenty far to go on the journey towards humility. But I've at least read a book on the subject, so I'm probably at least a little bit more awesome for that, wouldn't you say?

Blessed Meeting

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 13:18:00 +0000

I went to bed last night feeling very blessed. Mainly because I'd had a youth leaders meeting that was really encouraging. The Bible/Pray/Hang-out seemed good, wholesome, and happily long. The planning bit seemed quick, efficient and solidly done. We got a good team of leaders and we kicked off with a good leaders meeting. So I went to bed feeing blessed.

Video of the Week: Hello/Inspirational Speech

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 12:55:00 +0000

This week's video is actually two videos. I tagged both of these throughout the week for video of the week, since they're thematically similar, here they are.

Enjoy.

Happy Halfversary 7D

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 12:35:00 +0000

Today is Australia Day.

It's also 6 months since I bought my camera. Me and her, we're getting pretty close. To celebrate, here are some photos I took. I was going to do a best of the last 6 months of photography, but I haven't really taken that many photos, it's mostly been video. So I'll just chuck up some photos from when Gem, Hannah and I went to the zoo in December.

You can enlarge any images by clicking on them.

Hannah likes to fraternise with the evil Galatic Empire.

You'll notice there are not many images of animals, this is because Hannah was much more interested in the gardens.

We did however see a turkey.

Gem and Han

This is in honour of it being Australia Day.

We had fun at the zoo.

If you want to see more of my photos, you can always visit Flickr.

Take Me Seriously

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 13:38:00 +0000

When I was 11 I was on the radio for a segment called "15 Seconds of Fame". People would ring up and do their amazing talent on the radio. I rang up because I did a wicked impression of a seagull. Wendy Harmer, the radio host, was very kind to me and suggested that the seagull might be trying to eat a chip. I didn't know what she was talking about.

I didn't win the competition.

It occurred to me just then that they probably didn't let me on the radio because of my wicked impression of a seagull but because I was young and cute. I'd never thought of that before. I'm feeling pretty devastated. I thought I was talented. Now I have to change my perspective on pretty much my entire childhood.

It hurts. When will people start accepting 11-year-old me for my abilities and not for my cuteness?

Crush

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 11:41:00 +0000

I have a celebrity crush on Andrea Allen.

I'm not quite sure she's a celebrity but she's in lots of Vimeo videos. If I met her I'd feel awkward and not know what to say.

If she googled herself she might find this. She might be offended that I'm not sure if she's a celebrity.

I hope she doesn't and isn't.

I don't like posting secrets on the internet.

Should have sent this in to post secret.

Flexible Hours

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 12:56:00 +0000

Yesterday I had my yearly review at work. I did pretty well. The boss a little upset that I use my speaking platform in schools to promote my line of dietary supplements to kids, but I think he understands, a man has to make a buck where he can. Other than that I think he was pretty happy with my performance.

One of the things that came up was a suggestion I made to be allowed to work from 10am-6:30pm. The official working hours for my workplace are 8:30am-5pm but over the last year we've been allowed to come in at 7:30/8am and work till 4/4:30pm. I have been doing this because, as a result of traffic, I only have to leave home 15 minutes earlier but I get to leave work half an hour earlier. However it's meant that I've had to be up at 6am every morning. While I try and get to bed by 10pm, I never succeed. If you have a look at the time I do my blog posts, it's usually around midnight (like tonight). So I've been getting less than 6 hours most nights of the week. I generally fall asleep at work in my chair and I'm pretty sure my productivity suffers when I'm asleep.

So I suggested the late start. Because I have a good boss, he was happy to let me test out the new working hours (I also gave him some free supplements, which may have made him more persuadable). I tried them today, and while I felt a little sad having to work till 6:30pm, I think I was more productive, I was less sleepy, and I really enjoyed the sleep in this morning. And I'm really happy that I could go to bed right now and still get a solid eight hours. Plus I got to have a night out and not worry about the time. So day one of the trial has been a success. We'll see how it goes. I won't keep reporting to you though because, well, I don't want to share all my personal information. Some things, like how a man's work hours trial progresses, should remain private.

