I have loved SquawkTalk, it's been great! However, after a brief home here we are packing up and moving. I have had another Blog for a while, something that never really took off for me, but I already own the domain name, so we are moving. Don't worry, we haven't forgotten anything and the transition has already be made. When you go to our new place you will see many familiar things, although it will look slightly different, you should be able to find yourself around the place pretty easy. So, weather you started following me all the way back during the Xanga.com days, followed my move to mparrott84.blogspot.com, followed our family on parrottpeople.wordpress.com, or just recently found us on SquawkTalk.DiscipleshipGuy.com (the web address is a hint to our new home...), all content will now be found at...

DiscipleshipGuy.com

I would like to take this opportunity to introduce everyone to SquawkTalk! This new site is still a work in progress, it has some work to be done, but I want to introduce everyone so that you have the opportunity to help influence it's design. This new site is the combination of several things. First of all, I don't post here much anymore. This site was started as a progression from Xanga.com, and it has served it's purpose. However, I no longer like to keep everything so separate. So, in an attempt to converge many things into one, I have taken this blog, as well as parrottpeople.wordpress.com and merged them into one new site called SquawkTalk.

I hope you enjoy the new site. After a bit I will probably be deleting this site entirely, however probably not until after the new site has undergone the finishing touches. I want to make sure all of my content is safe, after all, it dates back to early 2001. Without further ado, here is SquawkTalk!

A couple of nights ago I watched Bruce Almighty for room night with a bunch of guys from work. It had been a while since the last time I watched it, and I missed a bunch of the movie, but there were some interesting quotes in it. The only one I can remember right now goes something like this:

To paint great pictures you need dark colors.

The point of the quote was that humans have to endure tough times to be all they can be, and fulfill their potential. Cheesy to say the least, but pretty sound none the less.

Towards the beginning of my LeadTime year there was a guest speaker who was talking about prayer. One of the things that stuck out to me was this idea that as Christians we are many times, asking God to relieve the circumstances. Many times, God has placed those very circumstances in your life to bring about change, increase your character, and draw you closer to Him. If we want to grow in Christ we can't have the circumstances taken away, we have to run through them, persevere, and allow ourselves to dictate how we will respond, instead of allowing our circumstances to dictate us.

Those are my thoughts, I am learning how to do what I have written, we will discuss it again in tweenty years ;)

Tonight I was on coverage for room night, usually on nights like tonight I would get off around 11. Tonight I stayed back a little while longer because we had been having Internet issues... This is where the story starts. As I left the house and I was walking to my car I started to think about being in Indiana, I was thinking about how I always had someone to call and talk to when I got off work. As I was thinking about that (very quickly) I thought that most of my Indiana friends would be in bed already, due to being on a different time zone. I also thought that it would be nice to have someone in Missouri that I could call right now, but I knew where all those people were already. They are all older, responsible folks who are in bed, or they are young, tired, Bigs on property who are in bed. If the Bigs weren't in bed (there are a couple night owls), then they are un-available and with guy/girl friends.

This paragraph is background info, we will get back to the story in a second... Another thought that went through my head was that I wasn't really all that close to a lot of people back in Indiana. I had a lot of deep friendships in college, but over time most of those people (me included) have moved on to other things in life. We are still close when we call, we just don't call all that often.

Then I heard a voice say that I could talk to Him. He was available 24-7. And as a matter of fact we had some catching up to do, it's been a couple days. Then the verse went through my head that goes something like this,

"...but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother."

When I heard that it was like, oops, good point. Let's talk. So, I began to pray, but my mind was still racing and scattered from my day, instead of asking God to help bring me into a state of peace within my mind, I turned on the CD Player in my car and drove home. Now I am typing this blog that your reading, but once I am done with this, I have some catching up to do with someone. Just in case your wondering what verse the one above is, I have it, along with the beginning part. Here it is: Proverbs 18:24 (English Standard Version)

"A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother"

So there are a few obvious ways to take this post, I am going to avoid some of those, but I will tell you the few things that stuck out to me.

1. Conviction. I didn't feel guilty, I felt convicted, like I haven't spent time with someone really important today, and that makes me sad. Also, it makes me want to strive to do better as opposed to be down on myself for letting someone down.

