So, I guess I took what Carlos Whittaker called a "Blogatical." With two little ones in diapers and all the new developments I've been undertaking...the blog took the back burner, big time! I'll begin informing everyone on the developments at the Tulsa campus of LifeChurch.tv soon. For a real-time look into what is going on, follow me on Twitter here (LINK)
See you soon...
Derrick
So there is a lot of church leaders from all over the country attending the annual Catalyst conference this year. For those of us who are not among the fortunate to go and hear from amazing leaders, hear awesome worship, and mingle with other believers doing ministry together...you can partake of Anne Jackson's Backstage blog. It's called Catalyst Backstage. (LINK)
Anne is streaming some live content and interviews and you can follow when the new content is up from her twitterfeed.
Check it out!
Here's the latest thoughts and concerns from yours truly. I'd love to get feedback about what you guys like to know about and what piques your interest!
Enjoy
So, it's hot out. Long hair in 105 degree weather with crazy humidity really sucks. So, after seeing Terry Storch take a Wahl to his...I took my Wahl to mine...here are the pics.
A friend showed me this cool website, Wordle where you can upload a rss feed or whatever text you want and it configures a word cloud. I made one from the Swerve blog feed. Pretty cool...and fun...who knew? Check it out here.
I just found out via Twitter that Greg Laurie (a well known pastor) just lost his son in an auto accident. He left behind a child, and a pregnant wife. WOA! I've got a child and a pregnant wife. Makes me really think about how fragile life is, and wonder if my life insurance is good enough.
I've been praying for the Laurie family, that God would give them thick, tangible grace in their loss. I can't imagine how much hurt they must be feeling. Please pray for them.
This week I'm hanging out with my wife in Ft. Worth, TX. I have VERY sparce internet connection possibilities... So...I'll see y'all soon...sort of. Pictures and more about what we're doing to come soon. Enjoy...in the mean time, you can follow my updates HERE on Twitter.
I jumped on the Myspace bandwagon a couple years ago and dove deep into the social network scene. I posted glittery text, little looping videos of chubby kids doing the truffle shuffle, and funny pictures of oversized men in speedos for my friend's enjoyment. But as most of you probably know, Myspace soon became over crowded with all kinds of not cool crap!
So, I made the switch to Facebook. This looks cleaner and seems to have some better tools to keep you connected and make it easier to manage your network of friends. This is pretty typical for me. I usually get involved in the thing that goes obsolete. For instance, we used to have a Beta player, Video Disc player, and I once thought about getting a HD DVD player. But one redeeming case of innovation on my part was that I was the first in my high school to wear Cool Water...cool huh? (totally unsupported statistic)
Here are my links:
My Facebook
My Myspace
My Linkedin
My YouTube channel
Follow me on Twitter
Recently, Anne Jackson and some other bloggers went on a trip to Uganda. I followed their stories and was touched by a post on Anne's blog about actually seeing the change in a child that was sponsored verses a child that wasn't sponsored through Compassion.
Soon after that all settled down and the celebrity bloggers returned home, Anne posted about a young boy named Francis that was awaiting a sponsorship. My wife and I decided to start investing in his life. (BTW, this further delayed me getting a DVR and better cable...we still know how to program our VCR though so we don't miss Lost, Smallville, or Idol.)
We received our first letter which gave me great perspective into his life, and the vast contrast between his world and ours. The simple desire to just go to "town" if he could go anywhere and that his favorite food is bananas really challenges my gratefulness. I'm looking forward to keeping in touch with him and praying for him with my family.
Maybe you should check out Compassion and be challenged too....it's okay, DVR isn't THAT cool.
Hello blogging world! My name is Derrick. Yes, I am back. It has been a while since we last shared a moment together. We've been sick a lot here at the Henslee Home. Ezra has a nasty cough and Rachel just got over her cold from last week. It seems like at any given time, one of us has something making us sick!
