designing for Philistines...

anatomy of setting up a stage design...

2012-01-30T07:30:00.001-05:00

I use everything that I am able to find to create the stage design each week. I snag tech carts and items from the school (this week I used the conductors platform). These items get covered with cloth and VOILA!

It may seem silly, but I am very excited. There is a large gray metal cart, that I use frequently to lift things up in stage designs. Well this week, the marvelous Emily Firestone made a custom cover (she calls it a tablecloth. LOL) that I just slip onto the cart now. Woot! Woot! I am doing a happy dance!
I look forward to using it...

You can barely even see in the pictures, but we added a dark blue net material to the design. It looks nice and flow-ie...

First, I have to say that I really like our banners.

Nobody asked; BUT if someone HAD asked, I probably would have asked for matte finish on the banners (note the lights that reflect off of the shiny, slick fronts of the banners).

I also would have staggered the designs. One towards to top, one towards the middle and one towards the bottom.

No biggie, it is something that we are able to work with.

That's what it looked like today; now it's about time to go back for Core Community, After which we will strike the stage set and band equipment. We will load it all up again in the trailer, drive it back to the office and in 7 days, we will do it all over again.

serve the world...

2012-01-30T07:20:00.000-05:00

Worship Set 1You Are Good
This is our second week with this song. It is so fun and upbeat. Lyrics (Brian Johnson & Jeremy Riddle, BETHEL MUSIC 2011)
Freedom is Here

Worship Set 2
Here For You (Matt Redman)
Always (Kristian Stanfill)

Message: serve the world...

Worship Set 3
Tear Down the Walls

Two focuses on our “serve the world...” Sunday.
One is our partnership with Windswept Academy. Gearing up for uur third trip to South Dakota
This is what we did last year
Building a fence

Second, today we are partnering with another local church for a collection of food for a backpack buddy program here locally. This is one of the things I love about our people. A couple times a year, we hand out a list on Sunday morning and have people come back later in the day to drop off donations.

It's cool to see how people respond. We are a medium sized church with a big heart to help others.

This is being submitted to Sunday Set Lists @ theworshipcommunity.com

love God, love others...

2012-01-23T18:29:00.000-05:00

Our current series is "love God, love others, serve the world" We are trying to brand this purpose statement in people's minds. Last week we were focused on "love God"...

An advantage to being mobile, is that you don't feel locked into a stage design once it is set up. Since the stage has to be struck each and every week, you feel more freedom in tweeking the design.

We want to keep the purpose statement in order, and each week bring to the forefront the portion being discussed.
This week we are focused on "love others"...
So that banner was rasied higher.
And I utilize whatever I am able to find to work with.
For example last week and this week, I used the tech carts to lift the banners higher. I also used the containers that the drums are stored in. LOL. Then I have to furiously take everything down so the techs and band are able to reach their carts.

love others...

2012-01-22T14:19:00.008-05:00

Well, our worship and tech team were fired up this morning. We spent Saturday night listening to Russell Fragar (of Hillsong fame). This week we had two worship leaders on stage. Each worship leader sort of has a niche. I categorize them into mostly “current”. “retro” and “vintage”. This week is a some current songs & vintage (hymns). We also had our violinist playing.

Worship Set 1
One Thing

Worship Set 2
You Are Good
Beauty of the Lord
Praise God From Whom All Blessings Flow

Message: “love others...”

Worship Set 3
In Christ Alone

How would you define your worship set lists?

This week for the stage design we obviously wanted to highlight the "love others" banner.

All this and more being posted over at the Sunday Set List @ worshipcommunity.com.

are you having a great time serving...

2012-01-22T05:46:00.001-05:00

Saturday evening, we were so blessed to have Russell Fragar come and share with our worship(both adult and youth) and tech team. It was such a wonderful evening of food, friends, worship and encouragement.Russell served as Music Pastor for the Hillsong Church in Sydney, Australia from 1989-2001, back in the days of "Shout to the Lord" and Darlene Zschech. He now lives in Northern Virginia and is personal friends with one of our worship leaders.
He shared a lot of stories and tips, then answered questions.
Just one of his comments: “if you aren’t having a great time in the praise and worship ministry, you’re doing it wrong”.
There were about 30 of us gathered and we were really glad we went out.
Needless to say, those of us who attended woke up at our normal 5:00 a.m. to get ready for worship set up were fired up. It was such fun to be able to serve and it spread to those who hadn't attended.

redemption....

2012-01-20T08:55:00.000-05:00

Possible thought for Redemption Sunday 5 minute countdown...

some "free" stuff for worship media...

2012-01-19T08:57:00.006-05:00

For those of you who remember...PowerPoint in worship or are just getting started using projected media in worship: we need to remember that there are churches all along the spectrum.

So I have been thinking of in the beginning; of being in transition from hymnals to projections.

Here are just a few great resources for various types of media. Both free and for purchase. If you sign-up for e-mails, some of the paid sites will occasionally send "free" media to use. There is a lot out there that people are willing to share.

We have had amazing results recently with simply asking creators/designers of various videos that are posted on You Tube and Vimeo, if we could use their work in our worship service. They have been very accommodating. Remember to always ask for permission, for it is their work.

Here are just a few basic Graphic and Font Guidelines for media

So from static graphics to loops and videos, there is a plethora of media available to you.

silent servers...

2012-01-15T13:16:00.000-05:00

It takes a lot of people to prepare for the Sunday morning worship experience. There are some who are creating during the week and then there are those who come in at 6:30 a.m. on Sunday to prepare the worship space.
Here are just a few that helped serve for this week. This doesn't included the person who got the ladder, helped me climb the ladder and put up the banners, took it all down and much, much more.
And that is just the beginning.
Thank you for serving!

love God, not kidney stones...

2012-01-15T12:31:00.001-05:00

I love our worship leaders! This week was part 2 in our series of “love God, love others, serve the world”... The message today was “love God” and our worship sets really highlighted the message.

Worship Set 1
Our Love is Loud

Worship Set 2
Our God
Revelation Song
Only You
Message: love God...

Worship Set 3
Awakening

We will be focusing a lot on this series, which is also our purpose statement at XC. Our banners arrived this week. Printed on foam core. Looked really nice.

O.k. Got the love God; but kidney stones? Yup! I have been battling kidney stones for awhile. Got the stage all set up, but then I had to leave because of the stones. (sadness).

This is being posted as part of Sunday Set Lists @ the Worship Community. See what people are singing today across the nation.

worship wars...

2012-01-14T08:38:00.000-05:00

I believe there is an inherent struggle for people to want to remain the same.

The people say: “What “we did” in the day is still current and relevant. “We want new people to come, yet just fit in and become just like us.”

The lines get drawn based on person's preferences.

What I struggle with is I see people pushing the remain in the past; which for us means late 80's and early 90's. It is ironic that these 30-40 somethings are becoming a graying congregation and they don't see it. I read a book in 2002, entitled “2020 Vision”, by Richard Hamm. It was very enlightening. It talks about how congregations are able to appear to be surviving well (a lot of it is based on the tithing habits of the founding members). Then those members start to die off and all of the sudden they realize there is no one left. What has happened was they didn't have a forward thinking vision to stay relevant enough to remain healthy in the future.

I keep saying that is it is God's will to remain stuck in the past (for this body of Christ), then that is what we are supposed to do. But if it is simply based on what “we want” or “we like”, then we've got it wrong. If you are passionate about following God, I believe you have to constantly step out of your comfort zone to pursue the higher ideal of serving God's vision. It all boils down to what God wants.

There is nothing inherently wrong with either traditional or modern worship styles.

If we listen to Him, we will continue to impact the world. But if we don't listen to Him, based on human nature, this “worship style” battle will continue to rage through the Body of Christ.

the video that went around the world (literally)....

2012-01-13T14:58:00.000-05:00

So, this is the story of how a vid literally went around to world to finally wind up back home...We have a missionary named Jessica, who is now serving in South Africa. She has been a member of our community for many, many years.
She posted this video on fb a couple of weeks back. I clicked and loved it!
Passed it on to our teaching pastor for that week. He loved it!
Someone on our team got permission for the creators to use the video. They downloaded it and prepped our ProPresenter. Used it that very same Sunday.
This all happened in less than a week.

Later, I went to write a thank you note to Kelly and Niki Tshibaka, the people who created the video;
and found out they they live here in Northen Virginia!
How about that!

inventory in a truck...

2012-01-13T14:33:00.000-05:00

Resolved...to get a handle on what inventory, props, cloth, etc we have (for XC creative arts) and where it is located! Not so easy.First, some of the cloth.
Need to update the newer cloth purchases; schedule a fun, exciting day to roll out, measure, mark and re-roll and document all the cloth. Yippee!
Next, these are the random items that are in a truck at CFC's property.

Then, I need to get the the XC storage facility and document what is there...

we will see what happens...

2012-01-13T12:12:00.000-05:00

Starting a new series. love God, love others, serve the world...
(smiling) Due to last minute planning (not on my part), the new logo (our purpose statement) have been created and made into banners and printed.
Didn't have any input. (still smiling)
They were not ready for this set design, so the pastor requested a simple living room set.
So this week it was our standard couch, end table, a light from Ikea and a little cloth.
Since the band was rather large this week, wound up hanging the cloth in the corner, safety pinned it around the school's American flag pole. Seriously.

Last picture: several times since we have been meeting in this middle school auditorium, the electric room divider has gotten stuck partway. makes for an interesting Sunday.
Thankfully I always have some sort of cloth in my car, so we roped off that section. LOL.
So, the banners are supposed to be here this week. I'll be really interested to see what they look like. They were described to me a little. We will see.
Still smiling!

love God, love others, serve the world...

2012-01-08T12:55:00.001-05:00

It has been a while since I have participated in the "Sunday Set List", at TheWorshipCommunity.com. So here goes...

Intro
Worship Set 1

Love Came Down

Worship Set 2

There is Nothing Like

I Love Your Presence

Always

Video: "This is Discipling" by Kelly Tshibaka at Foursquare Connection

Message: Love God, Love Others, Serve the World

Worship Set 3

Holding Nothing Back

Nice flow today. We have 4 worship leaders currently serving; one of them being a college student that lead today (home for the holidays).

For those of you who don't know me, I facilitate our creative team, produce, do the stage designs (for a mobile church) and I love worship. Our set was really laid back today since we were focusing on Vision Casting for the coming year.

visioning & WAREHOUSING

2012-01-06T14:14:00.001-05:00

Today I posted a pic on fb, of a young, thin man about 6 feet tall, African-American; claiming I found my long lost twin.

Now if you don't know me - I am a 54 year old grandmother of 6, short, fluffy (nice word for chubby) & Caucasian woman.

Recently I was musing that I realize that most people don't understand me or how I think. I am fine with that. Then I met Joshua Hill, my twin. Seriously, it was one of the most fun evenings I have had.

We are both extremely interested in creative stage design & experiential elements for our respective churches. We spent that time talking about our thoughts, ideas, past designs, future dreams...

We got talking about getting other churches together in the area to share stage designs we have created in the past with each other.

Now, that may not seem all that exciting; BUT I have been dreaming and praying about that very idea since about June 2008! I actually had to look the posts up on my blog to see how long I have been praying about it.

visioning the future (2009)

warehouse and fuZion thoughts (2008)

The concept is WAREHOUSE’ing actual set/stage designs, sort of where you are finished with a project and you are willing to give/share it with another church.
Sort of a clearing house idea where people could share their ideas of creative elements and possible lend or give props, designs, etc. away to other churches. Particularly there are so many churches that are working with a very small budget.
I can't begin to explain how fired up I am! It was just the shot of adrenaline that I need & that is so God! I always find it interesting how God works, in His time.

augh!

2012-01-06T12:01:00.000-05:00

I apologize to my (6) followers. I have been going through and editing (actually while searching for a previous post) and decided to publish some older drafts.Then I relized that they were posting today.
Sorry about that.

I have an idea...

2012-01-06T11:56:00.000-05:00

Sometimes an idea is simply that, an idea. But, often in creative team, when I say “I have an idea”, what I really mean is I see the ENTIRE creative element piece in my mind.
The SHOUT creative movement piece was one of those full blown ideas.

Well, anyway I have idea for next Christmas. Especially since Christmas actually falls on a Sunday next year.

The idea started at a dinner for the leadership: Campbell asked a question for us to discuss at each table: “which person from the Christmas story do you identify with and why?”
Then he gave a short message was on how important telling "stories" are.
Stories connect us to each other.
Then, the next morning I saw this video from Igniter Media “A Social Network Christmas”

So for next year I was thinking....
Start with the video…

Then creating short vignettes about each person in the story of the birth of Christ. Either live and/or videos.
Work with the pastors as to what each person would be feeling.

Zechariah -
Elizabeth -
Mary - with a photo montage of pictures of a 12 year old girls - when you really think about her being around 12 years old and seeing then seeing 12 year olds - it feels very different. (Thanks to Mark Driscoll for that thought) @20:01-23:51 It is really worth it to see this.
Joseph -
Shepard(s) -
An animal -

Ending with the reading of the STORY of the nativity…
Staging would center around our wonderful stable.

Maybe a take-away…

when does a logo need to evolve?

