To iPhone, or Not To iPhone.   That is the question.   I need to know, what do you think?  Should I get an iPhone?

I stopped in at my local AT&T store and they said they would have the new iPhone available on July 11.   So, I'm sold on the functionality of the new iPhone, I love the Exchange ActiveSync built in.   That is a necessity for me.   I'm 50/50 on the virtual keyboard, but could probably get used to that.   My biggest question is the AT&T network -- I'm on Verizon right now.   Is the AT&T network reliable?   I don't talk an overly huge amount on my cell phone, I mostly use it for email, text messaging and calendar.  I have a Treo 700 Windows version right now.   I really like it, but I guess the iPhone hype and marketing is getting to me.

I need to hear from anybody out there on the AT&T network:  Do you like it?  Do you drop calls?  Are you satisfied with the service?  Do you have an iPhone already?  What do you think?

Caleb Grant is 2 today!   Happy Birthday!

Caleb is getting so big and his words and speech are amazing us.   Today is birthday party day, lots of friends and family coming over to help celebrate!

Caleb's verse:

Numbers 14:24 -->  But because my servent Caleb has a different spirit and follows me wholeheartedly, I will bring him into the land he went to, and his descendants will inherit it.

I was reading in Proverbs this morning and came across two cool verses.  I've been trying to read a chapter in Proverbs everyday.   Since today is June 21, I was reading in Proverbs 21.    Proverbs 21:21 says "He who pursues righteousness and love finds life, prosperity and honor."   What a great verse for Caleb's birth day.    So then I decided to go look up Proverbs 6:21 (for June 21) and here's what it says "Bind them upon your heart forever fasten them around your neck."    Good stuff.  It's in reference to keeping your parents teaching and commands in your heart.

That's always been my prayer with our boys.   That God would give us the wisdom to raise them right and that they would bind that wisdom in their hearts forever.

This story has been posted on a few blogs and I heard it on WGNR in Indy as well.  I thought it was pretty cool and a great story of faith.

Just watch the video and then think about how you would have handled this situation.

Camden definitely has a love for music.   He especially likes the drums.   The other day he said he wanted to make his hair blue because he wanted to have "drummer hair".   Holli and I didn't miss a beat (no pun intended) and thought "why not?"

So Holli went out and got some blue hair stuff and made Cam's hair blue.

Notice the tee shirt which says "Rock".  He's definitely our rocker!

I'll have to post some video sometime of him rocking out on his drums. 

I heard something pretty funny over this past father’s day weekend.   If you look in the dictionary the word father is surrounded by the word fathead at the front and fatigue at the end.   

I wanted to confirm this for myself, but I found it difficult to find a dictionary.   Nowadays, I think everyone uses an online dictionary and you can only search for individual words on those.   I eventually found one at my parents and looked it up.   I think there were a few words after father and before fatigued, but the main jist of the point was there.

Pretty funny.  I don’t know about you other dads, but fathead and fatigued pretty much sums me up.   With a busy life and two boys (5 and 2), I get pretty fatigued!   And the fathead part…Just ask Holli.   There are plenty of times I live up to that label!

Cheers Fathers.  Let’s try not to be a fathead today.  Also, share this with your wife, maybe she’ll let you sleep in to help with the fatigue…maybe not.

I heard something pretty cool today.   Play along with me for a minute:

Stick out your arm in front of you.   Now point your index finger out as if you are pointing at someone.    

Notice how there are 3 fingers pointing back at you?    I never thought about that before, but it's a pretty cool illustration of why we should not be so quick to judge others.    The very thing we're judging could be something we're dealing with in our own life.  Or if it's not that, it's something else in our life that we need to examine.

For something else to ponder in a similar realm, check out a post my friend Matt wrote that got me thinking.

I was doing some reflecting on my dream day and re-reading some notes.    I found that I had a lot of notes surrounding 1 Chronicles 28.

I have a NIV Study Bible, so I really liked the notes called "Principles To Live By" next to this chapter.

1.  Get to know God personally.

2.  Learn God's commands and discover what he wants you to do.

3.  Worship God with wholehearted devotion.

4.  Serve God with a willing mind.

5.  Be faithful.

6.  Don't become discouraged.

I think I could dig into each of these a whole lot more.   Any one thing in particular stand out to you?

What do you think of our cartoon Jesus? Love It?  Hate It?  Think we're insane?

When we had the idea to launch this site, I was doing some praying and got the idea to create a mascot for the site.    Instead of creating a mascot, I decided why not create a cartoon Jesus to help represent Vortex?   Afterall, He's always with us anyways.    I ran with the idea, found an illustrator, gave him some rough ideas via email and now you see the final version.

Check out the evolution of our cartoon Jesus:

Version 1:


Version 2:


Version 3:


Version 4:


Version 5:


Version 6:


Version 7:


Version 8:


Version 9:


Version 10:


Version 11:


Version 12:
 

Final Version: 

You'll see lots of little subtle differences as you look down at the various versions.   

 So, what do you think?

So we moved off of Blogger today and on to a new blog platform to run VortexMinistry.com.   Me being the tech geek, just had to run my own blog platform.  

Read the About Vortex page to learn a little more about what we're trying to do.   It's an ever evolving idea and concept, but isn't that where it gets fun?   We've got all kinds of ideas running around of where to take this, but slowly they will come.   Afterall, there is still a family and a business and commitments, etc.....

Let's live a Freaky Life!   How about you?   Get Sucked In and see where it takes you. 

Definitely glad I did the Dream Day afternoon. I’m working to build that up to an entire day. What if I could do it once a week?

I found a park and it was empty, probably because it was raining. There was a huge covered picnic shelter, so it was great for me. I started reading my Bible, but I kept hearing some random scratching coming from a nearby garbage can. My curiosity arose so I went to check it out. I thought maybe a cat, squirrel or raccoon had climbed inside and was stuck. Well, after a couple of minutes I decided to kick the can over. Out popped a raccoon and it just froze there. Then, it got its bearings and took off for the woods. I told Holli I saved a raccoon’s life and she just thought I was crazy. She said I was lucky it didn’t attack me. Hmm, that wouldn’t be good.

So I kept on dreaming and then all of a sudden this big dog shows up from out of nowhere. It seemed friendly, but didn’t have a collar on, so I didn’t mess with it. It eventually left.

My mind is swirling around with lots of good scripture I was reading and listening to some of things God was trying to tell me. I took a lot of great notes and will definitely be doing this again. I spent most of my time in 1 Chronicles. Good stuff about David.