I've been spending time fixing up the green room at the church. I'm making a second office in a corner of it for myself. I'm doing this as a result of catching myself in too many open-office discussions about things that really aren't that critical and wondering where all my time went. So, I'm trying to distance myself from the "crowd" at work so that I can focus. I've never been tested, but my wife is sure I have some form of A.D.D. They've actually got a website about A.D.D here which is remarkable considering that people with ADD usually have a difficult time getting anything accomplished...hmm, maybe there's not much to the website past the initial page.
Anyway, there's lots of exciting things coming up. See you soon!
I think it's the moisture change / temperature change that's been going on that has given me the funk. At any rate...this picture sums up how I feel. Normally I steer away from medicine because it makes me feel all disconnected and jittery. But today my boss Chris convinced me that MucinexD would do the trick. But, I'm still blowing the nose with Puffs Plus w/ Vicks Vapor Rub (thanks Aaron.) Oh, and I feel all disconnected and jittery. *cue camera and trombone and call me Debbie Downer.
My wife is involved in a company called Premier Designs. She sells this brand's jewelry in ladies' homes across NE Oklahoma. She has been doing this for almost 9 years and loves it! Each year the company has a national rally in Dallas. Usually I go there for a week to learn a bunch of music and perform for the crowd with an ensemble. *Before you snicker, this gets us free room, board, and admission to the event!
In January the company has regional rallies across the U.S. The founders of the company asked for a quartet and I was called upon to assist! The cool thing is that I will be traveling to Orlando tomorrow and then hopping on the founder's private jet to go with them to the other sites! HOLY FREAKIN COW!!! Andy and Joan Horner are two of the nicest, most giving, godly people I have ever met...so traveling with them on their private jet is a little bit of a mind blower! I'll blog a little bit about my travels as the weekend unfolds but I really wanted to highlight what a honor it is to get to spend time with the Horners.
Andy and Joan started the Horner-Premier Foundation in 1992 to help protect the company's philosophy, purpose, and plan. A major part of that plan was to finance missionaries around the world. So, now that the Horners are no longer the President of the company, they spend a lot of time traveling to other countries and visiting the people that Premier funds. I will enjoy picking their brains about what God is doing and what they're excited about.
Okay, this was my inspiring post. From now on, just selfish pictures of me on a private jet and basking in "the life" that I will never live! Look out Creflo!
Last year if you would have told me that I would be a runner I would have laughed at you. Although my physique doesn't conjure up images of Jesse Owens or any other athlete besides a rodeo clown...I have seen huge improvements in my energy, stamina, and weight.
So far, I have run a 5K race and a 13.1 mile half-marathon. I went from running a consistent 11-12 minute mile, to a 10 minute mile average. During the 5K I ran a 9.5 minute average! It was rather quick for me! Now I'm off to my next challenge....a full marathon. Yep...it's out there. I said it. I am planning on running the Okc Memorial Marathon in April. This is a full loop 26.2 miles of pure torture! My goal is to do this in 4 hours....
The coolest thing about running for me, is the mind game that goes on while you're running. Your body keeps telling you to stop, that you need to take a break, but you know that you can run as much as you're running. You have to push past the pain and focus on the end goal. If you give in to the "slow down" mental game you'll postpone your goal and it will keep you from getting faster.
I've learned to use those cues to pray and ask God to help me through the pain. I'm reminded of scripture that I quote while I'm in pain...
So there is my new goal. Check in on me and see how the training is going... Do you guys have any goals this year that seem overwhelming?
So my family (Rachel and Ezra) went to Little Rock to visit family that they didn't see for Christmas. This left me as a bachelor for a couple of nights.
I was kinda looking forward to these couple of nights because usually my friends ask to hang out but I usually choose hanging out with my family before Ezra goes to sleep. So a couple nights to hang out with friends seemed awesome!