2012-01-06T11:54:00.000-05:00

Starbucks & XC. Time for a logo change?
Here I go, probably going to get myself in trouble again. It’s time to re-evaluate our XC logo.
Starbucks has cause all sorts of ruckus with it's announcement of a new changed logo yesterday.
But I like it, I get it.

I personally have felt it has been time to re-evaluate XC’s logo for awhile now.

Colors need to be updated?

Is text is bang-on?

Font needs to be updated?

Does it reflect who we have become?

There are ways to update it and not change the overall concept.

Let me be clear, here are just my personal thoughts…

Color palette needs to be updated from 1980’s to a more current color palette.

Keep the X and add the C into the graphic. That is what more people are actually calling ourselves now.
Minimize, lighten in color the Minimize, lighten in color the CROSSCURRENT to the size and color of the Ministries. Keep the all caps & add .org (?)

Point: It is interesting; our old school people still abbreviate our church C.C., while most of the newer people and groups use X.C. See they are actually picking up the X in our logo, it seems to reflect who we are currently.

Please note: I am NOT a graphic artist, so this is just a conceptual picture, not an accurate example.

Changing a logo – pros and cons

Gut Shabbat…

2012-01-06T11:53:00.000-05:00

So many things going on in my head. I don’t like it when my mind gets full.
Therefore it is time to stop and think…
Is it time to “cease”? Not only to practice Shabbat, but a sabbatical possibly?
Is it self doubt…

Can one person really make a difference?
How to inspire people who don’t appear to wish to be inspired?
Is my creative originality being hampered by my physical limitations?
What am I doing wrong?
Have I taken on too much?
What would people say about me if I asked them?

And it is such an odd time honestly. Things that I have been talking about, praying about for a very long time...seem to be coming to fruition.
So, I am taking some time to re-focus.
Obviously I need to seek some mentorship.
We will see how this plays out.

wahhh, wahhh, wahhh...

2012-01-06T11:52:00.000-05:00

I must say that I am not fond of the anti-church vibe among many "believers" these days. There comes a time in our personal faith journey when we no longer rely on the "church" to provide us a way to serve but; we have to become responsible for our own personal calling from God.
Don't take this to mean you should walk away from church itself. That is the cowards way out. Crying wahhh, wahhh, wahhh... the church doesn't serve my needs and wants. Guess what? It isn't supposed to be about you!
You need the challenge of the body. You need teaching that is true.

Los Whittaker @ Raggamuffin Soul posted #Dear Modern Day Church.

new band set up...

2012-01-03T09:03:00.019-05:00

The band set up from January 1, 2012.

This pic was taken during a worship set.
What do you think?

a little, can do so much...

2011-12-08T08:05:00.000-05:00

This is Eliza. We met a year ago when we were drawing together advocates/abolitionists to start working together to work on the issue of human trafficking here in Loudoun County, Virginia.

She writes the The Average Advocate blog and works to get people involved in all sorts of issues.
I first heard about Sole Hope, when a group of action oriented ladies (we have a lot) at my church had a shoe party. I was unable to attend, but was interested.
Then Elisa hosted one and I got to attend.
This is her post about how the Sole Hope Shoe Party went.
It was great fun and really simple to do.
Now we are hoping to host another shoe making party at our church in January.
Check out Sole Hole and read about the party.

glow sticks…

2011-11-26T12:25:00.000-05:00

LIGHT

Sometime in 2008 I ran across this video from GCC wired. And while I have shared these vid’s before, I haven’t traced how my mind has been working to use these ideas.

(http://vimeo.com/1300196 - If you link over you won’t be disappointed)

Very cool experiential element to emphasize viral communication.
It was interactive and fun!
While we have discussed it a few times at our creative meetings, we never have used the idea. I love the idea of the interactivity of the element.
While I would love to use glow sticks in a similar way as GCC did:

One possibility I thought of was using glow sticks in a dance piece. Where the dancer is covered with glow sticks and dances in the dark. This was before I realized that this was very popular at raves. Still like the idea. (smiles)

Or something as simple as hanging glow sticks all around the stage. Using various sizes and shapes.

Maybe creating a video of the traces made from glow sticks.

There are so many innovative concepts that could be utilized with glow sticks. One recent concepts is team iLuminate which garnered a lot of attention fro America’s Got Talent. (link: http://www.youtube.com/watchv=XRwX9oCaE9Q&feature=player_embedded )

I have taken the idea as far a purchasing several types of glow sticks and even trying them out.
So now it is a matter of simple finding the appropriate message to link them with. That hasn’t happened yet. But it will…

push play...

2011-11-26T10:21:00.001-05:00

So, at the end of October I pushed pause on the stage elements designs for X.C. and have been praying.
Basically our stage has been blank for two months.
Not because I wasn't able to come up with ideas; but simply because I needed to really evaluate exactly where I thought God is calling me with the stage design.
One of the impressions I have been exploring is the innovative use of light. Because we are a mobile church meeting in a public middle school, we are not allowed to moved the lights or gel the lights at the school. We are not in the position to actually purchase trusses and additional lighting. So, I have been playing with alternative sources of light to be used within the service and/or in the stage design.
Also exploring how light is being used in other cultural movements. It's been interesting to say the least.
Here are just three examples of light usage. One I have held onto for for a couple of years, some I have been exploring recently. I will be going into more details on each of these ideas soon.

I am gearing up to start styling the stage again. Now light isn't the first concept I will be utilizing in the stage design, but it will be coming soon I hope.

thankful…

2011-11-09T09:30:00.001-05:00

I am grateful for being who I am…
Through out my life I have often faced the fact that most people don’t understand me or how I think; which is fine with me.
The older I get the more I am thankful for how God created me. Completely unique.
One of those things is the creativity that lives in me.
I see things like these…

(http://youtu.be/Ov_iJQGq6DI)
…and my mind simply explodes with ideas. My mind extrapolates and blows the original idea up into something entirely different. It’s fun and exciting…
I have been dreaming about utilizing holograms for several years now.

(http://youtu.be/JMSBihWsuBc)
I don’t see the world the way most people see it. It is more alive and vibrant.

(http://youtu.be/XRwX9oCaE9Q)
I wonder how to translate things like these, into an experiential experience...
What I do know; is that I am doing what I am supposed to do, at this point in my life.
I have people who appreciate what I do; and for that I am extremely grateful.

pushing pause, con't...

2011-11-01T18:25:00.000-04:00

Being creative requires constant evaluation.

That is where the creative team is at this moment...

What is really in our toolbox at this point in time? We have been in a place where the gifts and talents of the people on the team are shifting.

Stage design, drama, dance, vids, experiential elements are all tools we have had for several years. We are going through an actually time of mourning (what has been) and need to start focusing on what we currently have. Tough place to be.

We are still able to focus on the 5S (5 senses). Which are taste, smell, hearing, sight and kinesthetic (touch). We are in a place of being un(limited). Recognizing that we still can be unlimited in our creation; yet understanding we ARE limited in our actually production.

While we still have tools like dance/movement, interactive/experiential elements, spoken words and much more. We have to face the reality that at this moment in time we do not have the bandwidth to do true dramas and major in-house videos.

Several team members are in a different season of their lives, which doesn't give the time they were able to give before; for writing, direction, production and such.

But this is not a bad thing. This is just the reality of where we are.

So, this is a time of experimentation. What new things are we able to do? Who wants to learn more about owning elements? Who is willing to try to learn new skills? Who have skills that are being used currently? Or are we even supposed to being doing this at all?
I believe we are supposed to continue...but doing what? I am not sure at this point.
One other point...while I personally still finding it easy to create the stage designs each and every week; I have intentionally pushed pause on that also.
This is truly a time to reflect and pray about where we are heading as a team.

pushing pause...

2011-10-24T09:18:00.002-04:00

more later...

do people know you and where you stand…

2011-10-22T08:35:00.001-04:00

Do they know you as a political pundit?
Do they know you because you are mad about hula hoops?
Most people who know me after a time, know certain truths about me.
One of those truths is that I am in the fight against human trafficking.
One of my sweet girls from Starbucks posted this picture on my facebook page (xoxo Jessica)

"It's a shame they don't use signs like this. We'd be able to fine 'em faster, that's for sure"
So, I ask again…
What do people know about you and where you stand?

rainforest African water drums...

2011-10-14T18:04:00.000-04:00

I spent the day reading, clicking and reflecting...and I happened to take a path that led me to this...
a sound track I used over 10 years ago and lost when my computer crashed. Same exact sound track. This sound is amazing to me. It captivated me when I first heard it, and it still rings through my mind. LOVE it...

This would be near impossible to pull off in a rented venue, but if we could work it out...it would be truly amazing!

this is a ball...

2011-10-09T16:36:00.000-04:00

This is a ball…

It is a bouncy multi-colored ball that lights up when you drop it…
I found this bouncy ball at work one day…
It sparked a creative idea in my head…
I often wonder about creativity and how creativity happens.
I keep track of ideas I have that are inspired by the world around me. Sometimes I know exactly what the idea will lead to, other times I do not.
Specifically I deal with stage designing and experiential elements.

For example: one idea that I knew where I was going with it came from a quick simply question from my brother. Which was, “what do you think about QR codes?” This is what happened with that thought.

Another idea I had was from a rubber mat at a library. I have no clue when or where I will use the idea (it has to do with the “feel” of walking across the mat). Super bouncy.
This is my reminder of that mat. It's an actual picture of that inspirational mat.

Who knows…it will find a way into some sort of design or experiential element. I just don’t know when or what.
That is the way it is with creative ideas.

These are just a few things which have inspired creative ideas for staging & experiential elements:

A ceiling (at the Cheesecake Factory)
From retail establishments
Pony-tails
Scrabble board
TV
Simply exploring on the internet
A bouncy ball (which lit up)
Watching SYTYCD
Reading other creative’s blogs
Starbucks
Brainstorming with our team
Ikea
Talking with my brother (several ideas)
On top of a ladder
Doughnuts
Iconography
Reading the Bible
Old dilapidated church
Driving (this one is hard, because I either have to remember or stop and write the idea down)
Home Depot (amazing place)
The “Lion King” (the stage play)
Reading (in general)
S.T.O.M.P.
Various types of material
The stars in the sky

For me, this is the way the creativity happens, or the cookie crumbles, or the ball bounces...

this week isn't a "spider"...

2011-10-09T14:53:00.000-04:00

Everything creative flew out the window for this week.
This is the end of the “Useful Jesus” series.
While previously we were expanding on the “spider” stage set-up; this week was completely different.

When I am up on the ladder “flying” a design, I often will design in the air. Honestly, I walked in - with some sort of a concept in mind. But as I started to soar in the rafters; the design took on a life of it’s own.
Sometimes this happens.
Again, as with the majority of these designs, this was done with griff clips and safety pins. There you have it.

Oh, wait. I forgot, we did use an animated intro created by Rich Oster of the song "Come Alive", by the Foo Fighters. It was fun.

expanding on the "spider"...

2011-10-08T11:15:00.000-04:00

I think it's funny how stage designs get strange monikers. But that is how it works sometimes. This series got named the "heavenly spider".
We tend to do mini-series and the stage designs morph, as the series continues. Partly because we are a mobile church and have to strike the stage each week and re-set it up again the following week. Plus, as the series continues, things change and grow in the stage design to match the "feel" of the message.
This is how we have morphed the stage design for this series so far:

(if you are reading the facebook feed and wish to see all the photos, you will need to click over into the "view original post" link at the bottom of the note)
Week 1
Week 2, 3 & 4:

I haven't mentioned it in a while, all of these designs are created with our standard griff clips, safety pins and a tall ladder!
We have been interspersing some experiential/interactive elements in these messages. I will update those soon.
There you have it.

why I do, what I do…

2011-10-08T09:31:00.000-04:00

She was about 5 years old, smiling from beneath long auburn curls, clutching a teddy bear wearing Marine dress blues. We were chatting and laughing. She told me she was leaving on a plane to go to El Paso (TX).

How much fun! We talked about going “sledding” on the white sand dunes of White Sands Missile Range (in New Mexico).
We started talking about her bear- as her beautiful mom was sharing that all of this wee child’s parents (mom, dad and step-dad) are active duty Marines. Of course, I thanked the mom for her service and shared I was a Viet Nam Era Veteran.
Soon it came out that the reason for their visit to El Paso was to attend the little girl’s father’s funeral; who was killed in action in Afghanistan just this last Friday.
The tears started to well up in my eyes. The little one continued to share that she was the “primary” (beneficiary), and that she was going to get her daddy’s flag at the funeral.
I asked and then hugged them both; and said I would be praying for them this week.
As they were departing we said we would see each other again soon.
I certainly hope so.

Lord, please wrap your loving arms around this charming young child and her mom as they deal with giving so much to preserve our country.
________________________________________
This is part of the reason why I work as a simple barista at Starbucks.
In my life, random people I meet tend to simply share rather important things that are happening in their lives. It just happens. Is it because I take a little bit more time and listen to what they are actually saying? I am not sure. All I know is that this type of thing happens over and over and over again in my life.
- A man whose sister was dying of congestive heart failure.
- Another man, whose dog was suffering from cancer and ultimately died later that week.
- A woman who was dying of cancer (I later attended her funeral)
- Another person, whose best friend has relapsed with aggressive brain cancer.
- I sang Happy Birthday to someone (I do that often), who later shared I was the only person who acknowledge her special day.
- The woman whom I choose to hug, who said it was the first time someone had even touched her in years.
These are just a few of the stories I hear.
So why do I work as a simple barista? Because that is where God wants me to be – touching people’s lives in a seemingly random place like Starbucks.

the missing step #2

2011-10-06T10:59:00.000-04:00

What happened to step number 2? I literally just got the word that the (TVPRA Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act) didn't pass yet, so there is still time to contact your representative.
So step #2 is:
2. Sign the petition asking your U.S. Senator to Support the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) It has expired and needs reauthorization.