Location Fixed

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 11:35:00 +0000

Tonight all the people who are currently involved in the church plant went to visit our preferred location. We wandered around, had a chat and a pray, and then went to the local RSL. They had $5.50 chicken schnitzel (ripper). We chatted and decided we all liked the place. So we now have a location. And it's very close to an RSL with cheap schnitzel! It's very exciting.

Tonight we officially moved from being a exploratory group to a core team. First item on the agenda was when we're going to be meeting each fortnight. Second item on the agenda was to ask for money. I gave my first offering talk. I think I did pretty well. I feel like if we're gonna be a church it's best to set the culture early and I want money. I am a visionary.

Actually I just told people they should open a bank account and start putting aside money the church so we have start up money. I'm hoping at least for each of the pastors to get a new car as a start up bonus.

So now that I've talked all about money. Let me say, I am actually really excited. I love that we now have somewhere to go. I love the group of people who are planting. I loved having everyone together for the first time, and I love that it was in the place are (God-willing) planting. I'm excited to see people come to know Jesus. I'm daunted by the magnitude of the task ahead. I keen to see Jesus work.

Hooray for the Kingdom. I hope it comes a bit more through this church.

Psalm 130

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 11:43:00 +0000

So I preached the sermon tonight. I didn't really talk much about shame. I did spend a lot of time talking about sin. Seeing as the Psalm talks about crying to God from the depths of sin, I thought I should first outline the depths of sin. That meant the first third of the sermon was spent hammering home the point "You are more sinful than you think you are." Which sounds bad, and it is, but I was talking about how we all deny God his glory and we don't really think our sin is as bad as it is. Rebellion against God, is not, in our opinion an offense that should be punished with and eternity in hell.

I spent the rest of the sermon hammering home "You are more loved that you can possibly understand." It was all about grace and God's non-condemnation of those who trust in him.

I got pretty nervous going into the sermon. Mainly because it was quite heavy, I didn't want to make people angry, and the sermon didn't have as many jokes or funny stories as normal. I was nervous only really for myself. It was silly but pride is a great motivator.

Finally I spent a few minutes having the church stand and wait on God. It was a bit charismatic, at least for our church. No one laughed or fell over, but that wasn't much of a danger. I felt like I wanted to get the church engaged in waiting to hear God speak. It may or may not have worked. But still, it was nice to do something different and a little out of the ordinary.

Anyway, I might post the sermon soon for anyone who's interested. You would be free to listen. And you'd be free not to.

A Photo

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 12:56:00 +0000

Today has been long and I'm not done yet. So here's a photo from today. Consider it 500 words of blogging. I'd say it was 1000 but it's not a fantastic photo.

Video of the Week: Life in a Day

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 12:56:00 +0000

When they released this film I forgot to watch it. I watched it yesterday. Tomorrow (which is today because I'm sure you're reading this on the 21st) this film will have been on YouTube for year.

Anyway, this is a feature film made up of footage shot by YouTube users all over the world on 24th July 2010. I think there were over 80,000 videos submitted. I feel sorry for the people who sorted the footage.

What the footage sorters did find and what the editor and director put together is pretty wonderful. Full of interesting people, and small glimpses into their generally mundane and fascinating lives. You should set aside an hour and a half and watch this, preferably on a big TV in HD. It made me pretty happy.

Enjoy.

Guilt and Shame

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 12:34:00 +0000

I'm preaching on Sunday night on Psalm 130. I preached on it before at a school, but I'm rejigging it because the talk wasn't amazing and it certainly wasn't one I could do for church.

Anyway, the psalm focuses on God's mercy and redemption. It encourages God's people to wait for him expectantly.

I listened to a Tim Keller sermon on the Psalm a few days ago and he reckons there's a difference between guilt and shame. Guilt is when you've broken a specific rule, shame is when you haven't lived up to an ideal (yours or someone else's). He says that these days we a lot of people don't feel guilt much because we've worked so hard at encouraging people not to feel guilty. But people still feel shame. They haven't lived up to their own ideals but they're not quite sure what they can do to fix it because they have not absolute morality. That got erased at the same time as guilt was erased.

