The British Are Coming

I usually blog about church, music or family. So here's something different. How about Beck & Posh?

For those of you who do not follow the world of football (otherwise known as soccer), David Beckham has been one of the best players in the world for the past decade. He is unquestionably the most well known and paparazzi-hounded footballer out there (or so it seems). And it appears he is coming to our shores this summer.

In 1992, Beckham started at age 17 with Manchester United in the FA Premier League. His skill continued to increase, playing a lead role in the clubs Treble Win of 1999 - winning the League Cup, the FA Cup and the UEFA Champions League. Beckham captained the English Internationals for six years and spent his most recent time, three years, in Spain with Real Madrid.

He has an absolutely amazing ability to place free kicks where he wants them, usually where the defense think he cannot reach. His style inspired the recent movie "Bend It Like Beckham."

So why spend so much time talking about David Beckham? It was announced today that he has been signed by the L.A. Galaxy and will start playing with them this coming August. This is huge for American soccer. MLS recently cleared the way for this to happen by allowing each team in the league to recruit one player of international status that would be paid separately from the team's allotted salary cap. Beckham was the first to be called up.

He came at a high price... $250 million for 5 years. He is now the second highest payed athlete in the U.S., which is amazing considering it's in a sport that is unknown to the majority of Americans. His presence on the team will undoubtedly sell out stadiums across America. A high-profile player like Beck will make a major difference in how football/soccer is perceived over here.

It will also open up the possibility of others following his lead. I just read that FC Dallas is in talks with Edgar Davids, the Dutch international who came to fame with Ajax and is currently playing for Tottenham Hotspur. The transfer window for MLS is right now. I suspect we will see other player transfers coming to light very soon.

It looks like American soccer is about to ramp it up another notch. Or rather, several notches. Cool by me. Oh, another note of interest... the current trend of international clubs touring America in their off-season could actually mean that Beckham's first appearance as a Galaxy member might be against Chelsea FC. There's a bit of irony in that...

UPDATE: Ramon Calderon has said he will not play Beckham again. He will continue to train with Real, but will not play. That means he may put Beckham on loan to another club until August. Is there a chance that he will be here in time to start with LA in April? hmm....

A Real Character

We've just begun a new series at GCR. It's a six-week series entitled "A Real Character." We are examining Godly character traits as exhibited through different characters in the Bible. The first week dealt with endurance as shown through Noah.

Our production team put our collective heads together (which is tough since we all have big heads anyway) and came up with what I think is a pretty "novel" idea. We decided to present the series in a graphic novel/comic book style. Every piece of print, artwork, and stage set is done "Frank Millerish."

What makes this so much easier is a program that came pre-installed on my Mac called "Comic Life." This fabulous program is available from Plasq and you can find out more about it on their site.

Take a look at the link below. It will lead you to a PDF of the first weeks comic book. I hope you like it. It came out of my computer, but it was a team effort.

http://homepage.mac.com/garymoyers/comiclife/

And for those of you who try to copy and paste and delete the last part of the URL to find my dot Mac homepage, I have not created it yet. Sorry...

Wade in the Water

My son, Austin, was baptized this past Sunday. I was fortunate enough to be the one to do it. What a day!

Both Austin and Ashley have been to many churches over the years, hundreds I would say. Every Sunday they would be in a new bible class in a new city. The poor teacher never had any clue who they were. And most teachers saw it as an opportunity to save someones soul. My children have prayed Jesus into their heart more times than any of us can remember.

Because of that, I have not pushed them to take that final step of baptism. I knew it would come soon enough. I found out the other day that he really wanted to be baptized in the ocean at Corpus Christi. I guess I missed that one. But one water is as wet as another.

My son's new spiritual birthday is New Year's Eve, the same day as my mother's physical birthday. I am so proud of that boy. I will post a video of the baptism some time this week....

Microshaft Hat

I know I'm a Christian and not supposed to hate. But I'm getting very close. So let me just say that I hat Microsoft. Hat is not quite like hate. Almost but not quite. 75% of the way to hate. Just hat.

It seems every time I turn around I am running into problems with something Microshaft related. I have a new Dell (six months old). It's already giving me the blue screen of death every other time I use it. Ashley has a new-to-her computer. It's not that old. Pretty respectable specs. I even installed a new version of XP on it less than 2 weeks ago. It's already acting up.

