Middleton asks the tough questions.

I was lost in a downtown area of a major North American city.  A place that was kind of like Baltimore but wasn’t Baltimore.  This was before the days of GPS and I was having trouble reading my map.  I saw a guy on the corner of the street who I thought I could ask for directions.  He looked pretty tough and I was a little bit scared of asking him. But I still asked him.

Vote Middleton.

Middleton is not perfect.

I like how the little squares on waffles collect the syrup.  Spreading the butter is harder than on a smooth surface like a pancake but if you stick with it I think the way it tastes is well worth the effort.  Make sure you don’t forget to really grease up the wafflemaker or else you’ll be picking burnt batter off of the elements.  I did that once and it took a long time to clean up.

But hey, that is why pencils have erasers.

Vote Middleton.

Middleton is tough on crime.

If I was a criminal I would not have a clue what to do with a crime fighting cyborg like RoboCop.  All of the usual strategies and tools a guy might use to evade or defeat a normal policeman don’t apply.  Guns don’t work - the bullets just bounce off.  Lying wont work because RoboCop has a built in lie detector mechanism.  

In this way, RoboCop stops crime before it starts because his mere existence intimidates the criminal mind.  

I feel better about your tax dollars being spent on deterrence versus punishment and I know many of you agree with me.

Vote Middleton.

City Council Fever Comes to nathanweselake.com

With election fever gripping Portage la Prairie, I have been approached by several budding politicians to wade into the fray and throw the considerable weight and readership of this blog behind their bids for office.

As a pastor, it is important that I remain detached and not use my pull to sway the innocent (I have to adopt a similar strategy with my rugged good looks).  

However, there is one person running for office who I believe is worth the risk of personal support and even allowing them to use my blog to explain their platform.  

His name is Marvin Middleton and I look forward to you meeting him as a guest blogger in coming weeks.

Technique or Transformation?

It is not about technique, it is about transformation.

Technique is to modern evangelicalism what circumcision was to the NT church.  

We don’t need to know “how to”.  We need new hearts.

So we are free of the burden of technique yet saddled with the knowledge that there has always been the distinction between the unacceptable offering and the acceptable offering.

We have to give God something and so what we give and how we give it matters.

Ah, so there is then, a technique to transformation.

Prayer, Scripture, Community, Worship, Service, Sacrifice 

And to the floundering, disconnected, or lost I simply say, these techniques have always worked and always will work.

Like GK says, “Christianity has never been tried and found wanting.  It has only been found difficult and so not tried.”

Because there is no such thing as an undisciplined disciple.

If He intended for us to be undisciplined in our pursuit of Him, Jesus would have chosen a different word to describe those who follow Him.

Excessive use of “Bro”

In the last 2 months I have heard more men use the word “bro” than in the past 15 years combined.  

(For those of you who have not been called “bro”, basically this term is similar to “man” or “dude” or “chum” or “sport” or “buddy” or the British “old bean”.)  

Now, the team of crack researchers at nathanweselake.com are not content to merely wonder why a term will suddenly emerge with this sort of frequency, we need to know why.

Here is what we know so far:

- “bro” has never been said by a man who was not a Christian; like “sanctification”, “frick”, and “you are such a blessing to me.”  It appears that they will know we are Christian’s by our “bro’s”.  

- “bro” is kind of unique among Christian slang in that it has no naughty equivalent inappropriate for a Christian to speak, it’s etymology is simply from the longer word “brother”.  This makes it different from other terms popular in Christian sub-culture a topic google reveals has been masterfully taken up by someone calling himself mudpuppy and his slew of commentators.  

- although “bro” is the shorter form of “brother”, I have yet to hear anyone say “O Bro!” as a shorter and way hipper form of “Oh Brother!”  You’d think that might catch on.  Although, take a second and say out loud “Oh Brother” - guarantee you both sound and feel more feminine than you did before.  That was bad enough, now say “O Bro!” - I’m thinking it probably wont catch on.

- it has been my experience that the more hours one has spent in church in ones lifetime, the more frequent the use of “Bro” is.  I am thinking of two “Bro’s” in particular right now who have had very different church experiences (one charismatic and one conservative) and yet both use the term often.  Something about spending 8 plus hours a week attending church which leads to excessive use of “bro”.  I also remember it being a term of choice here where I once spent a strange afternoon visiting a friend.  

I end this post with a shout out to all my “bro” spewing buddies.  Thank for the daily reminder that though we did not grow up in the same family we are “bro’s from different mo’s”.

Although now having wrote all this and put off preparing a plate of nachos way longer than I intended; it occurs to me I have heard the phrase “bro’s before ho’s” which of course is a friendly reminder to men to keep your relationships strong with your male friends even while engaged in courtship.  Whatever the pros or cons of this phrase, it really is only relevant here in that it reveals my researchers are not so much crack researchers as they are full of shoot.  

Let your “wants” rule your “feelings”.

I want you to know the difference between what you “feel like doing” and what you “want to do”.

You will not always feel like dragging your butt out of bed at 6am to pray/read the bible but you want to know God/express your love for Him/see Him answer you.

You will not always feel like starting your workout or going as long or hard as you planned.  But you want to have energy, be healthy, and model good habits for your kids.

You will not always feel like sticking to the budget.  But you want to be in a position to be generous to others and provide some measure of security for your family.

Guys, you will not always feel like listening to your wife tell you the same story for the 20th time.  But you want a marriage where she feels honored and safe.

Women, you will not feel like having sex as much as he wants you to have it.  But you want his eyes, affections, and energy.

I bring this up because if you intend to follow Christ, along the way you will have to do many things you don’t feel like doing, but basically nothing you don’t deep down want to do.

His yoke is easy and his burden is light.