It is such a simple thing to do...
All the details you need are here: (you may need to click into the orginal post to find the link)
Click International Justice Mission.

"Congress voting to renew The Trafficking Victims Protection Act, whose current authorization expires on Sept. 30, the main U.S. law that makes human trafficking and modern-day slavery illegal, provides critical services for victims, and must be reauthorized by Congress every three years. Advocates and survivors are concerned that this year, funding for victim services - among other important provisions - will be cut."

what I did on the rainy weekend...

2011-10-06T10:58:00.001-04:00

The weekend of September 23rd and 24th; I went to a music fest and got VERY muddy. O.k. I didn't so much go to the music fest; but spent the entire weekend manning a Human Trafficking Awareness Booth at the fest. It constantly amazes me that people don't realize that there at 27 million people currently enslaved in our world, and a lot of those are enslaved in our country, in our state and in your town.
There were 9,500 people that that attended the music fest and we talked to at least 1,000 people at our booth.
Here are some of us at the Human Trafficking Booth from that weekend.

Four simply things that you can do now:
(you may need to click onto the orginal post to find the links)
1. If you aren't aware that human trafficking still exists; you need to become more aware and education yourself. Contact me and I can hook you up with information to read or arrange for you to attend a training class.
2. Oh no, what happened to step number 2? Read the next blog post.
3. Spread the word and educate others. This is so simple. Purchase and wear an awareness t-shirt. I've had amazing results with this.
I wear this shirt (and 5 others) in public:

Now note the hash marks on the sleeve and hem of the shirt. Each hash represents a person that has stopped me and asked me about what my shirt means. The red hash marks represent someone that I have exchanged information with and are now working with us in the local fight to end human trafficking.
It's so simple: all you have to do is get a t-shirt from Zazzle.com/httfnva
4. Buy the Freedom cd from Family Christian Bookstore, not on Amazon. It only cost $5 and every single penny goes towards International Justice Mission. It a really great album with artists like Third Day, Relient K, toby MAC, Mercy Me and Jars of Clay.
These are simple steps. Most you are able to do just sitting there at your computer.

the octopus or heavenly spider?

2011-09-06T10:07:00.000-04:00

Saw this design in July on Church Stage Design Ideas. It was created by Tyler Dunlop, from Bon Air Nazarene in Kokomo, Indiana The Octopus.
So I downloaded it into my my inspiration file.
Things have been changing yet again, and it's back to me doing the designing and implementation. Though I've got some additional people who will help out. Most of them are afraid of heights.
So I wound up on the ladder this week. Actually I found great joy in doing it. I really missed being able to implement designs with a ladder.
I find freedom in being able to implement it myself. I know exactly where I am going with the cloth. Sort of like designing in the air! And so much easier than trying to explain it to some one else.

Once I got the initial design up, I decided that I really needed "gold" something. The middle section just didn't work correctly. So off I went to Walmart.
This is what it looked like, after all was said and done (this is without the gold).

Still, not the best picture, but hopefully I will have more to post soon.
It was nicknamed the "heavenly spider" by the pastors. LOL.
It was definitely fun to be back in the saddle again.

the story of everything...

2011-09-02T14:48:00.000-04:00

Found this vid awhile back. We decided to use it at to re-cap the end of the year through the Bible series.
The creator (Rich Oster) lives in England and was gracious enough to give us permission to use his vid for our service.

close to the end…

2011-08-31T10:54:00.000-04:00

That’s correct, we are coming to the close of our year long study at CrossCurrent.
We just finished up the Minor Prophets and are closing out with, Revelation of course.
This is the staging requested by our pastor for the last two Sundays.

So, we are gearing up for the next series, using these as our basic design material. It's called Mio Nomad System. It's pretty nifty.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego

2011-08-20T13:14:00.000-04:00

Maybe not overly creative this week with the stage. You know, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, fire furnace, yada, yada.
But, we used this for for our countdown this week.
Louis Armstrong - Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego
Very interesting responses from people waiting in the lobby, when this vid started playing. They started turning around and looking at the vid monitor in the lobby. Which was cool. Was it because it was something outside of the norm? Something really retro?

why designing for Philistines...

2011-08-17T09:09:00.000-04:00

why designing for Philistines?

I thought I had explained my thought process behind designing for Philistines and I didn't. Doh!

This is a repost from June 2008, about why I blog here at "designing for Philistines".
What happened I started blogging when it occured to me couple major running themes going on in my blog…

1. The biggest one being that:
I am a freaky designer of cutting edge and culturally relevant (read something relevant to people after Jimmy Hendrix, Prince, the Spice Girls and after 9/11)
5S (using all 5 senses)
experiential worship elements...
I am obsessed with this concept. I spend hours and hours research, searching youtube and such.

2. AND I REALLY dislike terms like “seeker” and “lost”, unless you are referring to the t.v. show. I find them extremely condescending and churchy sounding and actually so do they.

Why Philistines? It’s all Jon - of scl fame’s fault…he’s one of my fav (and prolific) bloggers. In his post "Calling People Seekers" – he discusses what “we” Christians call “people who do not go to church”. It really resonated with what I have been feeling for a long time AND from what I hear from those wonderful “people who do not go to church”.

3. I spend a lot of time with those who hang out at the well (read: people who do not go to church), and I love them to pieces. Those are the people who I feel compelled to design for. I want them to get a chance to know this guy named Jesus.

I have tried to find an online community that is like minded and have not been able to find one, so I decided to start one.
This blog is geared to researching, designing and implementing culturally relevant elements for worship. I may be blogging for myself, then again there may be 17 more people like me out there in the blogsphere who are “seeking” this type of information.

We will see. So welcome...
this is designing for Philistines...

into the woods...

2011-08-07T10:31:00.001-04:00

No stage design this week.

We are off to Meadow Kirk for Baptism Sunday!

can you guess what this is?

2011-08-06T10:29:00.001-04:00

Been twirling design ideas around in my brain for our next series at CrossCurrent for a couple months. More to come.

This is what I have been looking at.

hooks...

2011-08-06T01:56:00.002-04:00

I love "hooks".
It is a means of attracting interest or an enticement. Mmmmm, I love enticement. Something that makes you think again.
For example in music, a hook is a musical idea, often a short riff that is used in popular music to make a song appealing and to "catch the ear of the listener".
I having trying really hard for a while to create thought "hooks" from one week to the next.
Not easy to do when people don't really buy into the concept.
But, we did manage to accomplish it with the QR codes. It mostly happened because of miscommunication. The presentation of the whole idea wasn't offered in week one of the series; so people were left with the "empty" feeling of why in the world were those strange blocks of dots everywhere? People were curious.
Thankfully, the next week it was explained really well. But, it did create a hook. Nice.
For me this darn kangaroo is a perfect example of a hook. I really liked the short lived series "Fast Forward". In the premiere, just before the first commercial they focused on this picture of a kangaroo-and said remember the kangaroo... Obviously they were going to explain it later in the series. I remembered the kangaroo-it caught my attention. Then the series ended abruptly and they never resolved "the why" of the kangaroo. UGH!
Now the kangaroo haunts me. THAT is a great hook.
So, currently, this picture is my desktop picture, as a reminder to remember the importance of the hook.
I will continue to weave "hooks" from one week to the next.

little cloud of bounciness...

2011-08-05T10:53:00.000-04:00

One day I was simply walking into a local library for a meeting. As I was walking in I stepped on a really cool mat in the entryway.
"Wow"! It was like stepping on a little cloud of bounciness. The feeling was very cool and fun. My instant thought was how am I going to incorporate this into an experiential element for - you guessed it - church.

So, I pulled out my camera to "capture" a picture as a reminder of this moment.
Seriously, this is how is works in my mind. I haven't had a chance to use this concept yet. But is is there-in my memory, waiting for the right moment...

musing on creativity...

2011-08-05T09:33:00.001-04:00

I’ve been musing about creativity and how it happens in the brain, again.
Honestly, I wonder if I am really creative or if I have more of a gift of extrapolation.

I often note there is a difference between artistic and creative. I don't feel that I am necessarily "artistic". But I do have an intrinsic "nose".
My mind constantly "sees" things that inspire some sort of creative gut check. I "see" a snippet; and think "Oh wow, what am I able to do with that?"
This is the ceiling from The Cheesecake Factory in Columbia, Md.

Another small example: I have used a simple faux mirror to interact with on stage for a dance routine.
After we had done that, I captured this frame from SYTYCD. Way cool! I had an idea, then I saw it somewhere else.

Or even more recently. I was watching SYTYCD and saw this...

I file these "snippets" away in my brain and hopefully my computer. I actually have a file entitled "inspiration & thoughts".
I also will blog about it, mostly just to keep the little idea locked down somewhere until it is needed.

Another key element is being well read. Constantly reading, watching, searching, looking, checking out...

Seriously, I study things like marketing (Very helpful)
Yet another thing I do is keep up with what is currently relevant.
Just this week, I was reading some articles on creativity by googling “how does creativity happen?” Some of the information I gleaned from this search was:
The second link I hit was “How does creativity happen?”, really good stuff.
-Even Albert Einstein once defined creativity as "combinatorial play," referring to the intellectual playfulness aspect of creativity, the putting things together in a new way.
-Ah, “putting things together in a new way”. That makes sense to my mind.
-Amy Tan abnormal chromosome
-and I found an e-book "Untitled"

The biggest revelation that I had during this research was - the average person isn't really wired for creativity and most people aren't willing to do the hard work that is involved in creative process.

be still...

2011-08-04T19:20:00.000-04:00

Found out about this video from his book "Untitled" Thoughts on the Creative Process.
This is abolutely brilliant...

BE HERE NOW from blaine hogan on Vimeo.

what you are able to do with a very small budget...

2011-08-04T10:09:00.000-04:00

With a little imagination & work; believe it or not, you can create impactful stage design elements on a very limited budget.
Here is an overview of some of the stages that we have created. Drama sets, Starbucks old promo's, interactive elements - most between $20-$50 to create.

We are a completely mobile church and though we do use some of the same ideas over series, we mostly create a new stage design each and every week. We have built up a nice colection of cloth to use on our stage. Simply by watching for sales, and hunting at Walmart.

So, I want to encourage people that are out there designing on a very small budget.

You can do it!

QR codes…

2011-08-04T09:13:00.001-04:00

Was going to make a larger QR code for this week, went to Kinko’s (second time in two weeks) and ran into a snare. The printer we were using @Kinko’s only did 3’x3’ images, and then we’d have to go to a photo printing machine that cost a lot more (double or triple). Honestly, considering that all of this comes out of my pocket-I went with the least expensive option. Oh, well. Needed to adjust on the fly. So dropped the idea of the 4’x4’ image and went with a 2’x2’ image and simply added and rearranged the images on the stage accordingly.
So, got the images printed, cut, glued onto the coroplast, cut again, holes punched, fishing line threaded through and hung with safety pins.

The pastor introduced the idea and explained QR codes: sort of understanding often comes through the type of "lens" you use to interpret things. He "snapped" a qr code (the first one in this slide show), which was simultaneously shown on the big screen. Then showed the picture that was associated with that QR code (the Ezekiel; "If you don't get it, you don't get it picture), which again was shown on the big screen.
Each QR code was self-generated and then populated somewhere on the internet.
We had QR code links to the following:
I converted and dedicated an old blogspot place I had for this message on Ezekiel. It was just so much easier to do myself than explain and ask people to populate images and txt in other locations. A lot of the images and txt where then simply added to the blogspot and QR code links created.
Like:
The Vision of The Valley of The Dry Bones by Gustave Doré (on Wikipedia), public domain image

Ezekiel by Michelangelo (on Wikipedia), public domain image
Ezekiel logo image with tag "If you don't get it..." blogspot
Image of New Jerusalem
Explanation of why we are doing the element.
The Most Important Story (from the Relevant Word)
So What (from the Relevant Word)
Smile God loves you (Easter egg, just a funny ha,ha)
Other locations: Think and Talk blog post for Ezekiel 25-48. A blog on our website about where we are in our year long study and pictures on the Creative Arts page on XC website
If you are reading on facebook, designing for philistines blogspot pictures of the stage this week.

just saying...it's A-bed-ne-go

2011-07-28T12:24:00.000-04:00

Couldn't help it.

if you don't get it, you don't get it...

2011-07-26T08:41:00.001-04:00

What do QR codes have to do with church and particularly with Ezekiel?
The concept behind this stage design (follow link to the actual concept), was to populate and incorporate QR codes on the stage and through out the lobby and auditorium. This was to create an experiential element where people would use the QR code readers on their cell phones-to seek out more information about the subject of this weeks message on Ezekiel.
For example: I found images that were "public domain", like this painting of Ezekiel by Michelangelo, which was posted on Wikipedia.

