Daily Grit by Wes Thorp

I am proud of my son, Justin

On his personal blog, Through My Eyes, my son, Justin, just posted a prayer request for himself.  He's a junior at one of the toughest tech schools in the world and is being hammered this week with project deadlines and mid-terms. He's doing great, but running the academic gauntlet at a place like that can wear your stamina down to nothing.  I'm really proud that we just came out and said, please pray for me that he needed help that was beyond himself.  That's an important recognition for anybody.  You can't do it by yourself. My wife and I are certainly praying for him and anybody else who reads this, we would ask the same.  Let us know if we can return the favor.

Lutheran Schools: Can they survive?

This is a shot of my improvised workstation at the Lutheran Education Association (LEA) National Convention in Indianapolis where I am blogging from.  I am here as part of my main ministry at my church--Our Savior Lutheran Church in Lansing, MI.  as the chief support person for its third grade teacher who is also my wife. 

My history with Lutheran schools predates my wife.  I graduated from eight years of Lutheran schools.  For six years, I attended Mt. Olive Lutheran School in Bay City and for my last two, I went to Immanuel Lutheran also in Bay City.

With our changing culture, parental preferences for schools are changing.  Many don't see the distinctive part of a Christian grade school education and few schools do a good job of promoting what they have to offer.

So, I have been wondering. . .

RSS feeds-you need to know about them

I've shared RSS feeds and feed aggregators with a few people who are using them to get the latest posts on certain blogs.  It's really important to stay up with these because they won't go away.  They're useful and they have a ton of practical application.

Debbie Weil, a business blogging consultant, who I've really learned from, has a useful blog post and podcast with an RSS expert who puts all this in perspective in really simple terms.

Dr. Randy Carlson on mistakes Christian couples make

Dr. Randy Carlson of the radio call-in program, Parent Talk, has a website--www.loveyourmarriage.com--where he lists the top seven mistakes that Christian couples make.  It's worth a look for married and unmarried, young and old.

Mitch Albom needs a reality check

Mitch Albom, the Detroit Free Press columnist, who introduced us to his old teacher Morrie and people we will meet in heaven, has written about how great Detroit is with opening day.  Haye makes it sound like heaven with the Opening Day game.  He's all over page one of the Freep.  I think our values are really out of kilter when overpaid athletes receive this kind of credit.  Oh well.

General Motors problems will affect Michigan

The Detroit Free Press today has a story about how Rick Wagoner, the CEO of General Motors will take over day-to-day stuff for the North American operations.  I wonder what all this portends for Michigan that's so dependent on this one company.  It's a huge move for the company to do this.

Trackback demo for Fighting Forward

Our Savior Lutheran Church is a church on the cutting-edge of using a new technology to communicate with its members and to reachout to those looking for answers. 

Blogs are an important piece of this.  They can be incredibly interactive and can weave a disparate group of people together in some pretty serious discussions.

Trackbacks go from one blog to another and are a great way to let somebody know that you've read their blog post.  It goes from your blog to their blog and back again with its various and easy to use links.

By the way, thanks for the sermon today about Doubting Thomas.  I appreciate your explaining how I have a license from the Bible to doubt from time to time.  But, you also provided the encouragement to seriously go for the answer. 

I'm anxious to hear reactions from others.  Comments and trackbacks are a good way to do it.

All churches should be multi-racial; yes or no?

This is a good topic to get a heated argument started.  It's almost like there's a black God and a white God.  There's black churches and white churches.  Hmmm...I've always seen something wrong with that and I'm white. 

It's really rankled me.  I live in a mixed neighborhood in Lansing, MI and there seems to be a real wall between the races.  And, this wall is especially high in the church.  It seems to be there on both sides.  Nobody is willing to break the ice.  Maybe, I shouldn't care.  It's not my problem, according to a lot of my friends.

I don't feel they're right.  It is my problem and theirs too.  Look at the current issue of Christianity Today, April 2005 and its cover story about All Churches Should Be Multiracial.

Pastor David Maier is Fighting Forward and winning

Pastor David Maier is Fighting Forward in his personal life and as shepherd of his church, Our Savior Lutheran Church in Lansing, MI and his leadership is threatening of the Kingdom of Darkness:

• Got doubts about God and Jesus Christ and the Bible?  Think you're a real Doubting Thomas?  That's okay, he says in his blog, Fighting Forward.
• Feel like life and circumstances have performed open-heart surgery on you without anesthesia?  Most people don't like to admit it when it happens.  But, a broken heart doesn't have to be terminal.  It can be fixed for real.

Lansing State Journal needs an attitude check

Lansing, Michigan is not a podunk town, but its newspaper, the Lansing State Journal, a Gannett newspaper, acts like its a small farming village. 

A good example is a recent column written by Derek Melot where he describes city governments on-again, off-again deficit in its treasury.

The city's finance guy one day says there is a multi-million dollar deficit, changes and says "oops" that he was wrong.  And, then...