Austin's computer is my old one from Paris. It was a humdinger then. It's a lower midline now. Windows was giving me such fits, I installed a new hard drive and put Linux on it. So now we get a choice on boot up. I had to do that because I definitely hat Microshaft.

I have made the switch at work. My new computer is the top of the line MacPro with all the bells and whistles. You know what gives me the most troubles on it? Microshaft Office for Mac. And now the Russians have reported a major hole in Vista. Big surprise there. Oh, let me install that on something. It's bound to be better.

Hat. Definitely hat.

Kevin Schaffer

It's Christmas day and I haven't put anything into this blog in almost a week. I figure I better do something before I get out of the habit.

At this point in time, I am cooking giblet gravy for leftovers. We had a fine meal this morning, but didn't get around to the gravy thing until it was too late. So I am making the gravy for leftovers. Nummy....

Kevin and Michelle Schaffer came over yesterday after church. They are visiting the area (his parents live in Crane) and we had lunch and a good time rehashing old memories. I can't believe how big his kids are, but then he said the same about ours. Kevin lives in Clovis, NM and teaches in one of the local school systems. He's an elementary music teacher and is very good at what he does.

Music is still his passion. He is the volunteer worship leader at their church (which has doubled in size in the past year) and he is just beginning to write and record a new album of math fact jingles. There is a school curriculum company that has hired him to record an album based on their book... sort of a learn-by-singing kind of thing. I have no doubt it will be fun to listen to, math or not.

Kevin hasn't changed much at all. Same old Kev. His son, Ethan (2 yr-old), is a chip off the old block. He gets that same twinkle is his eye just before he does something mischievous. His daughter, Elise (5 yr-old), is a beautiful young lady and sharp as a tack. Her mind is way ahead of her age. And Michelle looks as pretty as ever and is doing well. Kevin married above his pay grade. :)

I hope to see them more now that we're closer to them. They brought back a lot of great memories. Time to add some stuff to the gravy, and Dallas starts playing in about 15 minutes. Merry Christmas everyone!

Anonymous Christmas

I have no idea who reads this blog (other than a select few). So this is my attempt to thank an anonymous Christmas benefactor who left a very nice gift for me at the office. Your generosity goes beyond words. My family thanks you very much. Merry Christmas and God bless...

~Gary

Swaddling Clothes

I learned something new today from Ronnie White. The story of Christ's birth as reflected in Luke holds deeper meaning than I realized. I'm sure you've heard the reference from the King James version in Luke 2, "And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger." New versions have just called in cloth.

But the question arises, why would a baby in cloth be a "sign" to the shepherds that this was the Christ-child? The angel didn't mention the manger first, he mentioned the swaddling clothes. What is it about swaddling clothes that would be a sign?

The term swaddling clothes is still used today by nurses who wrap the baby after birth. Unfortunately, that term is a 2000 year old misnomer. The origin comes as a result of the harsh countryside in the Middle East. As people took off on trips that often lasted days into months, it was not uncommon for sickness or accident to take place. There we deaths in these journeys.

They Middle Eastern culture developed a way to deal with in-journey deaths. Each person would take a long, thin, gauze-like cloth and wrap it around their waist many times. This would be one of the bottom layers of clothing. This cloth would be reserved for death. If someone died during the journey, their friends or family would remove the "swaddling cloth" and wrap them from head to toe so they could compete the journey.

The baby Jesus was wrapped in Joseph's death cloth. The sign for the shepherds wasn't that they'd find a baby wrapped in a blanket in a manger. The sign was that they'd find a baby prepared for death. Jesus came to earth to die for our sins. That was his purpose. This was shown even from the instance of his birth.

What a God.

By the way... this makes the wise man's gift of myrrh even more appropriate. Myrrh was the spice used for death. It was basically deodorant for the dead. Even though the wise men didn't actually show up until he was toddler, the theme continues.

Merry Christmas....

Copyright or Copywrong?

I understand the need for a copyright law, but it's one of those things that is imperfect at best. I spent several years trying to figure it out working with the Acappella Company. Now I find myself back into it again.

As you probably read in an earlier post, I would like to be able to post a capella recordings of new songs (new to our church, not newly written... yet) on our website. Our first song was Everlasting God by Brenton Brown. We introduced it to the church last night and it went well.