For this picture, I simply captured the URL for the location of the jpeg and feed the URL into a QR code generator.
Then I downloaded the QR code into my files, changed it from bmp to a jpeg file.
Then I went to Kinko's and had it printed in a 12" x 12" format.
Took it home and pasted the image on coroplast with rubber cement.
Cut the coroplast, punched holes at the top, strung it with fishing line and used a safety pin to hang it on the curtains on the stage.

I also generated some copy on an old blogspot and dedicated it to images and posts about Ezekiel from our study book, "Revealing the Relevant Word". Repeated the process of translating the URL into a QR code, printing, etc.

This was what the results looked like on stage this week.

Lessons learned:
The stage QR codes needed to be larger, for overall appearance and for application.
This coming week, we will incorporate a few more QR codes (larger) and move some of the smaller ones closer to the front of the stage.
Also, we are working more closely with the teaching pastor to incorporate the explanation into the message.
Let's see how it goes this coming week.

EZEKIEL: “If You Don’t Get It-You Don’t Get It “

2011-07-24T02:00:00.004-04:00

Fire up your QR app or download a QR reader app and get ready to interact with technology and learn more about Ezekiel’s prophecies.

It all started with a simple convo with my brother Brice Holland, an ad exec, asking me what I thought about QR codes.
Basically a QR (Quick Response) code is a matrix bar coded with information stated by a "link" that can be snapped and captured by a reader (eg. cell phone) to receive information.
How did we transform that into an interact/experiential element for our Sunday morning experience?

EZEKIEL: “If You Don’t Get It-You Don’t Get It “

First, the tagline is based on a Washington Post marketing campaign (for the white paper) from 2007. I always felt it was an interesting juxtaposition between trying to increase “white paper” (dead tree types) readership in a internet media obsessed world. They of course, were referring to peoples knowledge, based on the premise that those who ‘got it”-got it because they were reading the Post.

Since Ezekiel is full of prophetic imagery. It is often difficult to “get” what is being said, unless “you get it”. The main thought/bridge for this element is to utilize self-generated Quick Response Codes (QR codes) to convey the thought of “If you don’t get it- you don’t get it”. A QR code is a specific matrix barcode (or two-dimensional code) that is readable by dedicated QR barcode readers and camera telephones. The code consists of black modules arranged in a square pattern on a white background. The information encoded may be text, URL, picture or other data.

QR codes are currently being used as a marketing technique to engage technology savvy consumers, to interact to a concept through their QR apps and smart phones. People that “get it - get it”.

While brainstorming for creative elements for the Ezekiel messages it was decided that we would: Self-generate and post QR codes through out the lobby before service and possibly during the message.
Using a QR Code Generator: enables you to create and post: URL, text, phone number & SMS. We decided it would probably would be safest to post info on our website and self-generate the QR codes to lead people there.

Example: This self generated QR code:

When snapped and read by a QR code reader application would lead to this picture - posted on a dedicated blogspot:

Stage concept: populate and hang QR codes at the front door, through out the lobby at the breakfast bar, on the stage.

Pictures of the various locations and stage where we posted QR codes to follow.

lazy day -cool vids

2011-07-16T14:17:00.000-04:00

If you haven't heard of jonnybaker: worship tricks, you should check him out. Both of these videos were created by Rich and Fiona Oster. SUPER!
Found this last week (simply ignore the spelling mistake & continue to follow the storyline):

Found this today:

Here has been blogging for nine years-and has some really great worship tricks!

I am simply a grand-mother in jeans and a human-trafficking t-shirt...

2011-07-16T11:26:00.002-04:00

Have you been thinking I have been missing in action? Well, that is certainly one way to describe it...
This morning I am sitting around in my jammies and drinking an iced Starbucks Double Shot.
It’s the first morning in weeks; I have just been able to kick-back.

There has been a lot going on and I’ve had to stay completely focused on my goal.
Birth of grandbaby number 6 – check
Negotiate a terrible pay cut at work – check
Track mom, who had cataract surgery - check
Tracking two extended family members going through reconstructive facial surgery and throat surgery - check
Road trip to Pittsburgh for Human Trafficking gathering – check
Oh and the main goal – taking an idea that has been in my head for months and putting down on paper.

Rewind to a couple of weeks ago:
A lot of you may know that I have been very actively involved in addressing the issue of modern day slavery. I’ve been diligently working on a local Human Trafficking Task Force here in Northern Virginia.
Through out this process I have been praying and asking God what He wants me to do. More literally, what He wanted the next step to be for me.
I kept seeing this huge vision of:
1. Creating a nationwide network of volunteers to join the fight
2. Creating a home for the restoration of trafficking humans
3. Creating a dance/creative performance arts group to raise awareness of the human trafficking issue.
So, one day I am checking through my "blog designing for Philistines". I follow several blogs and I noticed one person, blogger Jonny Baker had posted "Got a good idea for social transformation?" . That really caught my attention, so I clicked over.

It was short and to the point. Is simply said:

praxislabs is a new program that supports social entrepreneurs engaging in transformation from a Christian/mission perspective. if you've got a good idea and want to be connected into a network of fellows with the chance to raise some funding towards your idea/dream go and have a read…

Well that certainly piqued my interest. So again I clicked over and started reading about the Praxis Accelerator Program. I thought o.k. this is interesting I will download the application and pray about it.

I did.

The next morning I got up and went back to the Praxis Lab website and read everything. I got the strong feeling that I should at least apply.
So, I decided to quick check on my fb page to catch up-before I started to work on my application.
Cool. Reading fast...and another blogger I follow, Jon Acuff @ Stuff Christian’s Like, had just posted his newest blog post entitled "A new way to change the world". Now that sounded very interesting to me. So I clicked…

He was talking about…wait for it…the Praxis Accelerator Program! Can you say WoW!
You need to understand I do not believe in coincidences. So, I left this comment: and logged off.

I was just checking out my fb page to catch up - before I logged off to work on writing on my application for...wait for it...the Praxis Accelerator Program...
I have been praying for God to show me my next step in His plan of action for my life. The info on Praxis dropped in my lap yesterday and I have been praying since. I literally had just applied for the application moments before logging onto fb and clicking on this post.
Needless to say, I didn't need skittles thrown at me to get my attention.
The big hairy dream: I am currently a modern day abolitionist, involved in ending human trafficking in my area. We are mobilizing churches and various ht.orgs, law enforcement and many more people in our area to come to the table and serve together. Working as one body.
One of the biggest issues I have learned about is that while there are many great ht.orgs nationwide & internationally-there is little networking between organizations.
This is my overall vision: mobilizing the Body of Christ and uniting all the various organizations to end slavery in one generation.
That is just the short version. Now I am of to work on my application.

Keep reading…

So, I started working on the application for about an hour. Decided to take a break & hop off the computer, but I would check on Jon Acuff’s blog one last time.
I went back and found this reply to my comment from Dave Blanchard (Praxis Founder & President)

“Dorothy - can't wait to read your application. Modern day abolition is such an important cause and I'm thankful to hear about people like you thinking about bringing people together to work on it. “

Well, needless to say, by this time I was overwhelmed. I actually started crying. I walked around my house, thanking God for this open door.
So I began my journey working on the application for this mentorship program and finished up yesterday and applied.
I am not sure where this will all lead. A lot of other things have happened since the time I started the application, all confirmations of what I have been dreaming about.
Now presenting the final take of the video introduction for this application:

I'm not normal, I'm xtranormal: take 3

I just continue to take one step at a time. I am very excited about what is happening!

little bitty rubber ducks...

2011-07-15T07:35:00.001-04:00

little bitty rubber ducks...an explanation of why of why the stage looks so empty.

This was created in September 2009.

i am not normal, i am xtranormal...

2011-07-14T11:27:00.002-04:00

shards...

2011-06-26T11:08:00.004-04:00

Ah, the hands of the potter...
Jeremiah: fairly simply leap from the potters concept to having a live potter on stage as the creative element.
The potter is a gal I know from another local church, who I met on the Human Trafficking Task Force. Her name is Brittany Tomick. She has been taking a pottery class and agreed to come help us out with this creative piece.

The poem was written in house by Milynda Foushee
If you would like to see and hear the element, you are able to find it at about min. 52:50 http://www.crosscurrent.org/media_player.asp?messageID=95780

-Shards-
(this is the first draft)
I wanted to spit deep rythms that changed minds
Stare deeply into the pupils of the Word and until I became an eloquent pupil that
Was able to expound on the deep preverbal notions written centuries ago
But I am not that deep
Sorry

When I think about God changing me – I cringe
I cringe at the prospect of God’s hands molding me away from my old ways
Those old, familiar ways
I. Love. Me.
I love the fallacy of me
I love the pain of me
It is familiar
It is love – right?

I can’t live without it
I pray about it night and day “Lord, why in the world did you make me like this?”
And when I breathe…it overcomes my very being
Causing me to believe that I am in the reject pile – usable but just not beautiful
But this is the way that God made me right?

And yet, every time that I call out to Him – He is insistent on changing me
Can’t He just help me without changing me?
He takes this marred pot and begins to shape it into this … this vessel to be used by Him
Doesn’t He know who and what I am –
This marred, broken, bitter, fallen, hurt, ugly, rejected lump
He knows – right?

I try to warn Him
There are shards in this clay – they will cut through your hands like nails
But He keeps pulling and measuring me
Why
Why choose this pain?
Doesn’t He know what this will feel like
Like a crown of thorns on thin skinned flesh
Like a whip that stays on a lover’s back for a few seconds too long
Like death
An ultimate sacrifice paid for a sinner
He is listening – right?

And yet
And yet He lovingly caresses me
Relentlessly pursues perfection in me
Endures the toughness of me
His tears smooth out my rough edges – revealing the true beauty of me
I want to melt in His hands
Be shaped by Him
Molded, caressed, touched, loved by Him
Pulled and measured by Him
He brings friction to my inner most being, causing me to change – sweetly – in the palm of His hand
This is love – right?

When I breathe – His love overcomes my very being
When I pray – I talk intimately with Him “Lord, I can’t believe you made me like this. Beautiful, full of joy, blessed and accepted.”
I can’t live without Him.
I think this is love
I cringe at the prospect of remaining the same as I was
So I surrender all just to be near Him
I love the pain of the molding
I. Love. Him
I am in love with Him
His love is deep and I want to dive in.
Ah Lord
Your love for me rescued me

listening...

2011-06-24T12:21:00.000-04:00

simply that.
I am listening...

D4F (Dancing 4 Freedom)

2011-06-16T09:18:00.000-04:00

Have you ever had a super ginormous, crazy - hairy idea?
This idea is called “La Casita”; a little house making a big difference.
The idea has been percolating for years now. With a lot of pieces to the puzzle.
Today I’m sharing just one of these pieces.

It’s D4F (Dancing 4 Freedom)

Since I have started to becom educated on the human trafficking problem I have been praying for what “Action Plan” God has for me to do. This is what I have been hearing: start a creative performance arts group focusing on awareness and restoration.
The first part is to develop a dance troupe (and other performance arts) focused on raising awareness of the human trafficking/justice through performance arts show. To bring stories alive. As we progress: offer an opportunity for victims of trafficking to have a creative outlet for their restoration process.
There is a lot more to this adventure. This is just the first step. Stay tuned for more updates.

why, oh why didn't I use spell check?

2011-06-11T10:41:00.001-04:00

What do you do when you have created a product (t-shirt) and forgot to use spell check?

Well, you use your noodle!
I have started a store at zazzle.com: httfnva and I am creating t-shirts to raise awareness of the human trafficking issue here in Northern Virginia. ALL proceeds will go towards ending human trafficking here in Northern Virginia.
The first shirt I made I spelled a word wrong. UGH!

Well, this is how I solved the problem; with a sharpie! Not perfect by any means, but hey it works. If they do *ask me, I respond with: "are you more concerned about the typo or about the fact that slavery still exists?"
Now I can wear my shirts without too much embarassment. LOL.
That shirt no longer "exsists" in the httfnva store. There are new ones now. There is one for Northern Virginia, Loudoun County and Fairfax County.
Each has a QR code on the back that leads to the National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC), run by Polaris Project with the hotline number 1.888.3737.888. I will be adding more as I get a chance.
Now let's see if I have any typos in my blog post.

really, really, really, really, really excited…

2011-06-11T07:29:00.000-04:00

Imagine: if you could go anywhere in the world. Where would you go?

We would all have different journeys, with different modes of transportation and steps to arrive at our chosen destination. Some would use their gps, others would use a paper map, some would fly and some would need a passport. Yet all with the same goal of arriving at your destination.

We are about to embark on a journey of abolition; to be the “hands and feet” of God’s people to abolish the heinous problem of human trafficking that is occurring in our back yard here in the D.C. Metro area. There are many pathways or journeys where God will prompt His people.

We are here to travel together, yet each on a unique journey that God has planned specifically for each one of us.
The goal is to ignite passion, create “smart” abolitionists, through awareness/education, networking people together based on where their heart is calling them and then travel into the world with an action plan to abolish human trafficking.