2. Humbled. How many times do we just go through our day and totally forget about God. Lot's of times we even pray or read our Bibles, yet we still forget about Him and don't spend the time to really get to know Him as our friend. As our friend...what does that even look like? Do we know what that means? Yes, some of us do, many characters in the Bible knew, I would like to think I knew...but do I?

3. Excited. Even when we are stuck in sin or self consumed we have a God who desires to be with us, who thought it worth dying to spend time with us. And sometimes we don't even remember He is there. I took my daughter shopping with me the other day, she saw so many things she wanted. She kept saying daddy can I get this or can we get that. It seemed like all she thought about was herself. Now she is young, very young, and so I talked to her about being selfish and self-consumed. But how would it have been different if she was so focused on herself that she wasn't even talking to me. I enjoyed the time with her, and I loved the conversations that we had, but what if she didn't even know I was with her? I would be crushed. And yet, sometimes that how I treat God...

This post has turned out much longer than I thought it was going to be. Many times while typing it I thought I might start crying in the middle of it. This is what has been bouncing around in my mind for the last hour or so. So know I am publishing what was in my head.

On my way home from a basketball game tonight I began to think about my time in Missouri, and one of the thoughts I was having is about how we have adapted and that where we are, live, travel, shop, etc is becoming normal, it's becoming home. This made me start to ponder about what defines home for us. Until our last trip to Indiana I would have said that Indiana was home, now I think that Missouri is home. Indiana is where I am from, and were friends and family live, but i also have friends and a community that live in Missouri now.

I think that this subtle difference that God has changed internally has freed me in many ways, I think after this experience, being here in Missouri and working for Doulos, that I could live just about anywhere in the states and be OK with it. I think my home can be anywhere (God, if your listening I still don't like snow...) if you notice I said I could be about anywhere in the states...It will take more growing and developing to leave the US. I really do like it here, and I don't ever want to harden my heart to leaving, because that's about the time God will ask me to go...

I like this internal change that's happened, I would be sad to not be around some of the people that we have gotten to know. Their are many that we would leave behind, but I would also look forward to meeting the next group of people that God would have to impact our lives. I think that Autumn would feel differently about this, but I am OK with that.

A final thought, Rich Mullins sang a song about Jesus having no where to call home, Jesus even said in Matthew 8:20

Jesus replied, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head."

I think to some degree we need to be like Jesus and have our home be in Heaven, our home on earth is where His will is for us at the moment we are there, but when His will for us moves on we need our hearts to allow where we call home to move on also. I guess that's why I was thinking about this, I think that for the first time home isn't a geographical location for me anymore, as much as it is where we are right now.

So, I have done several things to the blog.  First off I have installed a Disqus Comments system.  It's pretty cool, you can comment on the blog as a guest, log into Disqus and then comment on any site w/Disqus, register w/Disqus, tweet a comment, or I think you can even use OpenId.  That is quite a few options.  The question is, 'Why did I do this?' and the answer is just because.  I wanted to try it.  Also, if it works good I could possibly use it on my other blog site (which is Word Press).

Secondly I have obviously changed the layout, pretty dramatically I might add, and it was a pain in places that are generally covered with clothes!!!   Lastly, I think it's kinda cool, but overall it doesn't give me butterflys, and it was a lot of work...so I don't know what to do now.

Thirdly, I noticed that someone commented on my Honoring God with your possessions post but I don't know who.  In addition since I installed Disqus, it puts their comment system right over the top, no biggie, if no one has posted.  The only way to un-install Disqus is to change my template...do you know what will happen if I do that???  Bad things man.  So, if you commented, will you comment again for me?  Laters everyone.

So tonight I was realizing some significant things about myself. At Doulos I am technically a volunteer on the Shelterwood side of things (I guess, that's what I was told tonight) and it's not technically my job. So, while I was thinking about things, rules, consequences, etc., I was thinking about how being a big can be a hard job because there are lots of ways. There isn't always just a right way and a wrong way, there is a hundred ways that are all subjectively right or wrong. That makes my job hard for me because I want to know if what I am doing is right or wrong.

It seems like many times I want to know before I do something if it's right or wrong, if there isn't a definitive answer, or better yet, multiple and equally right choices what should I do? The answer of course is to listen to the Holy Spirit...which gives us freedom and liberty...and just made everything that much harder for an analytical guy like me.