Anyway, I went through the whole process of requesting a license so that we could get it online. Long story short (and it is very long), I was denied a license. I can record it for release on an album, but it cannot be placed on the Internet. This is not so much a function of copyright law as it is EMI/Word policy.

On the company FAQ they say, "songs or master recordings that are owned or administered by EMI Christian Music Group and Word Music, LLC cannot be used on the Internet in any form. Vineyard Music Group recordings are licensed by EMI Christian Music Group; therefore, they cannot be used on the Internet, " and "The right to display a copyrighted work is an exclusive right of the copyright holder. Also, the right to offer printed copies of someones copyrighted work requires a print license. Subsequently, to be able to display or to offer printed versions (chord charts, lead sheets etc-all of which will need to be secured and or password protected via e-commerce) of our songs via your website, will necessitate a print license from us. As previously stated, EMI and Word do not allow any of their songs on the internet in any form, so we will not be able to license any of the EMI and Word songs for use on the Internet."

So I wrote them back, just to be sure. I wanted to make sure that they understood we were making a new recording, not asking to use the original recording, and that we were wanting to pay royalties. And if this was still not allowed, how did iTunes and other such services fit into that policy?

They replied that large corporate music services were given special allowances (read: we make more money) and at this time EMI is not currently allowing downloads from individual (custom) sites.

However, if we wished to make our recording available on iTunes I should let them know and we can proceed from there. And that, of course, would kill the entire reason for doing this in the first place. How do you teach your church a new song if they have to go to iTunes to buy it first?

So, as far as songs owned and administered by EMI are concerned (which is a lot), we are reduced to physical CD releases. That's not so bad, just time consuming and costly. We'll see what happens.

So my next question... how does MySpace get away with allowing all those songs streamed from their thousands of pages? Surely some of those belong to EMI. And I'm sure that if EMI has that policy, you can bet other labels do as well.

Maybe Word would make an exception for one of their former distributed artists? Nah... I'm not holding my breath.

Fresh Praise

This is the article I wrote for the front page of this Sunday's bulletin. I thought it might go well here, too. See what you think...

"I like routine. There’s something about predictability that brings a little bit of peace. It’s like putting on an old worn shoe that’s been broken in just right. It’s rather comforting.

"There are times when routine is not that good, especially in our spiritual walk. Since my children were born, I have either prayed over them or with them every night before bed. That’s a routine I want to continue until they are gone to college. The routine of praying will continue, but I do not want my prayers to be “routine.” It is very easy for me to slip into the same prayer from night to night. I want my children to grow up knowing not only the importance of prayer, but also understanding that prayer is an open conversation with God - not a repetition of a daily mantra.

"Worship is much the same. While there is comfort in routine, we cannot allow our worship to become “rote.” Songs and prayers that once stirred the soul can become overly familiar and loose some of the meaning that moved us in the beginning. The Word of God encourages us to express ourselves in a fresh way. Six different Psalms specifically tell us to “sing a new song.” Isaiah tells us to, “sing to the Lord a new song, His praise from the ends of the earth.” In the closing chapters of the Bible, twice John hears the masses of heaven singing a “new song” before the throne. The Bible is replete with encouragement for us to seek fresh praise.

"There are many ways to achieve this and we wish to offer one more. About once a month, we will introduce a new song during PowerPoint on Wednesday evenings. These songs will find their way into the Sunday worship, as did Everlasting God this morning. Hopefully, they will offer a new insight into the ageless promises of a sovereign God.

"To keep them fresh in your mind, we will offer these songs as a free download on our website in the “New Song of the Month” section. They will be shorter versions of the song, recorded a capella by members of our own praise team. It is my prayer that we may all find deeper meaning in the songs we know, and a new expression of praise in the songs we learn."

Song of the Month

I've been wrestling with how to introduce new songs to our church. I saw a thread on Keith's blog a while back about just this thing. Unfortunately, most of the solutions presented on there didn't quite work for us.

I'd prefer not to introduce a new song in the Sunday morning service (except for the times when I do it not knowing it's new to everyone... oops). So we are going to do the "New Song of the Month" approach. We meet on Wednesday nights for our PowerPoint service (it has nothing to do with the software). Once a month I will introduce a new song to the church. In order to keep it in their memory, it will be made available on our website immediately afterward. We plan to offer the written arrangement as well as a short recorded version of the arrangement.