Over the last year, CrossCurrent has been on this journey. This Sunday is historic. We are gathering our people for our first mini-awareness meeting. We will meet from 5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m. at the “Piano XPress”, 20608 Gordon Park Square, Suite 190 Ashburn, VA 20147

If you can’t attend this first session; then sign up for the next step. We will be hosting two additional awareness trainings specifically designed to increase understanding of how to “see” what is happening in your backyard.

These training dates are:
Sunday, June 26 from 3:00 - 5:00 (location TBD)
Saturday, July 23 from 10:00 - 12:00 (location TBD)
If you would like to join us on this journey, contact me (through fb or the “Designing for Philistines” blogspot and I will give you further information.

Psalms…

2011-06-07T10:59:00.000-04:00

Also, through out this series on Psalms, we had various people write their own Psalms. It was truly inspiring.

"tweek three" Isaiah

2011-06-05T16:34:00.000-04:00

Today was a lot of fun. Walked into the middle school with a plan, within minutes I had changed the plan because of various items I saw when I walked in. So here goes, these pics show the progression from week one - this week.
week one

tweek two

tweek three

What changed was a few things. The school where we meet has a great arts program/teacher. One of the projects from last year, was painted benches. Well, for some reason these same benches were displayed in the lobby today when we walked into the school. I looked at them (I love these pieces) and started reading what the students has written on them.

On the Matisse piece was written:
"How can I be useful? of what service can I be?"
"Conscience is a man's compass"
"Happiness is in the joy of achievement"
On the Frank Lloyd Wright piece:
"The things always happens that you really believe in and the belief in a thing makes it happen"
So I decided in an instant to use the pieces on the stage today.
Also in the auditorium, there were two folding tables just leaning up against the stage. Cool. I set them up behind the drummer, covered them in black and started stacking the red tables and lights on them.
That was it.
So this is the overall look achieved this week.

Oh and the message: was on seeking justice. Actually doing something. Greg talked about the human trafficking issue again and we now have a starting plan of action for XC. We challenged people to pray about the issue (dedicated time during the service for that) and to sign-up for further education/awareness on the topic. Which we are having an awareness session next Sunday evening. We had a lot of people sign-up the week of March 13th. We had many more sign-up today.
That same week in March - we had people signed cards of petition to be hand carried to our Senators office petitioning to support changes to our state’s laws to criminalize trafficking. To give more teeth to our currents laws. We had about 30 more people sign today.
I am really excited about what happened today, both on stage and in the hearts of people today. A lot has happened in the last year when this topic was first brought up in a message.

seek justice…

2011-06-04T05:47:00.000-04:00

Heading back in time again to the week of March 13th week was a whirlwind of last minute changes. I even forget where we were originally were going with our creative element. But it all changed in the blink of an eye.

It started when some of us went to interview (on Friday) with a representative from the International Justice Mission (IJM), which btw, isn’t just international!

We came back to the offices energized and just “happened” (yea, right) to run into the pastor who was teaching that coming Sunday. He was really feeling called to hit hard on the issue of seeking justice. So were we.
We decided to show a video from IJM, which raised awareness on the issue of human trafficking. Then we simply created a call to action table.

People signed cards of petition to be hand carried to our Senators office petitioning to support changes to our state’s laws to criminalize trafficking. To give more teeth to our currents laws.

Also we had people who are interested in eliminating the human trafficking issue in our area sign up for further training. We had over 40% of our people sign up.

This was in March. I tell you exciting things are happening. Keep reading to see how all this continues to play out.

heinous act of modern slavery...

2011-06-02T06:42:00.000-04:00

"Think slavery ended in 1865? Think again." Believe it or not, modern day slavery exists. Not just overseas, but more than likely in your town. Whether it is domestic slavery, labor or sexual trafficking, it exists.

For the last few months, I have been serving on the Human Trafficking Task Force (httf).
We were tasked by our pastor’s consortium to research and find the gap in our county and to recommend an action plan to address the human trafficking issue in Loudoun County, VA. We did this by:

1. Identify existing organizations in Loudoun and the surrounding areas who are dealing with or have the potential to be dealing with human trafficking on some level
2. Conduct (usually face-to-face) informational interviews with leadership at each of these organizations to identify their awareness level, the strengths of their organization, and the gaps they’ve identified in addressing human trafficking in Loudoun
3. Report on these findings, especially the gaps
4. Brainstorm, based on research, possible recommendations based on findings/gaps

We presented our recommendations to the Loudoun Pastors Consortium yesterday.
This has been an exciting, yet sobering journey. You will see more to come on this issue…

love God, love others, serve the world…

2011-06-01T07:30:00.000-04:00

Just a short note to say I love being part of a group of people that seeks to help the lost, the skeptic, and the disenfranchised. We have had prostitutes; one who is now serving as a missionary in China. We have parolee’s; some that have returned to prison that we still minister to. We have our own biker “gang”, who does outreach to prisoners, strippers and many more. This is just a part of who we are.

We are not perfect by any stretch of the imagination. But there is a true heart of seeking justice.

Submitting ourselves to truly:

no diagonals again...

2011-05-31T10:06:00.000-04:00

Well, here is "tweek" two of Isaiah.
Didn't use diagonal hanging again.
We will see what happens for "tweek" three.
I must say I enjoy the effect of the lamps, when the house and bands lights are low.

Here is week one for comparison.

Simple. Acts = Holy Spirit

2011-05-28T09:41:00.000-04:00

Completely created with safety pins, fishing line and cloth.

stepping back into winter…

2011-05-27T09:35:00.000-04:00

I got sidetracked with blogging stage designs earlier this year. So much going on, but now it’s time to back track and fill in the gaps.
The series was entitled “The Kingdom”. As the story goes: the Israelites wanted God to give them an earthly king. God said “O.k.” Always remember to be careful what you ask/pray for.
The story ambles through the prophet Samuel, King Saul, King David & Absalom and more.
First two weeks of 1st & 2nd Samuel, 1st & 2nd Kings, 1st & 2nd Chronicles stage design are captured here.
Now, the last two weeks.

Within a mini-series, I will often use the same materials. But, particularly since we are a mobile church and load in and out completely each week: I tend to tweak the stage design each week within a series.

The third week’s design focused on remembering to praise God. King David was a man of many faults. But one of the things that defined David as a great leader was he accepted responsibility and remembered to praise God.
For this week, the stage design was a continuation of the crown. We added in a interactive element, where we encouraged people to re-focus on praising God. It was simple. A large piece of foam-core, with sticky notes for people to write on. We also created a space for creative people to draw or write on a large piece of paper taped to the floor. The speaking pastor also used props during his message. I always enjoy that.

Fourth week: the destruction off the Kingdom. The nation of Israel was destroyed, divided.
There seemed to be no choice but the take the crown and literally cut it up into pieces and hung it up again. This set of designs was fun for me creatively. To be able to capture the rise and fall of the nation of Israel through coroplast & cloth was exciting.

Side note: I highly recommend reading “Tale of Three Kings”, A study on brokenness (Gene Edwards). It is an amazing book on brokenness. If you have ever been hurt, broken, shattered by church, you will learn a lot from reading this book.

complete idiot’s guide to fishing line = fiasco

2011-05-24T08:26:00.000-04:00

Or literally “oh, snap”.

Most every stage design at XC is created with fishing line, griff clips or safety pins. These are our basic tools.

This week (Isaiah) I asked my husband if I could have “some” fishing line. What he gave me was .009 in. line, which I assume is fly line (use to create fishing lure flies). Well, what I failed to mention was that I needed a heavy test (weight) line. Generally I use 200 lb. plus in stage designing. My bad. Did some shuffling, people were contacted (thank you to some of the manly men at church) and still didn't get what I needed on time.

So the “diagonal” portions of the design didn’t go up this week.

This is what the stage looked like this week.

The lamps and red end tables are from Ikea.

The diagonal pieces are items I got from Starbucks. What you see mid-way in the slide show is from a design last year. They will be used this coming week.

We are in Isaiah for three weeks. I will use variations of this set design for two more weeks.

Lesson Learned: Remember to be more detailed when asking for something.

if you don't get it, you don't get it...

2011-05-18T08:29:00.000-04:00

Do you get it?

Fascinating discussion yesterday via facebook message and real time convo about QR (Quick Response) codes. Basically a QR code is a matrix bar coded with information stated by a "link" that can be snapped and captured by a reader (eg. cell phone) to receive information.
It fits right into a theory I developed several years ago. It's a demographic tag that crosses It isn’t defined by age/generation . It is defined by technology and mindset.

GEND Simply stated you either are digitally connected or not. You either get it or you don’t get it. This digitally enhanced/enabled media is re-defining the boundaries on how various social groups and generations interface with each other.

So how does play into what I do? The results of polling a multi-generational group (ages 24-54) of about 12 people: the results showed age had NOTHING to do with who knew about QR codes. The interesting thing was, when it was explained almost everyone knew what we were talking about, they had "seen" it-then they got it.
So we started brainstorming and will are going to use a QR code linked to a message about Ezekiel. What was "seen" by Ezekiel didn't make a lot of sense until you understand what was in the message.
Looking forward to this one.

oh, no...a bikini top

2011-05-16T08:30:00.000-04:00

This week is about stage design bloopers. Sometimes you get a lot more than you bargained for when you stand back and look at a stage design.
The scenario: I was producing and the only one working on the stage design. It makes for a very busy Sunday morning.
I quickly put the stage design up. Stood back and someone said "oh, it looks like a bikini top."
Now, in the scope of things a bikini top appearing in the stage design isn't too bad. Just not needed. It could be a distraction for some. So, it was a quick fix. I generally have extra bolts of cloth with me in my car. I just pulled some out, added an extra "swoosh". Problem solved.

Lesson Learned: "Always check with others". I know this one. Been there, done that before. If you've done any design work at all-you know that you have to be on the look out for: how shall I say this delicately? Unintended random body parts.

I think the funniest one was when the initial design looked like an uncircumcised (Philistine) body part. So glad somebody noticed THAT week!

His ways are not our ways...

2011-05-08T07:41:00.000-04:00

I recently revealed how much of creative stage design is work and some is just thinking & vapor…
Well this week, I had NOTHING. Absolutely NOTHING. Seriously, I read the appropriate scriptures, studied, prayed, thought...NOTHING.
Finally, I just gave up. That's right. Gave-up. I notified the Sunday morning team, I wouldn't have a stage design and would just be there for church. Hey, it was even Mother's Day. I enjoyed not having to get up at 5:00 to head in for load-in and set-up.
So, I walk into church, sat with my family, worshipped, kicked back to listen to the sermon...
then saw this...

Then I understood. (Sorry the pic to so bad. Used my really old cell phone).

There needed to NOT be a stage design this week. The entire focus was on those five music stands, with the words EVENT, UNDERSTANDING, BELIEFS, ACTION, OUTCOME.

Of course, it fit perfectly with the message. Revealing the Relevant Word: Proverbs.

Proverbs 3:5-6

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him, and He will make your paths straight.

I wish I could say I had the wisdom to understand what was happening beforehand. I didn't. But, I did simply trust. I didn't try to force a stage design. Lesson learned.

blessing of thorns...

2011-05-01T10:36:00.054-04:00

A giant stem of a rose, hanging all by itself at the back of the stage and the actually flower of the rose hanging far away, drooping. You call this a blessing?
You want a massive challenge?
At CrossCurrent, we have been reading through the entire Bible in a year.
In our creative process, when we are creating elements for the message each week, we are usually planning at least six weeks out. We agreed to read ahead, keep it up and pray about what we should do for a creative element each week.
May 1st, was Psalms 135-150.
When I was reading the scriptures for this week, I was also doing a little researching online, which I frequently do. Somehow I wound up at my previous denominations website and found a story turned into a drama entitled "Blessing of Thorns"

It just seemed to speak exactly to where David's heart was when he was writing these Psalm's. We didn't so the drama, it is really more of a story built around Thanksgiving; but the thought really worked.
So, this is what I did for the stage this week.

I made a giant rose and leaves out of red and green tissue paper. Then I took two tubes from wrapping paper, and wrapped green floral tape around then and built in large cardboard thorns along the stem.
It sounded like a simple idea, but man, implementation was lot harder than I expected.
If you care to read the story, this is the link to the pdf online: http://www.discipleshomemissions.org/files/DW-GP-BlessingOfThorns.pdf. It is actually worth the read.
Oh well, live and learn.

rainy Saturday and the red door...

2011-04-24T09:00:00.001-04:00

Every curious about how stage designs get done?
This is part of our Creative Team, who gathered on a rainy Saturday to prepare a stage/set design to support an in house sketch written for Easter Sunday. We had a really great time!

Here is the actual performance from Easter.

And this is what the stage looked like on the morning of Easter.

Last, but not least this is the image that was created for our newspaper ads. Love it!

I spend a LOT of my Saturdays, preparing the various elements for the stage design each week. Trust me they don't just magically appear.

bronze planters, l.c.d. votives & little lambies…

2011-04-17T18:10:00.000-04:00

Stuffing a a cute lillte lambie in the brazen alter? What in the world? LOL. Yep that is what I did. For our next set of lessons, I went to the Dollar Store again, and looked around for various individual pieces that we could use to interact with.
Over the next three weeks, we broke down the individual pieces of the tabernacle. The goal was to create child friendly pieces for the children to interact with. I broke the lessons down in the same order I did the first week. Outer court, inner court and Holiest of Holies.
Each week we would talk about what would happen at each place in the tabernacle and how it relates to things we do today.