I'm not sure what I think. I feel like that's a neat way of defining guilt and shame, but I'm still trying to work out if I agree. I'm not sure how people experience guilt and shame. It's not really something we talk about much.

I'm going to spend a bit more time thinking about guilt and shame. I might solve the puzzle. Or I might not. If you have any thoughts about guilt and shame, how they relate, what they are, what the worst thing you've ever done is, that sort of thing, feel free to comment.

Predictions: Part 2

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 12:45:00 +0000

First things first, no unattended baggage blew up.

Secondly, we didn't predict any womanly changes for me. So no win there.

I cannot tell you much because the predictions ritual is very secretive, kinda like being part of the Masons or the Cinebuzz Club. What I can tell you is that of the twenty-six things we predicted for 2011 only 11 and three-quarters of them came to pass. While it was predicted I did not fall in love with a person called Tara (that was the name Jo picked), though The King's Speech did win Best Picture at the Oscars (hooray)! My nephew was not born ugly and got cuter, he was always pretty cute but he definitely got cuter. Jo didn't manage to finish knitting a scarf which we also predicted. She did however get herself romantically attached, which is a win all round!

The rest of the predictions I cannot tell you. Mainly because of secrecy, but also because I cannot remember, but I might not be able to remember out of secrecy. I'm not sure how good my security is.

Ask me next year and I'll tell you how we went this year.

Predictions: Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 08:48:00 +0000

I'm standing outside the Star Bar on George St waiting to meet Jo Kemp (if this blog were a sitcom then she'd be known as a former regular character on this blog). We meet around this time every year to make predictions about the year ahead and read the ones we made last year. I'm pretty excited as I have no memory of what we wrote. If we predicted that I'd become a woman then that predictions will be 80% wrong. I'll let you know how it goes. (Unless of course I get blown up by the unattended luggage that has been by the bin this last ten minutes. I'll let you know how that goes too.)

Warren Buffett

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 12:42:00 +0000

I think Warren Buffett is one of my new heroes. I read an article about him in Time today, and he's pretty cool. He's the third richest man in the world yet he lives in a house in Omaha which he bought in 1958 for $31,500. He drives himself around in a 2006 Cadillac DTS which is worth about $12,000. He likes eating at his local club (like an RSL Club I think) and he drinks almost 2 litres of Coke a day. He thinks the rich should be taxed more and there should be less private schools so rich people invest in public education. Oh and he's giving 99% of his $45 billion fortune away to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Warren Buffett is who I would love to be, rich, humble, a lefty, and the owner of 8.6% of the Coca-Cola Company. Winner!

Quotable Quotes

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 12:36:00 +0000

Today at work my job was to find nine quotes to go in the resources that I write. However I couldn't find nine. I found one. That means tomorrow is going to be spending another seven and a half hours on the stupid quote sites. I get so bored of them. Still, I'm doing it for monies (and Jesus) so I can't complain.

I have, at times, thought about just making quotes up and attributing them to people. I figure it shouldn't really matter who says them just that what they say sounds pithy and/or true. I asked my boss if he'd have a problem with me making quotes up and he said "Yes". Shame.

Still I'm hoping he changes his mind. Just in case he does, I'm going to make up some quotes and store them here. So for your reading pleasure, here are some things the people below did not say. (Feel free to add your own in the comments.)

"The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away", right now I just wish he was doing more givin' than takin'. - Martha Wilkes, in 1957 after losing her house to a tornado.