I have no idea how many will take advantage of this. We're going to give it the old college try anyway. At the very least, it will drive a few more folks to our website. I'm sure it will be an educational process to get people to realize that they can download songs from our site for free.

I've considered this approach before, but it was always along the mindset of doing an entire album and making it available to church. This way, we are building the plane as we fly it. And if we want to do an album, we can go back and revisit the songs pretty easily and flesh it out so that it fits the "album sound."

We'll see. Look for the "New Song of the Month" section on the GCR website here in the next few days.

He's Baaaack......

It's hard to believe that it's only been a little more than a week since I've officially started work here at GCR. With the moving, new job, new school, new everything... it feels more like a couple of months. I've been so busy I've not even been able to wash my car. It still has bird poop from Corpus on the roof. I may leave it there for memories sake.

My first official Sunday went well, I thought. The most important thing is that God was honored. The program flowed well and the theme was carried throughout the morning. The central idea was expressed in several different formats; song, message, scripture, and video. It culminated in the special offering for single parents, which ended up way beyond anyone's expectations. All in all, it was a great morning. For those interested, I'll post the order here in a moment.

The kids are doing very well. Ashley is loving her new dance studio. Austin is adapting, although we really need to get him spending some time with new friends. Sherri is having some medical difficulties, so please say a pray for her, wherever you are.

I need to run and do some fun stuff. It's time to run by the Cingular store and pick my new phone. I'm thinking Samsung Blackjack. hehehehe


Order of Worship
Golf Course rd Church of Christ
Dec. 3, 2006

We Have Come to Worship Him

Welcome

We Have Come to Worship Him – cho only
I Stand Amazed
Above All
I Stand in Awe

Prayer time
Jesus Draw Me Close
Lord Have Mercy
Scripture reading – ooh softly as Ps. 103:1-12 is read
Lord Have Mercy – cho x 2

Communion
Offering (Christmas version by Paul Baloche)

Contribution
Video: What If?
Lord I Give You My Heart

Message: Road Trip – The Magi

Here I am to Worship
I Need You More

Special Offering
God Will Make a Way

Closing Comments

I Stand Amazed – cho

Kevin Riggs

Today was my first day at GCR. I did not lead worship, not yet. Today was, in the words of Ronnie White, "the passing of the torch." I had the rare chance to sing tenor on the team. That's not rare for others, but it's very rare for me. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It also let me know I am out of shape vocally. Leading a band has let me get lazy. The a capella world is much more demanding.

I am very impressed by what God has done in Kevin Riggs. Kevin has been the worship leader at Golf Course for the past three years. He took the mantle from Ken Young who led worship and directed Hallal Ministries for many years.

Kevin has done a fabulous job with the GCR worship team. He has transitioned it from the leadership of Ken into something very much his own. Following in Ken's footsteps would be hard for anyone, and Kevin has done it in a part-time status. My hat is off to him.

What impresses me even more is his humble attitude. That same attitude is reflected in his wife, Iris. Kevin recognized what few are able to do. In his words, the GCR worship ministry is going great but it needed to go to the next level. He felt like he could not do that in a part-time role. And he certainly was not going to give up the construction business that he owns. He came to that painful conclusion about the same time that I first sent out a mass email to my friends telling them I was looking for a job.

The day after I sent out that email, Kevin called me and laid everything on the line. He told me he needed to step down and asked if I was interested in taking his place. The rest is history. Not only did Kevin listen to that still, small voice of God, but he acted submissively... going as far as actively recruiting his replacement. And his attitude and behavior has continued to reflect that submissiveness.

I am honored to share the ministry with Kevin. He is truly a man of God.

Home is Where the Bus Is

That used to be one of our little pet phrases while on the road with Acappella... "home is where the bus is." Our bus has made a stop in Midland. Lord willing, we can just park the stupid thing and be done with it.

I write this on Thanksgiving night. Everyone has gone to bed but me, and I'm not far away. The past few days have been some of the most physically stressful and emotionally challenging days I've had yet. I will cover the whole moving episode in another post. For tonight, I thought it appropriate to stop and give thanks to the good Lord for all He's done. Especially all He's done in the past few weeks.