We had rubberized mats with outlines of the tabernacle elements.
1. A bronze planter represented the brazen alter.
We talked about the difference between a sacrificial offering and a thanks offering.
2. A stuffed lamb to represent the unblemished animal that was sacrificed on the brazen alter.
We talked about the link between the unblemished lamb used for the sacrifice – to how Jesus was considered to be the “Perfect Lamb of God”. I found it to be very interesting that they actually got that concept. Never underestimate the mind of a child.
3. A plastic bowl was the laver. (painted bronze).
4. An L.C.D. votive light stood in for the lampstand.
5. We used an actual small incense burner (painted gold) for the incense alter.
6. Painted a little cardboard container gold with 12 round pieces of brown felt to symbolize the showbread table.
7. Then Gold angels on a stick, to be a symbol for the Ark of the Covenant. We have been talking about how Holiest of Holies was the place where God rested with the Israelites. But, no one had access there, since God was so Holy and people were not.

And the very last piece was a simple paper towel. With Easter coming in two weeks, we discussed how the Perfect Lamb of God, died on the cross. But the real miracle that happened was at that very moment, the veil in the temple tore in half. (I didn’t go into the difference between the tabernacle and the temple). Allowing everyone access to be in relationship with God. Then we ripped the paper towel in half. They got it! They got it!

Each week, we sang and had coloring sheets. The last photos in the slideshow: I had printed as photos that the children had more realistic images of what we had been talking about, wth the name written on the back. Sort of like flashcards. At the end everyone went home with a red bucket and pieces for our own tabernacle set, including the very loved lambie. Even the youngest children (18 months & 2 years old), were able to place the pieces of the tabernacle where they belonged. It was really cool.

It was really fun for me that each week during the adult series in Psalms, a reference would be made in the message on the exact portion of the tabernacle study I was working on with the children. How cool is that!
This is the end of our 5 week study. I look forward to doing it again.

Palm Sunday 2011

2011-04-17T09:09:00.000-04:00

Simple, simple, simple.
We focused on corporate communion.
These more traditional liturgical banners were created by the wonderful Emily Firestone. She is the lady who God sent - as an answer to prayer for someone who could sew.
It all started with the fact that we were celebrating a Messianic Passover with one of our sister congregations Kehilat Sar Shalom for the second year. We were needing some type of space design for the venue of this event.
So we created the idea of emphasizing the communion elements. They were sewn by Emily.

When the banners were finished, we realized that they would be perfect for our Palm Sunday.
So they were used twice.

turning dollhouse furniture into the tabernacle...

2011-04-15T16:54:00.000-04:00

How do you turn dollhouse furniture into mini-models replicating the O.T. tabernacle? I just finished teaching the second session of the pre-school Bible study. For the first week’s lesson, I created a mini-tabernacle made from cut up doll house furniture and other random items.

You are able to actually purchase a Tabernacle Model Kit for $49 plus shipping/handling. It looks nice. But I didn’t feel that would work, since I like to send the children home with items they are able to interact with and tell the story over and over again.
I had an idea of what shapes I am looking for. Have some thoughts on where I could find the various items. Like for the tabernacles articles. I thought it might be good to go to Michael’s and look for doll house furniture that could be taken apart and used in pieces.

Then I went shopping. Went to Michael’s, then Wal-Mart & World Market.
Michael’s I found several pieces of doll house furniture, mini-angels. Wal-Mart: wooden dowels, shapes & glue. Found the bowl for laver at World Market.

Next I cut up the furniture, took off the metal hardware, painted and then reassembled.

I found a really cool laminated brochure that I used.
For the lesson, I explained each item in the tabernacle, what it was used for and passed around the little models. I showed them where they went in the tabernacle, and what they were made of.

Outer Court (items made of bronze)
brazen alter
laver

Inner Court (items made of gold)
lampstand
alter of incense
table of shewbread (showbread)

Holiest of the Holies (cedar & gold)
Ark of the covenant.

Each week we sing our song “The More You Know the Bible”. This particular week we ended with the importance of praising and worshiping God. So we did just that.
We sang, danced and played instruments to:
“You’re Love Never Fails” (Jesus Culture)
“Praise Awaits You” (Matt Redman)
“Facedown” (Matt Redman)
The first and last songs are personal favorites of the children in the study.

So, there you have it.

seeing the bigger picture...

2011-02-15T08:05:00.001-05:00

Just a short note here. I am now serving on a local Human Trafficking Task Force. We are simply a group of people from various churches that have a passion for ending human trafficking. While we are focusing on finding and filling the "gap" here in our county; I keep seeing a much bigger picture.
I'm talking a ginormous, big, hairy picture.
It's hard to completely define at this point but:
It includes creating a dance/performance arts group. And I don't dance (LOL)
Building a place of restoration for victims of trafficking and abuse. Called "La Casita" a little house making a big difference. This concept geared more towards a community center, has been on my heart for years.
Creating some sort of nation-wide coalition of believers to address the issue of modern day slavery.
Creating some way of getting the word out about trafficking. To engage people I meet on the street about the issue. Maybe t-shirts?
Don't know where this is going. I am being transformed. I see it, I don't get where it is going. But, that's o.k. I learned a long time ago, when God is speaking, I just wait, listen and don't ask a lot of questions.
Just letting it percolate...

right choices are always followed by right feelings...

2011-02-13T09:39:00.003-05:00

This week was a personal testimony of restoration from a wonderful couple.

Testimony of Restoration

creativity is easy, implementation is hard work...

2011-02-08T10:00:00.000-05:00

A lot of creative elements is work and some is just thinking & vapor…
Sometimes I imagine that some people think a stage design just shows up in my car and we put it together. Not so… Sadly it is hard to explain what the creative thinking entails. Looks so simple, when I look at the photos. And sadly I didn’t get pictures of the laver and brazen altar fire. Oh well…

Here goes: This is How to Create the Temple Elements in 60 Easy Steps:
1. Meeting one: by txt. Can we do temple set-up again. Think. Pray. O.k. Will need extra people.
2. Research previous temple set-up. What do I still have, what do I need. How am I going to do it?
3. Shopping at two different Walmarts and Michaels.
4. Draw out ideas and set-up
5. Meeting:
6. In between shopping at Ikea.
7. Think. Pray.
8. Type up general directions for set-up team and meeting. Posted on basecamp.
9. Search pictures on-line for team.
10. Think.
11. Found laver. And items for brazen altar.
12. Oh yes, in between all of this I read 2 Chronicles.
13. Took notes.
14. Painted laver gold. Wrong color. Ugh!
15. Research the Temple set-up. Think.
16. Looked at all the cloth in car. Need to find all the shiny cloth (bronze, gold and silver) and chiffon (at least 4-6 pieces)
17. Type up general directions for set-up team and meeting. Posted on basecamp.
18. Meeting. Work on details. Prep team. Explain how it will work.
19. Think: Decided not to do brazen altar.
20. E-mail reminder for 6:30 a.m. call at school for set-up.
21. Think about setting up crown and think about the nebulas idea of the “glory of the LORD”.
22. Went to CVS for power strip
23. Get bread mix.
24. Clean two folding tables.
25. Pulled out plug-ins. Get urn.
26. Make bread.
27. Take bronze plate down from wall (it hangs in my living room), get legs out of attic.
28. Study temple set up again (location of the elements in the temple) online and confirm various materials (gold vs. bronze, etc) each element was made of.
29. Make a list.
30. Type more detailed instructions for team. Printed out.
31. Never found incense bowl used before. Came up with alternative. An old salad bowl.
32. Painting incense bowl bronze.
33. Load half the things in my car.
34. Located and gathered safety pins.
35. Go to office. Found bronze cloth and 3 pieces of chiffon. And candelabras, left two because they did not fit in my car.
36. Ran some cloth thought the dryer to get wrinkles out. Rolled up.
37. Rolled up yet more cloth.
38. Txt to find other cloth.
39. Finish list. Bed.
40. Wake up at 5:00
41. Finish loading car.
42. Camera, coffee, Bible, bag, cleaning material..
43. Pray. Drive to school for 6:30 call.
44. Decided not to use crown.
45. Unload car and haul it in.
46. Bronze piece for laver didn’t dry. Ugh! Bronze paint everywhere.
47. Txt’s. Some people are running late.
48. Did the showbread set-up while waiting. Organized various pieces.
49. Lampstand done by producer.
50. Deploy team with instructions. One team on laver, one team on cloth on stage, one team on incense.
51. Will need ladder.
52. Set-up plug-ins for incense smell. Had to work with person.
53. Future note: need to label the various scents.
54. Need to raise level of certain pieces. Think. Move rolling cabinets all the way around to raise one piece. Cover in cloth.
55. O.k. I am going to do it. Create on the fly the “glory of the LORD”. It worked. Yippee!
56. Asked to raise a second element higher. Hmmm…get conductors platform from back stage and wrap in golden cloth.
57. Asked to add in fire (brazen altar) after all. Think.
58. Pastor happy. Go team! Said some thank you to people.
59. Break all of it down. Seems like that takes longer than setting up.
60. Help load trailer; then got help to load all the temple stuff back into my car.
Now all of it is still sitting in my car…

Since we do a lot of Old Testament Study, I can see the value and am seriously looking at taking the time and just making a nice set of temple elements to use in the future & box it up.

how does God do that?

2011-01-16T18:10:00.000-05:00

This week I had NO IDEA where the Chris' may be going with the message. I always find it interesting when praying, reading and preparing for the stage design to see where God leads me. This is where God led me this week.

First I was drawn to the great story about Elijah the prophet in 1st Kings 19: Elijah was waiting on the LORD in the mountain and the Lord comes to Elijah in a gentle whisper.
Then, I decided to add 1st Kings 18 when Elijah was challenging the false prophets of Ba’al.
Hopefully this reflects both.
The first two pics are what I drew out as the concept.

(fb friends link to http://designingforphilistines.blogspot.com/ for pics.)
I then found out on Friday, the last song was going to be “Fire Fall Down”. Perfect.

Pulled everything together. This morning when I was told what the pastor was talking about today. I got flat out excited! It was 1st Kings 18, with an emphasis on 1st Kings 19.

So everything was set up at the rear of the stage (mid stage right)
Here are the plans we had. Mostly the same as last week; grey tech cart covered with black cloth.
This week we wanted to raise it up higher.
So were thinking about adding ½ of the cover for the sound board on top of grey cart and also covering it in black.
Placing the crown on top of that.
Then hanging either purple or red satin (hopefully red, if we can find it), vertically behind it.
Then placing an oscillating fan behind the material. The hope being that the fan will billow the material and cause it to move gently, reminiscent of the fire the Lord sent and the gentle whisper.

Well, it worked. And the oscillating fan gently moved the cloth…
But, I was moved by the same still voice of God that helped me create the stage design this week.
WoW! Gotta love how God works!

going, going, gone…

2011-01-15T07:23:00.000-05:00

I am sure the only person that will care about this is Jim Drake. I design with a lot of fabric. It is so quick & easy to use, particularly for a mobile church. And it fills up an empty black stage really well.

A couple of years ago you could find tons of material at Walmart for only $1 a yard.
Gotta love Walmart
Then about a year ago, Walmart decided to close out most of their fabric/sewing departments.

So I researched and found one location that still would continue to carry fabric in my area. It’s only 8.5 miles away, but in the DC Metro area that is about a 40 minutes drive. The cost of the fabric slowly crept up to $2 a yard. O.k. I dealt with that. So, every 8 weeks or so, I would travel to Fair Lakes and see what they had in stock. Probably spending $40-$80 each time.

Well, Thursday I made my little trip to the fabric Walmart. Oh, everything was 25% off. Yippee! Then I found out why. They were closing out their sewing/fabric department there also - to make room in the store to convert it to a Super-Walmart.

Ugh! Oh, no…
What am I going to do now?
Yes, I know there are other fabric stores. But when designing on a budget, there is nothing like getting fabric for $2 a yard vs. $4.95 and up at other fabric retailers; especially when it comes out of my personal pocket & when I purchased around 15-20 yards at a time.
I bought extra Thursday. They may get another shipment, so I will make another trip (or two) out there and stock up.
Thankfully I have quite a bit of fabric now in stock. We are currently organizing, hemming and measuring all the material we have on hand.
In light of all the praying and reevaluation we have been doing, I gather it is time to revamp my thinking. We will see where this journey shall lead.

extrapolating experiential elements from extreme sheep herding....

2011-01-07T07:57:00.000-05:00

While I've seen sheep herding with lights before; this is extreme sheep herding. And it reminds me of an experiential element I've thought about for church.
No, I am not going to rent a bunch of sheep; simply because that is really expensive. No seriously, renting animals is expensive and yes I have checked it out.
So see this...

...this combined with: we were talking about a previous designing for Philistines post this week at creative team-where GCC plays Simon Says (April 2008)

see this...

Camp Friendship Plays Simon from Grant Ferguson on Vimeo.