I did manage to hang out with some friends but wound up both nights trying to figure out what to do with myself. So, here I am at Starbucks (photo) charting music for upcoming worship sets. All alone, but being very productive. This is not a pity post, just an acknowledgment of an ironic situation. The family has returned and I got to hang out with my amazing son and eat Totinos pizza with my sweet wife. Back to life...back to reality! (Name that artist!)
Yes...it is true...I have my MacBook again! It's got a schnazzy new 150GB hard drive! Now all I have to do is spend countless hours toiling over what to put back on it. But here is me....happy, giving the "thumbs up" from my handy dandy ichat camera. Now I can continue the blogging at a more steady pace. Just you wait.
It is apparently the new trend to figure yourself out in 100 questions or less, then post the results for all to scoff! So, here ya go...
When I was hired at Lifechurch.tv over 5.5 years ago, I took a Myers/Briggs test and tested as an ENFP. Since then, I've changed a lot. Through life experience and adding to my family...I have adapted some and obviously have become a "hard-nose" about things! Man....I used to be a nice guy!
Each year, for the past several years, Lifechurch.tv hosts all of its staff and spouses for the annual "The December Event." (Yes, it is in its simplicity that you'll find the creativity of the name!) Anyway, we came together at our OKC campus and heard from Perry Noble, Senior Pastor of NewSpring Church in Anderson, SC. All I have to say about him is that I have a new-found fear of butt-freezing snow snakes. You can read more about his talk and the first day of our event here.
Thursday had some really great information and insight which you can read about here. It was a rough day for the Henslee family though! Ezra got some sort of 24hr bug last week and was VERY sick. Rachel got it next, and wouldn't you know it I followed right behind. It all began Wednesday night when I was bowing down to the porcelain water goddess and retching myself so hard my femur hurt! Sorry to be gross....but I think the whole hotel was afraid an woolly mammoth was about to break through their wall! What can I say, I'm a loud sick person. So most of Thursday I was just achy and cold.
Rachel had to stay in the hotel with a crying baby so that we wouldn't put him in child care and potentially get other people sick. So, although she was feeling the best out of the lot of us, she had to listen to the screaming kid all day!
Today, all is well. The kiddo is doing better, Rachel feels better and I feel like nothing ever happened! I wish that were the case. I wasn't able to get as much out of the event as I would have like due to feeling so puny. So, I'll end the whining session now and let you get to reading the cool blogs that I posted links to up ahead! Moral of the story.....freakin wash your hands!!!! It's FLU season!!!!
Well, I know it's a long shot but this guy (another Arkansas Governor) has had my vote for President. Thanks to Anne Jackson for finding the video!
Chuck Norris Picks A Candidate - Watch more free videos
So, I've taken a blogging/social network hiatus the past couple of weeks. I've been in a maintaining mode and focusing my energy on some other things. With getting up early to run, helping out at home, putting in 50 plus hours a week, and trying to be a good husband/father/son/friend....I'm pooped! So, I'm having to shift some things around in order to make my priorities an actual priority.
On the positive side, work is good, the running is good, my son is awesome, and Rachel and I are getting some good quality communication. Once I get a handle on the priorities I'll resume quasi-normal blogging life.
My boss has been blogging about service lately. This week he's doing a series dedicated to customer service. Check it out HERE.
To me this is a big deal. With my band at church, we've really been focusing on engaging people in the lobby between experiences. Some of them have gone out of their way to talk to people and seek out new people to strike up conversations with. This has been cool to watch! We recently had someone that works at another Lifechurch.tv campus come and visit ours. I asked them if they noticed anything that stood out to them. They told me that they were amazed, because they have never seen any other campus' band come out into the lobby and engage people like our band did. That made me feel SO proud of the guys (and gal) that I serve alongside!
I wonder what ways we could serve people that we come in contact with, and at the same time, not make them feel overwhelmed by us? I'd love to see what your thoughts are. Be sure to check out Craig's Swerve blog at the link above.