If I was a polygamist and could marry mythical creatures, I'd marry a mermaid and a reverse mermaid. One to take out on the town and the other for her childbearing qualities. Of course I could achieve the same result by just marrying a woman and a fish, but I think I'd find taking a fish on a dinner date too confusing for my appetites. - Michael Cera

I probably didn't say this. - Mark Twain

Great stories are like rare diamonds. They are a beauty to behold and have the strength to cut through even the hardest of men's hearts. Only the author who is willing to toil alone, digging deep in the blackest darkness will be able to produce this treasure of a pressured soul. - Leo Tolstoy

Doubt and faith are not enemies but allies. It is ignorant certainty that fights against them both. - G.K. Chesterton

I always say that the secret to success is to believe in yourself. That and make sure you're drunk by midday. - Ulysses S. Grant

Greatest Bible Study Ever

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 11:33:00 +0000

I was in the shower this morning listening to a Driscoll sermon. He was preaching on Luke 24:13-35 about when Jesus appears to the two disciples as they walk to Emmaus. As they walk along, not recognising Jesus, the disciples express their sadness that Jesus was killed. Luke then goes on to say how Jesus led them in a Bible study: He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself."

I've always read that and thought "Man, wouldn't it be awesome know what Jesus said there? To have Jesus do a Bible study with you about himself. If only we knew what Jesus said." And then it occurred to me, we do know what Jesus said. We don't know the exact words but I'm pretty sure we know the content. The two disciples, whoever they were, surely did not keep Jesus' teaching to themselves. They obviously talked about the encounter, how else did Luke know about it? And they wouldn't have kept what Jesus said a secret, they would have told the other disciples. And that teaching would have then influenced how the early church interacted with the Old Testament. And I reckon that same teaching wound up in the New Testament. When the New Testament deals with the old, it would have more than a little of the influence of Jesus' Emmaus Bible study (and any other similar teachings he did) on it. The disciples were of course influenced by the Holy Spirit, but my guess is Jesus laid a lot of the ground work himself for how the biblical writers interpret and reference the Old Testament. If that's the case then we may know not know what Jesus said in that Bible study, but whatever Jesus said, if we've read the Bible, then it's probably not new to us.

Still it would have been awesome to be part of that discussion of the road to Emmaus. It'd be like the difference between reading Lord of the Rings and having Tolkin sit down and read it with you. One is definitely cooler.

Foster the People

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 12:43:00 +0000

I bought Torches by Foster the People in December for my drive home from camp, so I've had it for about a month now. It's a pretty fantastic album. Plenty of joy, poppy tunes, musical talents. It's one of those albums that will put you in a good mood and make you want to dance. That's a bit of a winner.

We had brunch today and brunch opened with this album. It set the tone for a pretty awesome brunch, full of dancing and pancakes, as you can see from the below photo.

I think song might be my fave. Enjoy it for you inspirations:

Houdini by Foster The People

Video of the Week: Stormtrooper Playing Accordion

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 12:54:00 +0000

Here is the video of the week:

Now that you've seen it, I think it's clear to see why it's video of the week.

Positive Obedience

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 13:09:00 +0000

I'm reading a book at the moment called, The Obedience Option. It's about obedience, which surprised me as I thought it was a spy novel. I guess sometimes titles and their books match up.

One of the points the writer makes is that obedience is primarily about choosing God's glory above anything else. And this may be an old and basic concept for many of you guys, but it was pretty revolutionary to me. Not that I couldn't have guessed it seeing as everything is about God's glory, but the idea that when I choose to obey God, I am actively choosing to glorify him, that's a big deal. Often I have viewed obedience in the negative, obedience is not choosing to do the sinful thing I feel like doing. And then I go from there to give myself positive reasons why obedience is a good idea (e.g. because sin hurts people, it makes God sad, it's why Jesus died, I might get put in jail). Sometimes I even have the idea that obedience feels better, in the long run, but when you're staring temptation in the face, it's hard to believe that. However when I view obedience as an active choosing of God's glory, it becomes for me a much more exciting prospect. Obedience stops being about me and starts being about God. I love God, and I love to glorify God, so getting to actively choose to glorify him, to do something that makes him look good, that's exciting. I'd rather be obedient because it's good, than not be disobedient because that's bad. And glorifying God is the best, so that's the best.

One Day Camp

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 12:18:00 +0000

I was meant to be on camp for work this week, but not enough people went on camp, so I was made redundant from camp.