Obviously this would be for fun; but it could work when discussing communication, doing what God asks you to do. Actually that is why we were discussing it at our creative team meeting. We were planning for the 1 Chronicles message later this month. Thinking about what you are willing to do when God asks you to do something and/or where would you draw the line...
Thinking several things.
For example: Creative movement/percussive element
Lights out.
Dancers entering from the back, walking up the aisle creating movement light designs with glow sticks to a percussive beat. Maybe handing out glow sticks to people in the crowd. Lead into opening worship set. Band with glow sticks encircling their arms?
That's just one idea I was thinking about.
Just thinking...

yesterday I went to an adult oriented sex store with a man, not my husband….

2011-01-06T09:21:00.000-05:00

Often with me there is a story behind what I say; this is no different.

Here is the back story…
It all began with just a few seconds in time, a few words quoted from a newspaper article.
In a special message given by my friend Greg Genter, May 30, 2010, entitled “My Lavish Lifestyle”. Nestled in his message (about 38 minutes), he briefly mentioned a newspaper article.
This is what he said (quoting from the article)…

3 massage parlors were shut down in Sterling (a local community in our area) because of sex trafficking. Congressman Wolf described the crime as this “Sexual services performed at a businesses operating under the guise of a massage parlor or other business store fronts This establishment is forcing women into sexual trafficking through debt bondage, isolation and other manipulations to keep women indoors at all time, unable to escape.”
Wolf announced his intent to encourage all local officials to begin further investigation into human trafficking In addition he will be asking local religious organizations to begin provided temporary housing for those rescued from human trafficking.

Those few seconds have snowballed.

Since Congressman Wolf had asked specially for faith-based organizations (that new pc word for churches) to step in, our pastors talked and called his office. They got to meet with the Congressman in person.
During that time, we found out that Congressman Wolf’s office had sent out somewhere around 400 letters to various churches in our local area asking for help. Sadly not one responded. We were not one of those churches.
We called simply because of that little blurb in the newspaper that Greg read to us.
One of the things that was shared in that meeting was the police are aware of various locations in our area that are trafficking people sexually (including children) in this area and are prepared to raid them-but the problem is there is nothing really established to provide after care for the victims.

Now the second part; our pastors are involved in a Pastors Consortium in our county. The consortium has decided to take stopping Human Trafficking in our area on as a cause.
Then they contacted and invited in Polaris Project to come and present a training session on how to identify the various types of human trafficking in our neighborhoods. It was cool. We had at least 50 people, representing 9 churches in our county and multiple organizations involved in this issue.

Next, one of the previous members of our church was in town and had lunch with our lead pastor. Just a catch up lunch. During lunch, Dan Clark was sharing what he has been doing in Ohio. He and his wife had started an organization called Doma International, Among others things, Doma steps into the judicial system and stands with the victims of Human Trafficking and provides after care.

This has lead to developing a local Human Trafficking Task Force for Loudoun County/Northern Virginia. I am part of that task force.

Can you see how God is moving to bring all these pieces of a puzzle together?

We are currently meeting. We are praying for discernment for God’s will on what we should be doing to help this issue. Part of it is finding on what is needed to see if we are able to contact all the services we can find in our area and put the pieces of the puzzle together, help them to work together, and then see where the missing puzzle piece is and fill that gap. Then the pastors consortium will take present this plan to their churches and let people know-this is how you can personally get involved.

We know that we will be hosting a second training session on victim identification education program by Polaris Project. This time we probably be using a 2,000 seat venue, And afterwards offering people places to put action behind their feelings of wanting to serve.
It’s in the beginning phases, but we are very excited to see where God is going to lead us.

So back to, why did I go to a adult sex store? A friend thought they might be interested in at least providing materials to their customers and helping support this project. Strange bed fellows you may think, but this connection will reach people that you and I can not reach. The first meeting was a success. They are willing to have materials displayed in their store and they are willing to e-mail their “Friends” list informing them of the next victim identification education program.

What we did may not make sense to you. But it worked. This is a very real issue in many areas; chances are it is happening in your town. You may simply not be able to see it. If it burdens your heart - I challenge you to do something.

before it went viral...

2011-01-04T07:31:00.000-05:00

I know it is way early to start talking about next year (or is it?), but I had a thought for next Christmas.

It started with Campbell’s question and comments at the leadership dinner last week. (121210)
The question was, which person from the Christmas story do you identify with and why?
Then his message was on how important telling "stories" are.
Then I received this vid from Igniter Media "A Social Network Christmas" (121610). Check it out.

Perfect intro.
So for next year I was thinking about short vignettes about each person in the story of the birth of Christ. Either live and/or videos.
Who would you be…
STORY of the nativity
Work with the pastors as to what each person would be feeling.
Zechariah -
Mary - with a photo montage of pictures of a 12 year old girl - when you really think about her being about 12 and seeing 12 year olds - it feels very different. (thought came from Mark Driscoll)
Elizabeth -
Joseph -
Shepard(s)
An animal

So, we will see how this plays out for next year...

capturing the convoluted process of creating a stage design idea…

2011-01-02T15:15:00.000-05:00

This is the thought process for me, behind creating a stage design.
1. Read the synopsis: “Unpack the seven or eight identifiable attributes of spiritual maturity that we seek to gain; use the stories from (1st & 2nd Samuel, 1st & 2nd Kings, 1st & 2nd Chronicles) etc. to identify example of those who got maturity right, or those who didn’t as positive / negative reinforcement. “
2. Try to get more details. Ha, ha. That didn't work, until much later.
3. Prayer, lots of prayer…
4. Study 1st & 2nd Samuel. Re-read “Tale of Three Kings” (Gene Edwards) since I know our lead pastor really likes that book. I also recommend it. Study the “Relevant Word” (our study guide for the year). Based on this, it is a fairly safe bet that the teaching pastor will be covering Samuel/Saul/David...
5. Glean info: obedience, waiting on the Lord, & having total trust in God's intentions for
our lives. First two by prayer and reading, last one from an e-mail from the pastors wife.
Now go...what do you think the stage design should be?

6. EUREKA: An idea! A crown!

Now this is the part of the creative process I can't explain. It just happens. Input information and out pops an idea in my brain. I give all the credit God.

(fb friends, pictures here)

7. Draw out idea (I often do this on a Starbucks bag, during lunch at work).
8. Make a list of things to do.
9. Ask dear sweet hubby to get Coroplast in Springfield (1 ½ hrs)
This is my first time working with coroplast.
10. Measure twice, cut once.
11. Cut the crown out of the coroplast with a box cutter/utility knife and (drill/punch) details out. Ugh! Here is the point where I bemoan the fact I am not artistic or handy. I AM creative, but sometimes implementation is rough (face/palm).
12. Glue on details.
13. Finding gold spray paint (it may be in my garage or at the church offices). Finally found the spray paint. Hubby had hid it.
14. Paint it, let it dry…Remembered to wear gloves this time, so I don't have gold fingers and nails.
15. Get jewels. (Two stores. WalMart & Michaels)
16. Add additional detailing of jewels.
17. Get the crown in the car and transport it to the school (easier said than done)...
18. Get the tall ladder. Decided not to fly the crown, but just set it up above band.
19. Hang it up.. (forget that detail)
20. Ta! Da!
21. Take it back down, put in trailer.
22. Put ladder back.
Repeat 17. - 22. for several weeks.
There you have it...

visitor jitters...

2010-12-26T12:39:00.000-05:00

I didn't anticipate that I would feel so nervous & apprehensive about visiting another church this Sunday.
But it is a good thing. I used to visit other churches frequently. So having a free Sunday gave me the opportunity to explore the feelings of making the decision to attend a church and what it feels like to be a first time attender. It's always good to get a fresh look at what others are doing.

First off, I checked online...some had good information. Some did not and were hard to navigate.
I was looking at about 4 or 5 churches. I think the deciding factor for me today was ease and the fact that they had visitor parking and said so up front. Also there was a possibility I might know a person or two there.
A couple had shuttle services to satellite parking. Didn't want to face that. Ugh! I am actually a very shy person in new situations.
I knew some of what to expect from the website. Directions were easy to follow, though I did google it to be sure.
It was nice to have a sign directing me to the visitor parking as i entered the parking lot and they had ample visitor parking near the front door. Cool!
Welcome Center right in side the door. Not comfortable going there.
Lots of greeters, opening the door, saying "hi!" and handing out bulletins.
Like the fact that they had the announcements rolling on the screen during the countdown. I learned a lot about what was going on. Easier to see and watch than trying to decipher the bulletin. Too much information.
Worship right up front. About 20 minutes. Most songs I didn't know.
Then the greet and meet. Stayed seated. Didn't know anyone. Not approached.
NOTE to self: Make sure to look for people sitting down and go out to greet them.
Service was smooth, though I didn't know where it was going, since I didn't see the order of service in the bulletin. Is that important?
The message was good from a guest speaker.
Communion at the end, really nice. Picked up a neat little idea from that.
After the service; I actually ran across someone I knew from my church. We didn't have services today at XC (that is a whole other story). It was nice to see someone I knew.

Now, from my creative point of view. I wish I had brought a camera. The stage design was great.
A snapped a couple pics with my cell phone:

I would love to be able to sit down and talk to the person who does the stage designs for them. I think that could be possible, since our church does have connections with the church I visited.
All in all, a nice experience.
If I was searching for new church I probably would give it another try.

another BLANK stage...

2010-12-25T08:27:00.000-05:00

Yes, another blank stage.
O.k. so we had a few poinsettias.
December 20th, we performed a Willow Creek drama. Lots of busy-ness on the stage.
So, no real stage design.
In the meantime trying to plan the stage design for January literally on a wing and a prayer (o.k. lots of prayer).
Then for Christmas Eve, it was requested that we decorate the interior of the auditorium to somewhat reflect a traditional Christmas decor. In addition to another drama sketch entitled "Stolen Jesus".

Along with praying about January; we are still taking time to reevaluate the contribution and value of the stage designs, particularly when it meets the crush of a Sunday only set-up and tear down.
The stage designing is not going away.
Yet...
Can we continue to implement creativity in so little time?
Are we in the way of the other teams?
Does it really impact people's journey?
Does it entice the skeptic, challenge the lukewarm & ignite passion in the believer (to go into the world)?
This ENHANCE team prays and designs so the stage reflects the message being given, just like the other teams. If it was simply decoration, I wouldn't be doing it. We design experiential elements that hopefully land the truth of what is being shared. We work to engage ALL the senses in the worship experience.
After the holidays, the leadership often will offer to let us take a break from creative elements. That means dramas, videos, dances, etc.
For example, just in the last several weeks; we have done a dance/movement element, 2 drama sketches, 2 videos pieces, 4 take-away or experiential experiences-challenges.
Well, that break doesn't really include the stage. *smiles*.
This is the synopsis that we have to work from for the next couple months:

Unpack the seven or eight identifiable attributes of spiritual maturity that we seek to gain; use the stories from (1 & 2nd Samuel, 1 & 2nd Kings, 1 & 2nd Chronicles) etc. to identify example of those who got maturity right, or those who didn’t as positive / negative reinforcement.

That's it. Now go...what do you think the stage design should be?

envisioning the future…

2010-12-20T08:35:00.000-05:00

I envision it now, fb filled with images of Menorahs to commemorate the festival of lights, pictures of Ashura pilgrimages, the meditative thoughts of Bodhi Day, the time of devout and penitential preparation of the soul for the proper and worthy celebration of the great feast of Christmas for the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, the celebration of family, community and culture of Kwanzaa and, dare I say it?
Christmas Nativities to celebrate the birth of Christians long awaited Messiah…

Today my profile pic isn’t a nativity…but more importantly a reminder of the expectancy….

THIS is what excites me in my faith journey about the season. To imagine what it was like back then...patiently waiting for the long awaited and prophesied Messiah.

Can you imagine the years of anticipation that lead up to this moment in time?

By next year, maybe people of the Christian faith will be posting Nativities, those who simply celebrate the Santa man, could post pictures of Santa & elves...

If you choose not to believe any of it…well, then keep your profile picture of whatever…

Start a revolution…

Don’t muzzle or deny others, but humbly share the excitement that fills your life.

all riled up...

2010-12-18T15:15:00.000-05:00

Not sure what has finally gotten me all riled up about Christmas today, but I definitely am.
Was it because I was shocked today when the man at the bank actually said "Merry Christmas" to me; I was so surprised. I turned around and said "Why, thank you. Merry Christmas to you."
Was it yet another story on fb about the offensiveness of the Nativity, or no wait, was that a Christmas tree?
Or was it the song about the 12 days of "winter"?
That's it. While I respect the beliefs of others; I have the right to believe what I belive. I'm not telling anyone that they have believe what I do.

I believe in Christ. I believe in celebrating Christmas. You are free to celebrate or not celebrate, whatever you wish.
"But, as for me & my house" we celebrate the birth of Jesus.
Therefore, I am going to post a different pic of the Nativity as my profile picture from ...now-through Christmas. And you know what, no one can stop me!
I already have posted my first one as my profile pic.

Here are some others that I am considering...

Merry CHRISTmas!

SHOUT...

2010-12-17T10:49:00.000-05:00

Nothing big and flashy, just a simply SHOUT element. We were studying the book of Joshua a couple of weeks ago, and I can't think of Joshua without the battle of Jericho. Think about it, seriously...God tells a group of warriors, strong, bold, courageous...hey there, just walk around the city
once every day for six days with the seven priests carrying ram's horns in front of the ark.
On the seventh day you big strong men march around the city seven times and then the priests blow their ram's horns.
That's what they did-and gave a war cry. The walls of the city collapsed, and the Israelites were able to charge straight into the city.

