Is Kevin a great communicator? YES. Is he a great pastor? YES. Is he a great leader? YES. But, every person in your church is looking to him for a different reason and he is bringing so many different sides to the table and stretching Harrah Church in many new ways that will increase our ministry potential in the future, because he is unwilling to let guys like me HOG the work, steal the glory, and destroy ourselves. Some are being challenged to get more involved. Some are being asked to delegate. Some are being asked to STOP. Some are being asked for better, some for more, others for less.

What are you looking to your pastor or boss for? If you work in the church, how is your boss pastoring you?

I few insights that have helped me this past 8 months are to look to your new boss to find out what are his goals. What are people, especially those in leadership over him, asking for? What are his deliverables? Help him succeed and he will help you succeed. How does he like to work? Kevin hates meetings so we try to avoid table talks when a lunch conversation or quick couple of questions get the job done. What kind of work does he appreciate? What does he do for fun? This isn’t about sucking up to the boss. Working the relationship can be like fine tuning your car’s engine. That thing is never going to run right if the parts aren’t working together.

Just a couple of thoughts about the last 8 months and how things are going here in Harrah, which is totally awesome.

I have learned many things on this trip

• We have too many chiefs in this car
• Jimmy eats 5-7 meals a day
• There is a reason that Jimmy has so many traffic tickets, really there are MANY reasons
• 5 Guys Burgers in incredible
• Orlando is an amazing place

I have learned a lesson about why you don’t eat with your elbows on the table. Jimmy eats so often that I have developed a blister on my right elbow from lifting my drink and food to my mouth. Ouch.

     Part of me wants to be an uncle similar to Gene Hackman’s grandfather in The Royal Tenebaum’s. He had freaking blast with those boys. I guess time will tell.

     While I am writing this post I am watching Cassandra’s Dream about an Uncle who convinces his nephews to murder a business partner. It is scary how the things you blog about intersect with what you are watching on TV or listening to. LOL

     I saw some great volunteers working together at the church. The Kraeer family works together in the A/V running sound, lighting, and video. It is great to see a family serving together. What a legacy.

      The church’s student ministry is gearing up for a performance of The Diary of Anne Frank in January. During the performances they will have exhibits in the lobby area about genocide that is happening throughout the world today. It is really great to see the church bringing attention to these issues to the community. I hope to get back to Harrah Church soon and lead some worship and see some more friends.

     Head over to www.harrahchurch.com and check out the church, watch the sermon, and send Jimmy an email telling him to start blogging.

So last night I saw that Ryland had posted a video of his band singing Jesus, Paid it All that I wanted to share with you guys. Watch the video, go to his web site, invite him to lead worship at your next event, buy his new album.

Ryland Russell Band – Jesus Paid it All – SYATP 08 from ryland russell on Vimeo.

     I went to Dark Side skate shop this afternoon to pick out a skateboard to give away at our September 9th Launch party for Skate Church Broken Arrow. It is going to be a killer time and the board is amazing. It is a Bachinsky deck with Venture trucks, Pig bearings, and Hubba wheels. I love going to the skateshop and putting a board together. Highlight of my day. Well, that and the white chocolate and macadamia nut cookies I ate. The students are going to freak over this new board.

     Currently watching The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. Clint Eastwood is crawling around the desert and looking like a burnt raisin.

     Kim and Phillip came over and hung out at the house with us tonight. They are relatively new to the church. They both love to watch movie, listen to music, and go to concerts. Great people. Phillip helped me move the skate ramp I built over the weekend to the church.

Battery is running low and so am I. Chat at you later taters.

The water on the river was perfect and felt great when we jumped into it from the boat. Now is the perfect time to float the river. Camping was fun. Zack and I went down early to set up the tents for our group up. When we finished setting the tents up we were soaked with sweat and had given one particular tent a good cussing before finishing setting it up. We went and hung out and Wal-Mart for awhile and waited at Starbuck’s playing Scrabble until the group got there.

Our friends Hollie and Zack are moving to take teaching jobs in the Yukon area. We are going to miss hanging out with them and want to wish them the best. They are moving the first week of August. Zack already has a job, but please pray that Hollie would find the right teaching job.

      Hi, I’m Katherine Conner, and I get to be your guest blogger today.  My favorite Jeremy Davidson friend asked me to write to you about the impact that www.youtube.com has on my life, and the ways that I see we could use YouTube to reach others for Christ.

      I use the YouTube service on an almost daily basis.  I have Flock set as my current web browser, and one of the features I like most about it is the ability to log into my YouTube account.  The videos that I have previously favorited will then be displayed across the top of my screen.  I can play those while continuing to browse the Internet.  This is easier to me that Itunes most of the time, because all of my favorite songs are in one place.

      I mainly use YouTube to access music.  Lately, I have been on a big kick to discover new songs and artists, and YouTube makes it very easy to do this.  Tulsa used to have a pretty cool “Christian alternative” radio station that I enjoyed listening to- unfortunately it was changed to another “contemporary Christian” station, meaning there is too much Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith for me to handle.  Using YouTube, I can get online to hear new songs by the artists that I used to listen to on the Kross.  I use the “Related Videos” tab on to often find new music.  I recently unearthed a cover of one of my favorite Rush of Fools song that I am determined to learn to sing- which is a big deal since I can’t sing.  At all.

      I feel that YouTube is a valuable resource for those of use trying to further the Kingdom of Christ. Wikipedia states that “few statistics are publicly available regarding the number of videos on YouTube. However, in July 2006, the company revealed that more than 100 million videos were being watched every day, and 2.5 billion videos were watched in June 2006. 50,000 videos were being added per day in May 2006, and this increased to 65,000 by July. In January 2008 alone, nearly 79 million users had made over 3 billion video views.”  These facts are old, and I’m sure that they’ve only increased since then.  I feel that the dreams and desires of my generation to see the love of Christ could be shared through videos- how cool would it be to see tutorials such as “How to Love the Skaters” or “How to Witness to the Gay Guys Next Door”?  It would be totally neat to get on and see other Christians sharing their walks and relationships with us.  I would like to log on to YouTube and watch testimonies from around the globe of how God is moving.  Sermons and music are helpful and needed, but I would love to see real world application of how I can fulfill the commandment to “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”  (Matthew 20:28 NIV). 

-Katherine Conner
You can help save lives- one mile at a time!!
Check out our NEW webpage for TNT-
http://pages.teamintraining.org/ok/rnrsa08/kconner