Orange 2010 does it big..!
I just got back from The Orange Conference where I had a great time seeing meeting so many old friends, and making many new ones. If you haven’t been before, trust me when I say; they do it big…!
Sure they have top-notch lights, sounds, visuals, etc; but what I mean by “Orange does it big” is that they challenge people to dream big things for the cause of Christ. They are passionate about churches partnering with parents, and to me that is big…!
I’l elaborate on this more next week when things slow down for me, but for now enjoy these images from #Orange10
Can you say “DELUXE ” accommodations…..
I’m in Atlanta this week at The Orange Conference, and while I’m in town my friends Jared and Eryn (both who work for Orange) offered to let me stay at their place. Since they are both working CRAZY hours at the conference, they are staying in a hotel across the street from the arena where the conference is located. Which means we (a cool guy by the name of Kyle is staying here as well) have their house to ourself…!
I’m sure they wouldn’t want me to brag on them, but I was excited to find out they have a HUGE bathtub. (For those who don’t know, I’m a “bath” taker. So what, I”m not afraid to admit it.) Not to mention their entire place is awesome! (dual shower heads + dual sinks = AWESOME!) Kyle and I got to their place around midnight tonight, and take a look what we came home to…! Thanks Eryn and Jared, it’s going to be a great week!
The Making Of Orange – behind the veil
All week long we will be live streaming from backstage at The Orange Conference. This is totally cool, and totally FREE…!
Here is a sneak peak “behind the veil” before we get started. Enjoy..!
Orange 2010 – YOU CAN BE “THERE” – FOR FREE…!
Please excuse the low quality of this video, I’m going on about five hours of sleep in the last three days so I’m a little out of it. Now on to the important stuff! Tomorrow is the start of the one conference I look forward to all year – The Orange Conference.
If you are attending, please be sure to make the short journey to the top of the arena to The Orange Leaders Lounge. I’ll be hanging out there pretty much the entire conference, and you won’t want to miss some of the cool things we’re going to be doing! During the conference you’ll have a chance to come up and meet Donald Miller, Rev Run, Reggie Miller, John & Nancy Ortberg, just to name a few…! In other words, we’re going to be having a GREAT time up there…and rumor has it you’ll be able to come up with your team and great a FREE picture taken in front of some awesome masterpieces created by Hannah Joiner! We’ll also be giving out some prizes, and running contests throughout the conference, so stay tuned..! (You can follow me on twitter for the real-time updates from The Orange Leaders Lounge. @Rick_Smith )
If you aren’t able to attend the conference I am very excited to announce that we are doing something super cool this year at Orange – a live video stream from backstage. You can click this link, and get your fill of “Orange” for the next three days – FOR FREE!!!! This is a great chance for you to get a “sneak peek” at some of the cool things going on backstage at Orange. You’ll also be able to hear some great insight from people who are passionate about helping the church partner with parents and students! (And if your around your computer at 1:10 on Thursday you’ll be able to see, and hear from me! I’m excited to be a part of this, and I think it is super cool that we are able to do this totally free for all of you out in “internet land”!!!)
Again, if you’re at Orange, come up and say hi. If not, check out the link above and enjoy the FREE, live stream…! See you, or tweet you, soon….
p.s. – if you have an iphone, or iPad be sure to download the official Orange iPhone App..!
-Rick
rhythm. how’s yours?
Everyone has rhythm. Yelp, even me. The question is how’s yours?
Lately mine has been fast. Too fast. Sure, a fast rhythm can be exciting, but I find I feel more connected to God when I slow down. If we aren’t intentional about slowing down the rhythm of our lives from time to time, April turns into May, and 2009 turns into 2010, and life gets away from us.
We look up and find we aren’t any closer to God in 2010 then we were in 2009. And then 2010 becomes 2020. And there we are, still chasing iPads, and iPhones.
I want to make sure I take time to slow down and connect with God.
It may just be me, but God seems to really like slow rhythms.
Dallas Seminary + iPad = Crazy Delicious
You want to see something that is mega, epic, cool? Check out this short video! My good friend, John Dyer, the director of web development at DTS is wicked smart (and a mega geek – which is another reason I like him so much!) As you probably know by now, the iPad dropped today, and John allowed me to get a sneak peek at something VERY AWESOME that he is in the beginning stages of developing. What is this mega, epic, awesome thing? Well I”m glad you asked. Check out the video below to find out!
As you can see there are many things he is still working out, but to even to have something as innovate as this in the pipeline, I think is epic! I don’t want to get to ‘deep’ here, but it really excites me when Christian organizations are on the cutting edge of technology instead of doing the same ol’, some ol’. I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure it honors God when we creatively use technology for purposes like this…!
If you have an iPad and want to check this incredible technology out, John has allowed me to post the link for your touch screen pleasure.