I'm thankful that....

• We made it to Midland in one piece, safe and sound.
• Our dogs have not run away and seem to be adjusting well.
• Our kids have not run away and seem to be adjusting well.
• We had lots of people show up to help us load and get things finished up in Corpus so we could leave (more info later).
• We had lots of people show up to help us unload here in Midland.
• We had a wonderful greeting awaiting us when we arrived in the form of a massive care package specifically designed for each of our tastes. Thanks Praise Team!
• Our house closed on time and we actually got a refund instead of having to pay cash.
• Ashley had a chance to meet some wonderful people and make some very good desserts.
  
• Nancy and April were available to drive our truck to Midland and stuck around for a few days for "vacation" (can you call helping us unpack vacation?).
• Thanksgiving meal today was fabulous. :)

There's much more to be thankful for and more stories to tell, but I am very tired. To all my friends in Corpus who are reading this, thank you for three great years. We will miss you all terribly. To all my new friends in Midland, thanks for the warm reception. I can't wait to meet all of you.

All because of Christ...

Midland or Bust

This should be my last post for a few days. We've been packing for weeks now and tonight is the night the computer goes back into the box. Tomorrow (Sunday) we load into the truck, and Monday we hit the road for Midland.

Tuesday morning we close on our new house. Tuesday afternoon Sherri has her interview for the new job. Tuesday evening Grande installs cable and Internet.

Wednesday morning I stay in bed until Thursday.

I should be back online by Thanksgiving. Keep us in your prayers. God bless... ~Gary

A Plethora of Boxes, God Stuff & MISD

We are getting very close to our moving day. We have boxes running out of ears. I found a place online that gives you great deals on boxes, so I ordered about 90 for about the price I would pay for 30 at U-Haul. It took 5 days for them to get here with free shipping. In those 5 days, friends have donated about 90 boxes. So we have a few extra. Okay, a ton extra. Better than not enough, I suppose.

Sherri got a call from MISD today. As I mentioned in an earlier post, she found a job she is interested in at Rusk Elementary. Normal procedure is to have a screening interview with the District people. If you pass that, you can interview with the principal of the job you're looking at. We set up a screening interview for Tuesday afternoon, the day we close on the house and move in. One of the administration people from Rusk called today and wanted her to interview at the school on Monday, before the screening. We obviously can't do that, since we aren't there yet. So they asked about Tuesday morning. We can't do that since we are at the bank closing. So they said to drive over to Rusk right after the screening interview downtown that afternoon.

I don't want to read anything into this, but it sure sounds to me like she's got a pretty good shot at this job. Which makes this yet another God-thing. This entire experience has had Holy Fingerprints all over it. We keep wondering what will be next...

Now if OUR house sells quickly...

The Place of Houses

Things are coming together, finally. The biggest obstacle we've been facing over the past few days is our home. Packing and cleaning. And a realtor.

The realtor part is going well. God led us to Jean Marie Giegerich of The Place of Houses. After some not so good experiences with Realtors, it is nice to have one who is very good. Jean Marie has been doing this for almost 20 years and is one of the top 5 in Corpus. I feel that we are in good hands. She's better than Allstate.

We're finally seeing some headway on our packing as well. It seems like we have been packing for weeks and nothing seems to change except the stack of filled boxes in our garage. The house still looks the same. But after careful inspection today, we realized that a large part of what's still in the house is either stuff we will need till the last day, or stuff we are getting rid of in our "moving sale." Sherri feels a lot better about it, which means I feel a lot better about it. You know how that goes.

As far as Midland is concerned, everything is coming along nicely. Our house is in the last stages.We close on the 21st, and we are just waiting on a time. We've even got the cable/phone/Internet company scheduled to come in that afternoon, so the mortgage company better make sure they have their act together. We even know our phone number already.

If you read this, please pause a moment and say a little prayer for safe journeys, peace in the transition, and strength to see this out. God bless... ~Gary

MISD

Another God thing might be happening.

Midland ISD posts new job openings on their website every Tuesday and Friday afternoon. Sherri has been watching this site since we first began to look seriously at GCR.

