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ReposNai
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Name: Ian
Country: United States
State: Virginia
Birthday: 10/18/1979
Gender: Male
Interests: It wouldn't be Xanga, cause I just changed this from the first time I edited it about 10 months ago, or so.
Expertise: Graphic Design, Photography, web design, putting my foot in my mouth and then joking about the foot lodged in my mouth thus turning that potentially disasterous situation into a jovial and jolly one.
Occupation: Artist
Industry: Nonprofit
Message: message meEmail: email me
Website: visit my website
AIM:  ReposNai
MSN: me@iansoper.com
Member Since:
9/21/2003
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| NEW BLOG:
read it. relish in its words of wisdom. comment on those beautiful
words. then in an act of impluse click on one of my compelling google
ads, get ingulfed in that new website and forget the amazing things
that you read on my blog.
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| DRASTIC CHANGES
Has it only been 6 weeks? I can't believe this. My life has gone
through some dramatic changes in the last month. So, where do I begin?
I could begin with the fact that I don't have a job anymore. Wait, I
won't start there. Let me go futher back...
Myself and a group of 4 others from my former place of employment (a
church in VA) began to feel called to start a different expression of
church. What does that mean? It is hard to say. We don't think that it
will be in Fredericksburg where we are now, but we also have no idea
where it will be or when we will be there. We'd been discussing church
(what we like, what works, what doesn't work, how the church needs to
change to deal wit this new culture and dramatic shift in human
thinking that is emerging in our world), our passions, and our
frustrations for the past year or so.
Dialog
There was all talk going on, and little, if no, action. We really
thought that we could express church in a new way inside the context of
our current church environment. But, that ended up not working out. So 7 weeks ago, we went up to D.C. to see Brian McLaren speak at Sojourners.
It was amazing, but most amazing from that is something that we all
took from it. Brian said that one of the best ways to change the status
quo is to start new churches, saying that they are the ones that
innovate, while old churches will immitate them if the new models are
successful. So, that night we prayed. What should we do? What direction
should we go in? We began to feel a tremendous pull toward something
new, not just talk now, but true action.
We felt fairly secure in our jobs, or so we thought, and we were unable
to give them up just yet. That is when God began to punch us in the
face. We had meetings with our boss that week, and each of us
discovered through the conversations that God had given us some open
doors to actually make decisions about leaving our jobs and persuing a
new thing that God has for all of us. We prayed again on Friday, then
we prayed again on Sunday night. We finally knew that we had to leave,
to venture out into the journey of God's calling.
Resignation
Iin light of our new found calling, we talked to our boss. We told him
what was on our hearts and that we feel called out to a new kind of
expression of church. We gave our letters of resignation that day (as
we were encouraged to do so) and found that I had two weeks left a few
days later.
Community
So, it has been about 4 weeks since that meeting and I am currently
without a job. I've moved in with my cohorts (Ryan & Ashley Poe
and Chris & Natasha Kirk). We'recommunally, sharing living expenses and continuing to seek what God has
for us. I'm excited!
Relationship
I've also found a partner for life. Her name is Jamie Smith and is a
teacher in Fredericskburg. We've been together for about 6 weeks, but
it feels like six months. I love her and intend on marrying her. Yes, I
have discuessed all this with her :)
Blog
I've decided to stop using Xanga as my personal blog, instead, I'll be using blogger. My new blog will be at http://iansoper.blogspot.com/
Sorry for the disconnect from Xanga, but blogger will suit me better as I transition.
The Nameless Church
To learn more about this journey that the 6 of us are on to be God's incarnate church see our website: thenamelesschurch.com
I might post on xanga occasionally and I'll try to do better job on commenting on all of your posts in the future.
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| Ok, this really pissed me off today.
I hope I can be angry and not sin. Forgive these children, father, they don't know what they are doing.
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I lost a disc golf disc in a pond yesterday.
This is me trying to retrieve it. I did not.
Is it me or does my butt look gigantic in this photo? Please refrain from any comments relating to the size of my butt.
Ian
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| I'm stuck in Louisville right now typing on a computer at the "Business Center" at a La Quinta hotel by the Louisville International Airport. I flew in last night with the plan that my dad would pick me up at the air port and then drive me back to Evansville. Didn't happen. Not in Southern Indiana and definitly not on I-64.
Anybody who originates from Evansville, IN and is making that Mecca trip home for the holidays this year has been royally screwed by the weather. Evansville got over 19" of snow in a 24 hour period and possibliy close to 24" altogether. This is the worst snow since 1978 according to my dad.
My original idea to come home for Christmas to save a little bit of money (over $100) was to fly in to Louisville (from Baltimore) and then have my dad pick me up at the Louisville Airport which is about 2 hours away. Cause, everyone knows around here that flying into Louisville is much cheaper, and who can beat Southwest for prices and service? Well, that didn't work quite right this year.
So, here are Ian Soper's Travelling Mistakes/ Tips for Christmas 2004:
- Don't Park at the BWI airport. It took me 3.5 hours to get there yesterday (usually 1.5 hrs) and the Long Term parking lot was full, so it will cost me about 20 more bucks for parking - about $110.
- Instead of driving, take the train. Amtrak could have done me well for about 70-80 bucks. Live and learn.
- Take the Convenient route, not the cheap route. Fly straigt into Evansville. Flying to Louisville may be cheap, but the cheap way can screw you over and end up costing you more money.
- Plan ahead better. I planned ahead this year, well, sort of. I kind of planned my trip on auto pilot, not looking into every option.
- Be very aware of weather conditions. I could have paid better attention to the weather, however in this case it didn't matter because no one knew this one was coming.
- Buy your gifts online. This is what I did right. With just about everything in the world purchasable via the internet there is very little reason not to buy your gifts online if you have to travel somewhere for Christmas. Let the UPS guy handle delivering your presents.
- Let God deal with the Chaos. Hey, you're in uncontrollable chaos. There is NOTHING you can do to solve it. God made the world and knows his creation pretty well, let him deal with it.
That's alls I got. Learn from my mistakes and from the uncertainty of this world we live in and have a Merry Christmas!!!
Ian | | |
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