(**Disclaimer – My comments regarding other seminaries in no way should be taken seriously. I am not making any theological statements regarding any seminary, or implying that a theological institution is in ANY way “better” then another by the sorts of technology it uses. Those of you who know me in “real life” understand my humor, so if you don’t please take my comments in jest.)
I want to pop the big. blue. balloons.
This picture reminds me of my life lately. There is the one thing worth focusing on. The one thing deserving of all of me. The one place where all of life is found. Then in an attempt to take our attention away from the one thing, is this big, blue, balloon.
I have a lot of these big, blue, balloons in my life. It seems that lately they are all over the place. My mind is going a million miles a minute. It’s all mostly a mix of good, and just ‘neutral’ stuff. Seminary, ministry, work, family, travel, dreaming about ways I could change the World for the cause of Christ, and just living life. Then things like Lost, 24, ipad’s, my fish tanks, rss feeds, naps, projects, and the rest of the things that take up my time. All big, blue, balloons.
I haven’t gotten much sleep lately, instead I’ve been consumed by these big, blue, balloons. (Again, it isn’t that these balloons are all bad) – but they are distractions. Things attempting to keep my focus off of the one thing that really matters.
I want to pop all of these big. blue. balloons.
Tonight I put away the Hebrew parsing, the mountain of books I have to read, the sermon prep for Easter Sunday’s sermon, the ministry planning, the iPhone, and all the rest, and I just sat with God. I popped all the big. blue. balloons, and just sat there, at the foot of the cross, with my God. It was nice.
I read through Psalm 63 tonight, the entire Psalm is beautiful, however I really like verse 1-4.
“O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you,
as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.
So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary,
beholding your power and glory.
Because your steadfast love is better than life,
my lips will praise you.
So I will bless you as long as I live;
in your name I will lift up my hands.”
My soul really does thirst after God. I know this land is dry, there is nothing here for me. It’s lame in comparison to my God. No iPad, no Iphone, no degree, no anything can compare with how awesome God is. In fact, that Psalm says, “Your love is better then life.” How true is this! The fact that the Holy, Loving, Powerful, Creator, God loves a guy like me. Enough to send His Son to die in my place, and take ALL of my sin, and put it on His Son so that I could have a personal relationship with Him, that blows my mind. That is better then any of the big. blue. balloons.
God’s got a lot of work to do on me. A lot. But my prayer is God will help me to get better at popping these big. blue. balloons.
Ed Young is a Lyrical Gangsta’
I had no idea Ed Young knew how to rap, but check out this video I ran across today by Ed Young, pastor of Fellowship Church in Grapevine, TX. Say what you want about Ed Young, but you got to admit, this is pretty funny…!
Check it out, and let me know your thoughts. Funny? UnFunny?
God loves Uganda
I’m currently taking a World Missions course at Dallas Seminary, and one of our recent assignments was to create a “prayer guide” that focused on a country outside of North America. We were also asked to find a few other people to join with us in prayer for the country that we focused on. I decided to create a visual “prayer guide” to help myself, and others, get a better idea of what is going on in Uganda.
I also thought I could use the “power” of the internet to hopefully get more then “a few” others to pray for Uganda. My hope is that everyone that stumbles upon this “prayer guide” would view it, and then take a few minutes to pray for the prayer requests at the end of it.
Please let me know if you took a moment to pray for Uganda, as well as any other feedback that you wish to share in the comment section below!
Do you have a love for “the lost?”
I am reading “Let the Nations Be Glad!” by John Piper for a class, and came across this quote tonight, and thought I would share.
“Have you ever wondered what it feels like to have a love for the lost? This is a term we use as part of our Christian jargon. Many believers search their hearts in condemnation, looking for the arrival of some feeling of benevolence that will propel them into bold evangelism. It will never happen. It is impossible to love “the lost.” You can’t feel deeply for an abstraction or a concept. You would find it impossible to love deeply an unfamiliar individual portrayed in a photograph, let alone a nation or a race or something as vague as “all lost people.”
This quote really made think about how often I share the Gospel of grace that has so radically changed my life with people in my life. How often I think I need to wait for some “feeling.” (whatever that is)
It saddens me that I’m not so in love with God that I can’t do anything BUT tell everyone I meet of us grace, and love. Not just when I’m on a stage, or “working,” but always, everywhere – sharing, and talking about God’s love and mercy, and how He made a way for us to come into a personal relationship with Him through His Son – Jesus Christ, as the Holy Spirit opens us hearts to the Gospel.
What I need to do is love my God so much, that I, like Peter, can’t shut up about Him. That it oozes out of me.
At this point in my life, it doesn’t. And I hate that.
I can’t wait for that day when the Love that God has for people oozes out of me. I know deep down in my heart how deep, and wide this love is, I just want my actions to match up with what I know.