Last night (Tuesday) Sherri found an opening at Rusk Elementary for a position in "Life Skills" for K-1st. We believe this to be the same type job that Sherri is now in, though it is called Adaptive Education here in Corpus. This is what Sherri loves and she is very good at it.

One of Sherri's old friends works as a teacher at Rusk. They have spoken and Sherri is trying to contact the Principal there.

On top of all this, it is about 3 minutes from our house. These kind of things just keep happening. I don't know if Sherri will get this job, but the way things have been going, it sure seems likely. Praise God.

The Church of the First Down

We had an interesting experience this past Sunday morning. I mentioned in an earlier blog that we didn't feel entirely comfortable going to our new merged church. So we chose to go to the mega-church here in Corpus, Bay Area Fellowship.

I'm sure, at some point or another, you've heard comparisons drawn between the behavior of people at a football game and the behavior of people at church. You've most likely heard something along the lines of "why do we get so worked up at the stadium and not at worship? Isn't God more important than ______ (fill in your favorite team)?"

I finally got to see this concept in action at Bay Area. This past weekend was "Dallas Cowboy Weekend" with special guest Bill Bates. Do you remember Bill? Linebacker wearing the number 40 for over 15 years. He wasn't afraid to hit anyone and often used his body as a human projectile. One of my favorite Cowboys of all time. It was worth the visit just to hear him speak.

But the fun part was the worship service. At least, I think it was worship. Most of the crowd and ALL of the staff were wearing Cowboy jerseys (except the aging rock and roll bass player who was actually wearing a Houston Oilers jersey). Some of the greeters and ushers actually had their faces painted in Cowboy colors. The band broke through a big banner to enter the stage, which was covered in massive glittering metal stars ala Cowboy logo. They had a pretty rockin' first song which got everyone pumped. Then the second song was none other than the Monday Night Football theme song with a few lyrics changed. The place went nuts. For the first time in my life, I actually saw the same enthusiasm at a worship event that I see on TV at a pro football game.

And it was all for God. Way cool.

As an aside... there was a television crew out front filming reference shots as we were leaving. That evening on the local news the story ran with some of those shots. There we were, big as life. The Moyers family walking out of Bay Area on Sunday morning. Sherri had several people at school ask her what we were up to the next morning. I think we got caught. :)

Real Estate

Lots of stuff is going on in our world of real estate. It's been less than a week since we've accepted the job in Midland. In that short time we've made an offer on a house (which was accepted) and taken the first steps to putting ours on the market.

The Midland home has a few problems, as all homes do. The inspector did his thing yesterday and came up with three pages of problems, some small, some not so small. Now we begin the process of working through those problems.

This afternoon we made contact with the realtor we wanted and she is excited about working with us. She is one of the better Realtors in Corpus Christi and I expect God to use her as He has everything else in this change. In her initial look at our place, she was pricing it in a ballpark that floored us. I guess housing has gone up in the last 3 years. We apparently made a good investment. We shall see if we actually get what we asking for.

It's Saturday night, and we are trying to decide which church to attend tomorrow. We thought about going to Christ Point, but I'm afraid we'd be going for the wrong reasons. If we went there, we'd be doing our best to put on a "I'm not hurt at all" face, which would not be the truth. The minister at GCR told us, whether we realized it or not, we were coming to them wounded. The more we reflect on that, the more truth we see in it.

God's Canvas

The past few days have been a blur of spiritual activity. We're not talking "Ghostbusters." This is the Holy type. Kevin Riggs commented in an email I received today that "this has been like watching a picture that HE'S painting coming more and more complete." Amen to that one, bro. The ultimate artist.

The list of coincidental timing issues and answered prayer has become almost humorous. Things keep happening and details keep falling together. And as usual, God has waited until the last moment to make it all happen at once so that I will have no trouble recognizing that He is the one doing it and not me.

We made an offer on a house in Midland yesterday. They've accepted. So unless something bad comes up in the 10-day inspection window, that's a major hurdle out of the way. Anyone out there interested in buying our house in Corpus? Anyone? Bueller? Beuller?

If things continue to proceed on the path that's appearing, we will be moving to Midland during the week of Thanksgiving and I will start full time duties at GCR on the 27th of this month... unless something goes hinky with the housing thing.

Things are speeding up quickly. God is really moving in an obvious way. We'll see what happens before the next post...