I'm an Uncle and a Godfather

Jacob Russel Talmedge was born at 2:38(california time: 5:38 Gaylord time) today, June 26, 2006. He was 9 lbs. 7 oz. and 20 inches long. I am excited to be an Uncle and the Godfather. (Hopefully I won't start acting too much like Marlon Brando). Hopefully we will have pictures soon. Woo-Hoo.

4th Anniversary was yesterday

Yesterday, Lisa and I celebrated our 4th anniversary. So, how did Paul and Lisa celebrate their anniversary? I'm glad you asked. We went golfing...yes I said golfing. Not putt-putt golf either. Real golfing. Our church has an annual golf outing and we thought that it would be fun to go. I had only been golfing once before and this was Lisa's first time. So it was an experience, but we had so much fun.

We played what is called a 4 man scramble. Everybody tees off and then you take the best shot from those four shots. Then everybody hits from that spot and you take the best lie from there, and so on until someone puts it in the hole. I had 1 drive that landed on the green...it was the best drive I had all day...and I had a few good putts to put us at par or under par...Lisa, my beautiful wife did an awesome job for golfing her first time. She hit the ball really well for never having golfed before. We were paired up with a very cute older couple who were so patient with us and gave us little pointers and told us some of the ettiquette rules and such...it was a blast.

Our team ended up coming in last. We played a pretty easy par 3 course and ended up 5 over par. I thought that we did pretty good, but the winning team was 11 under par. I couldn't believe it.

So, our anniversary was fun...We didn't do anything too spectacular, but I think that we had a great time...we got to spend time together and do something that was really quite adventurous. I loved it.

I would recommend everyone trying golf at some point in their lives.

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY LISA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Must...kill...superyouthpastor

Recently I have been reading quite a lot of books. I know…it’s amazing…I’m reading.

Anyway…I just read a book called Velvet Elvis. It is by Rob Bell (one of my favorite speakers of all time…God speaks through Him and makes the Bible so alive), who is the pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church in Grandville, Mi. So I was reading this book and I got to a chapter where Rob is talking about how he had this concept of what a pastor should be and do and how he didn’t match up to it. He realized he had this view of Superpastor. Superpastor was this person who visited every sick person in the congregation, counseled everyone who came to him, performed marriage after marriage, and funeral after funeral. Superpastor didn’t stop. He did everything. Rob talks about how he finally realized that he couldn’t be Superpastor because, Superpastor does not exist. There is not way he can exist and never will exist. Rob realized that he was trying to be something that was completely unhealthy.

While I was reading this chapter I completely related, in some respects. It is not that I am trying to do everything and be everything…but it is that I am trying to be Superyouthpastor in my own way. I am a people pleaser…I need everyone to be happy. I realized that I was trying to be Superyouthpastor because I wanted my congregation to be happy with what I was doing (though that is not a bad thing). I realized that my motivation was completely wrong. I shouldn’t be trying to please First UMC’s congregation, I should be trying to please my creator and Lord. My motivation was unhealthy.

I also realized that I can’t be Superyouthpastor. I can’t reach every student in the way that I want to. I can try to point them to God, but I am not going to reach every student and create this huge transformation in their lives. There is so much that I want to do to reach students in our little community and there is so much that I want them to learn about their creator and Lord Jesus, but I cannot be everywhere and do everything. I have to let God use me where I can be used and let Him be the SuperGod that He is. He is the only thing that is “Super” in this world.

Another thing that I learned is that I have to kill Superyouthpastor. If I do not, I could become even unhealthier. In the words of Rob Bell, I need to take Superyouthpastor out back and kill him. I cannot be, and will never be, Superyouthpastor. I need to be the Youth pastor that God is molding me and shaping me into. I need to be Paul Block, mild mannered youth pastor by day and night.

I hope this all makes sense; sometimes when I write things down I don’t communicate well everything that I am thinking and feeling. I am praying that God will continue to change me and mold me into the Leader that He wants me to be.