The stage was very simple.
Bought and painted some trash cans and buckets. Sorry, I am so not a graffiti artist.

So this is what we ended the service with...
SHOUT element at about minute 44
Let it buffer, then watch...

how to make teeny, tiny books....

2010-12-17T10:17:00.000-05:00

Link to how you make teeny, tiny books...

intentionally BLANK stage design for church…

2010-12-12T13:23:00.000-05:00

The next few Sundays the stage design @XC will mostly be BLANK.

There are still some who prefer a BLANK stage for a variety of reasons. While I won’t delve into those reasons, suffice it to say the naysayers have it this month.

Trying not to let the negative comments overcome us. Simply taking time to reevaluate the contribution and value of the stage designs, particularly when it meets the crush of a Sunday only set-up and tear down.

When we were discussing the implications of going to a Sunday only set up, we tried to explain that the added in stage elements (drama, dance and stage design) would have the toughest time with implementation.

So the stage design team is praying and talking. Thoughts?

macabeats..

2010-12-04T08:32:00.002-05:00

fishies in the ocean…

2010-12-03T20:01:00.000-05:00

I think the “Fishers of People” is one of my favorite stories. I am all about reaching the fishies in the ocean vs. fishies in fishbowls. These big, strong fishermen chose to give up their well paying jobs and decided to follow a man they believed in. All to change the world. This week we are studying Mark 1:16-20.

Again dear friends, if you are reading from facebook, link over the designing for Philistines… to see the pictures.
In between the OT lessons, we are doing NT stories.
First was the “Parable of the Sower” (Matthew)
This week is “Fishers of People” (Mark 1:16-20)

Started with our theme song “The More You Know the Bible”.
Then did the “Books of the Bible Rap” (hit the link & scroll down, then you are able hear part of it) to go along with the four books of the Gospel that I've made.
In case you are wondering, I make these books from various types of boxes (cereal, dog bones, etc.). Glue white construction paper around three edges for the pages, and glue some colored paper around it for the book cover. Then I use sticker letters to write the name of the book.

Then we made simple fish out of colored paper triangles.
Read the scripture (and story). We talked about how fishermen catch lots of fish with nets. Then we pulled out our personal nets (made from white chiffon fabric with knots tied around the edges) and practiced catching our fish in the nets.

And of course the ever popular coloring sheets.

Somehow we have gotten on a kick of having snacks from different parts of the world.
So, the snack this week is one I learned to eat while living in Panama. They are ‘Maria” cookies. Yum, yum! Though they are popular in a lot of Latin American countries.

Hopefully you are enjoying these posts. I seems to be where I need to be at this time…

clothing is pouring in…

2010-12-03T07:07:00.000-05:00

I’ve been blogging three years now. Almost solely about stage designing and experiential elements for worship experiences.
Back then there was Jonny Baker who blogs mostly about ancient modern experiential practices and Ragamuffin Soul (Carlos Whitttaker) mega-blogger from Buckhead Church which is one of the three North Point Community Church campuses. Los had a weekly blog carnival for stage design. It was very cool. Then he stopped.
I met several bloggers through Carlos’ blog.
Then more recently Church Stage Designs Ideas. There was another one that encompassed several types of creative arts from Willow Creek, which I can’t seem to find right now.
The trouble is, it seems most of what I find out there is about stage designing for large congregations with budgets. These are great resources for inspiration.
This week’s inspiration comes from Simple Worship Stage by Fork in the Road Music blogger
Russell Martin. I saw this design a couple weeks ago-and it jumped out at me. Very nicely done, simple and inexpensive. We were in the planning stages of creating the stage design for “Fishers of Men”
The implementation didn’t quite translate as well as we intended.

I wasn’t there for implementation - one person implementation, short time frame. I did have to laugh because though I was at home that morning, we were in communication via txt. Sending pics and suggestions back & forth. It turned out nicer than our pictures show.
At least, when the other elements we added in (video- http://www.sermonspice.com/search?q=fishers+of+men) it pulled it together nicely.

This was also the first week for the collection of items needed for the local elementary school. The items poured in; I will have more pictures later.
We have 4 Sundays a year, that are designated "Family Sundays". Everyone except the babies and toddlers are in the main service. This was the first week of our reformatted Family Sunday.
Before we simply had the children join us, had a shorter service, had kiddie bags and maybe an element design for all ages. This time we focused the entire service on a child's level, including the message from one of the teachers in the children's ministry. It worked out really well, but will need some tweeking.

the most important number is 1...

2010-11-23T06:49:00.000-05:00

“I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something:
Yet, just because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something I can!” – Helen Keller

My dear cousin @ Thomas Lindsey Hooppaw commented on my last post where we were collecting clothing for local elementary children in need, he said “Just so sad that there are that many needs tho.”
It’s true, it is so sad…

But the exciting thing is you can help at least 1…

For example: This is a video we did at XC a few weeks ago to raise awareness of adoption.

We have several families at XC who have adopted children from all over. The family @ 3:33 adopted little Faith from Ethiopia a few months ago.

The most important number is 1 from Sonya Judkins on Vimeo.

That is 1.

Another family just recently adopted two brothers from Africa.
That is now 1 + 1 + 1
See how that works?

This week we are helping 86 children at a local elementary school in need of basic clothing…
That is 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 +…
You get the idea!

The needs of this world seem so overwhelming,
We cannot do everything…
But we can do something…
Of all the statistics, the most important number is 1
It only takes 1 person to the life of someone forever.
But, the most important number is 1

What is God calling you to do?
Is He calling you to help?
You cannot do everything.
But you can do something….
What will YOU do??

worship & justice…

2010-11-22T06:50:00.000-05:00

XC’s mission statement is: love God, love others, serve the world…
No bells & whistles. No flashing lights. For me, this is the most exciting pictures of the stage design this week. But these blank boards show you the heart of the people that make up XC Ministries.
We like to offer Missional challenges at XC.

While were we planning the details for our Missional Sunday - We were looking at various organizations that need help & then to challenge the members to serve. Then we received a last minute request from a local elementary school. They have 86+ children that don’t have coats, shoes, clothes, socks or underwear…can you imagine?

This is a big challenge for us. We usually run about 180 in attendance and there were about 300 cards for the various items need. One cool note: some of the members of our creative team are already purchasing items needed.

In addition, our older FLIPT kids (children’s ministry) is taking on the challenge of providing all the socks needed!

So the set design this week is various pieces of clothing for the children and four boards, with all of the requests cards attached (269 cards left). We started out by hanging some of the articles of clothing; nixed that - looked like invisible children hanging in the air. Oh, well.
Then we simply displayed the items on tables in front of the stage-with the request boards standing next to the tables.

11/21/10 – Deuteronomy (Part 2): "Missional Emphasis / Injustice"

Worship Set 1
Instrumental Opener (Call to Worship) Our Love is Loud
Everlasting God

W/G & Announcements – FLIPT Out

Worship Set 2 (challenge element package)
Precious Jesus
I Heart Revolution clips interwoven throughout second worship set
Tear Down the Walls

Message – Great message on Deuteronomy, talking about God’s heart and telling us to take care of the poor, the widowed and the orphaned.

Challenge Bridge: for Hutchinson Elementary – explaining the need at the school.We are giving the congregation two weeks to purchase items.
Challenge Bridge: w/ Beans & Rice Challenge
This is the standard challenge to see what most of the world eats for dinner. We have individual packages of beans and rice for people to take home and have for dinner that night.(Congregation to pick up cards off of the boards, at front of auditorium & collect their beans & rice at the back doors).

Worship Set 3
Mighty to Save
Closing-prayers

At the end-ALL the cards were taken. People took the cards off of the display (things that had already been purchased) Several came and offered money (which we will use for additional needs for Hutchison). And we handed out about an additional 50 cards for more underwear.
I tell you what-I love the people of this church!
-----------------------------------------------------------
Hutchinson Needs…
86 pairs of shoes
38 coats
17 sweat suits for girls
18 sweat suits for boys
55 pkgs of underwear for girls
55 pkgs of underwear for boys

This is one of the reason I love CrossCurrent!
Our last challenge was a backpack collection: The middle school where me meet, ask for help in collecting backpacks that were needed for children attending the school.
The challenge was issued at the end of the service. The drop off was 4:00 p.m. the same day. Here are the results and we met the goal!

shema...

2010-11-18T08:05:00.001-05:00

Well, today we started with a crying toddler.
Which is really pretty funny because it doesn't bother me or the other children. We work together to get him interested in what we are doing.
So today we started we MUSIC! It worked in a matter of about a minute, he was dancing around with us.
I’ve been working on a cd of various songs for each week for our study. I finally handed it out to each child today. We first sang the Books of the Bible (rap) to go along with the first five books of the Bible I've made.
(see pictures on blog)

Then on to the lesson. This week we were in Deuteronomy. We were going to learn more about those Israelites that we have been studying about.
First we learned about "how" they read the Bible. With the prayer shawl, covering their eyes with their right hand. We put on our fake prayer shawls, covered ours eyes and read the Shema.
So we chatted about:
Shema is the scripture (Deut. 6:4-9), that starts with...
Hear, O Israel, the LORD is our G-d, the LORD is one...

תרגם: שמע ישיר ישראל, ה 'אלוהינו; ה' אחד

The Shema is the prayer.
The mezuzah is the piece of parchment with the Shema inscribed on it.
We rolled our own mezuzahs, and placed them in little wooden boxes.
Then we went over the a door jam and I showed them "how" and "why" they are placed on the door.

Then we fast forwarded to Mark 12:28-34! You know, where the scribes tried to trick Jesus.
You know the story? Scribe says '“Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”
And J.C., the man said...you guessed it ZAP!
"Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.
The second is this: Love your neighbor as yourself.
There is no commandment greater than these."

So...basically Jesus said the main thing you need to know is...

"love God, love others, it's simple..."

Then we learned our song for the day. "Love (The Greatest Commandment)" by Jeremy Blaido.

Snack: Cookies from China and nuts. Yummy!

As you can see there were a lot of coloring sheets today! They really like to color; but we didn't color all of them.

Then they asked if we could please play the ENTIRE cd. So we did, we sang, danced and played musical instruments for a half an hour.
Another fun week in the basement.
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SONGS on cd that we've been singing and using for our studies
We didn’t meet for the week of Genesis.
1) We the More We Know the Bible (our theme song), sung to “The More We get Together”.
2) Sow, sow, sow the Word (Matthew - Parable of the Sower), sung to “Row, row, row your Boat”.
3) Let My People Go (Exodus - 10 Plagues)
4) Perfect 10 (Leviticus – went back to the 10 Commandments)
5) Facedown – Matt Redman: (Numbers – Israelites complaining about the manna)
6) Love (The Greatest Commandment) – Jeremy Blaido (Deuteronomy – 6:4-9)
7) Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho (Joshua – The Big Battle)
8) Books of the Bible Rap – Rob Biagi: (as we play with the Books of the Bible being created).
9) Consuming Fire (because it’s one of my favorite songs)

good element-poor execution…

2010-11-17T08:33:00.000-05:00

Ugh! Sometimes that just happens.
The experiential element designed for this week, had some issues with execution.

Shema is the scripture (Deut. 6:4-9), that starts with...
Hear, O Israel, the LORD is our G-d, the LORD is one...
תרגם: שמע ישיר ישראל, ה 'אלוהינו; ה' אחד
The Shema is the prayer.
The mezuzah is the piece of parchment with the Shema inscribed on it.

This week we were in Deuteronomy.
The message focused on teaching the future generations...
For the experiential element, we made a replica of the mezuzah and during the service, we invited people go to various stations and pick the replica to take home with them.
We also had a brochure for further explanation.

Well, some got it and others did not.

The stage design was a representation of the traditional receptacle that the mezuzah is place in. It is box placed on the door jam of traditional Jewish homes.

Lessons Learned:
- Remember that a lot people don’t listen (during instruction).
- Really thinking the element all the way through. We (the creative team) knew all the ends and outs of what we were doing (or some of us did). It didn’t translate well enough to the whole congregation.
- Must remember to keep everything at the simplest level. Remember the 5 W’s & 1 H (who, what, where, when, why and how)
- Some people only picked up one piece and not the other (an explanation brochure). When explaining I only picked up one piece (the Shema scroll) and not the explanation brochure. I should have picked up BOTH pieces.
- In the last minute editing of the reading portion of the element, I probably forgot to even mention the brochure. This week it may have helped to put the two pieces of paper together in one unit, so that people would have the explanation attached. Simplify the process.
- Make sure the entire creative team sits and listens to the entire element. Remembering that most people won’t read even though the entire element is posted on our communications network.
- Didn’t bridge or tie in effectively enough into the over all message. (read last point again)

Interestingly enough, I bet I will have better luck when I do this same element with the preschoolers this Thursday. LOL

Well, we get a chance to redeem ourselves this week-we have two take-way challenges. And thankfully, I don’t have to bridge the pieces. Let’s see if we learn from our mistakes.

Now I need to go to Michael's and pick up adhesives dots to create one of the take-way challenge (collections of new clothing items for a local elementary school in GREAT need) for this week. BIG project – BIG need! Stay tuned for details.