That’s the hard part.
This is what keeps me up at night
I wonder what these crayons were doing an hour before this picture was taken. Were they just resting inside of a dark, dusty, old box on a shelf at Target? Do you think those colorful crayons would ever guessed that very soon some external force, a powerful force outside of their self, was about to intrude in their life in a powerful way? In fact, so powerful that these simple crayons would never be what they once were again. Life as they knew it was over. Something powerful was about to transform these crayons; so much so they could NEVER be the same again!
When I examine the lives of so many in the Bible who have had a true encounter with the Triune God, I see them as one of these crayons. No they don’t write in cool colors, but their lives were impacted by such a powerful external force that they couldn’t ever be the same again. They were all together different.
I think of Peter. One day he says he doesn’t even know Jesus, then a few pages over he is willing to die for this same Jesus. What happened? One day Matthew is collecting taxes, and then then later that same day he is inviting everyone to his house to tell them about this guy named Jesus he met. Why? How about John, a fisherman from a well-to-do family, with a flight temper who leaves it all behind (including his temper) to follow Jesus. His life forever changed. FOREVER. CHANGED. Then you have Paul. Just making an afternoon trip to Damascus. Little did he know that trip would change his life forever. FOREVER.
Normal people. Living normal lives. Impacted by a supernatural God when they least expected it. Wow!!!
Their lives turned inside out because of a supernatural, external God! Their lives would never be the same.
Be reminded of that today. God is powerful. He changes you in such a way that once you encounter Him, you can NEVER be the old you again. It’s impossible. You are changed. (The Bible says you’re a new creation!)
This thought keeps me up at night. It still blows me away. The fact that this powerful, loving, awesome, Triune God, would decide to come into this old, dusty crayon box and change me forever. Why me? Why not lots of other people who need God? Why not a “nicer” person? A “richer” person? A more “gifted” person? Why Rick?
Why you?
I can’t explain it, but it blows me away – every second of the day. I can’t get my mind off of it. I can’t stop thinking about it. It consumes me.
Grace.
Grace.
Grace.
Grace.
Grace.
Mass: We Pray – “Bring your Family Closer to Heaven” …. by playing a video game?
When I first saw this commercial I thought it was a joke; but it’s not! “Mass: We Pray” is a REAL video game produced by a company called “Prayer Works Interactive.” (I cut and copied the press release below the commercial.) I’ve seen some bad Christian “stuff” before, but this is over the top. I can’t believe this is even real, even as I type this I still think it is a joke, but unless this is a very elaborate, and early, April Fool’s Joke – it’s real! Check out the commercial below, and let me know if you’ll be getting one! (Be sure to check out their website – it’s over the top as well!)
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“PRAYER WORKS INTERACTIVE LAUNCHES MASS: WE PRAY.
NOW YOU DON’T HAVE TO WAIT UNTIL SUNDAY TO WORSHIP THE LORD.
Boston, Mass., November 17, 2009 – Prayer Works Interactive is pleased to announce the launch of Mass: We Pray, a revolutionary videogame that allows families to go to church every day from the comfort of their own home. After all, a family shouldn’t have to wait until Sunday to worship the Lord.
Mass: We Pray is the first of many worship-themed games in development for Prayer Works Interactive. Just like with any videogame, families can use a television as a monitor to play. Then, they can use the CROSS, a proprietary, wireless, cross-shaped controller to participate in 24 unique and exhilarating rituals. Make the Sign of the Cross, sprinkle Holy Water, take Collection and even give Holy Communion. Every motion and nuance of a blessing or ritual is detected in three dimensions and replicated on-screen.
As they play, gamers collect Grace points. Then they can trade them in to unlock the Holy Mysteries. It’s entertaining, educational and enlightening.
To get off the couch and into the action, add the KNEELER, a pressure-sensitive accessory that allows gamers to kneel or genuflect just as they would in Church.
To extend the experience even further, download the Seven Sacraments and Holy Rituals Expansion Pack featuring: Ash Wednesday, Confession, Holy Procession, Transubstantiation and much, much more.
According to the founders of Prayer Works Interactive, “Families shouldn’t be scared of videogames. Just like television and radio before that, it’s not the medium that’s dangerous; it’s how you use it. Mass: We Pray is proof that videogames can be used to spread the Good Word.”
Don’t miss this revolutionary launch, coming Easter 2010. Visit masswepray.com for more information.
With Mass: We Pray, you can bring your family closer. To Heaven.
About Prayer Works Interactive
Prayer Works Interactive is a new game-development company founded in Boston in 2007. We believe there is a lack of quality games based upon traditional family values. Our mission is to fill that void by creating engaging, top-quality games that entertain, inspire and bring families closer to the Lord. Our first game is Mass: We Pray, but look for many more in the months to come.