But I did go to camp for one day. It was pretty fun. As soon as I arrived I was asked to tell a joke. 7:30 in the morning and I have to tell a joke. It's traditional that I tell a joke at this camp. So I told this one:

Am man walks in to the doctors with a penguin on his head. The doctor says "What seems to be the problem?"

The penguin replies "Well it all started with this growth on my foot..."

It went down ok, but people didn't think it was as good as I think it is.

I did other things today other than telling jokes. I listened to a talk, and almost hit a girl in the head with a frisbee. I threw the frisbee and it was meant to go over her head (silly idea) but it did not, it skimmed the top of her head, glancing off her plastic head band. She was talking to her dad at the time. Oops, that was embarrassing. (Can frisbees kill people? That would have been more embarrassing.) She forgave me, I think.

Oh and I dressed as a bearded lady for a carnival event. I haven't done that since 2008 so I thought it was time. Wearing a dress and fake boobs; That's what my job is all about.

And that was my day on camp. I would have liked to have been on camp, because it's pretty fun. But at least I can probably sleep more here.

Meeting, Meeting, Movie, Meeting

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 12:19:00 +0000

Today I wasn't at work but I did plenty of work. I had a meeting with a potential new youth leader, had a meeting with my second in charge at youth group, the two of us then had a meeting with another potential youth leader, then I went want and watched Cobra (Yes!), then had a meeting at the pub about our upcoming YouTube Bible extravaganza. So much meeting. I felt like I was back in church ministry.

Still I enjoyed myself. I drank a lot of beverage and did a lot of wee. It's the work of the kingdom.

Last Words

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 12:33:00 +0000

"I've never felt better." - Douglas Fairbanks Sr's last words

Superman III

noreply@blogger.com (Tom French) — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 12:54:00 +0000

I bought the blu-ray box set of Superman for myself for Christmas a few weeks ago, and I'm loving it to bits. Superman is awesome and the special features are wonderful.

Yesterday I watched Superman III and it has to be one of the worst movies I've ever seen. I had never seen it because my video store as a kid never had it, and judging by Superman IV, I decided it wasn't high on my list of films to track down. If it didn't have Superman and actually took itself a bit more seriously it'd up there with the Twilight Saga in the magnitude of it's crime against cinema.

The whole film is built on the premise that computers can do anything. The villan uses a computer to reprogram a weather satellite to stop monitoring weather and start causing weather, then he uses a computer to reroute every oil ship in the world and turn off every petrol pump, and finally he builds a computer that is so sophisticated is can look at any person or thing, analyse it and find and exploit it's weakness, the computer even turns a woman into a robot and puts Superman in a bubble he almost cannot break out of. It's from a time when computers were not that common so people could be more easily fooled into thinking they can do anything. One guy hacks into his companies payroll system by typing the command "Override all security". Genius!

Also in the film, Superman gets turned bad by some poorly synthesised kryptonite. Superman becomes a womaniser, alcoholic and serial pest. He stops fighting crime and starts doing things like blowing out the torch at the Olympic games. He's a naughty one.

Beside the absurd plot, is some pretty terrible acting (though Christopher Reeve seems to be working hard to do his best with a bad hand), rather silly slapstick and some of the worst paced action I have ever seen. There is however some beautiful photography, which looks especially good in Blu-ray.

Now you may think from this review that I hated the film, but I actually really enjoyed myself. It was a whole lot of fun to watch, if only because it's so bad. I spent a lot of the time having a good laugh. Plus I love Superman, so I can't really lose.

I decided that I love the film so much I want to use it as a sermon illustration. First available chance, I'm gonna do a Superman III reference.

Watching the film did remind me how good Hollywood has been in the past of destroying perfectly good francises in the chase after money. Superman, in my opinion, is one of the greatest comic book adaptions of all time. To have gone from the greatness of Richard Donner's Superman to the camp, embarrassment of Richard Lester's Superman III it makes me think that Hollywood can destroy anything. Still they can also fix things. We went from Batman and Robin to Batman Begins. Redemption is possible.

Anyway I recommend you all see Superman III unless you all don't love everything Superman. Otherwise watch Return of the Jedi or something. 1983 did have good cinema, Superman III just wasn't it.