Speed Cameras & AZ!

Today, we Arizonans have been released of the Speed Camera cops. The 2 year study is over today and will not continue as of right now. I’m, personally, not a fan of the cameras as it doesn’t have the ability to actually enforce the written law. This is what the ‘Basic Speed Rule’ in Arizona states:

Basic Speed Rule: A person shall not drive a vehicle at a speed greater than is reasonable and prudent speed under the conditions and actual and potential hazards then existing. §28-701(A) & (D)

My argument is that the last time I checked camera’s don’t have judgment on what is ‘reasonable and prudent’ speed for conditions. I’ve got some friends that disagree. I think it’s a brilliant little scheme to make up for an extreme financial deficit in the State, but, probably not the best way.

What do you think? Have you been caught by the camera’s here in AZ in the last couple years?

Robbie Seay Band :: Free Stuff For YOU!

It’s really as simple as this…Robbie Seay is a great friend and a guy making music that I respect in big ways. You may know his song called ‘Song of Hope’ an awesome tune. If you don’t know about Robbie Seay Band let me introduce you to one of your new favorites. He’s got a BRAND new record out entitled ‘Miracle‘. It’s an incredible record full of the tension of struggle and miracle.

Robbie and the crew have given me a SWEET little gift pack to give away here on the blog. It includes the CD, Vinyl and T-Shirt from the newest offering ‘Miracle’. ENTER TO WIN: Leave a comment on this blog post with your NAME, CITY & STATE that says ‘I NEED A MIRACLE’. Also, make sure to leave your best email contact when submitting your comment…so I can get in touch with you if you win! No weird catches…just leave a comment.

ARIZONA FRIENDS: Robbie and the band will be in town this Saturday, April 24th @ 7pm at Mission Community Church in Gilbert. They’ll be playing the new tunes from the new record. I’ve got THREE pairs of tickets to give away to the concert. If you want in on the tickets just comment on this blog post with these words ‘I NEED A MIRACLE AND TICKETS!’. You could win the gift pack and the tickets if miracles still happen. 🙂

I’ll start giving the tickets away on Wednesday, April 21st! We’ll pick a winner for the gift pack on Friday, April 23rd! Get your comment in and spread the good word about all of this goodness!

Ryan Axtell :: This Valley :: CD Release

I just wanted to take a second to remind you how blessed I am to have Ryan & Danielle Axtell as friends of mine. I’ve been so honored to have been able to walk alongside Ryan during these past months as God has given and taken away with the loss of their first child. Ryan has never ceased to amaze me with his capacity to follow Jesus into ‘This Valley’. He has been relentless to dig in to find out how God could use this tragedy for His glory. Ryan and Danielle have traversed this trial with honor, integrity, humility, authenticity and yet anchored in the hope we have in Jesus. I only hope I can do my ‘valley’ with that level of respect and honor!

That being said, I could think of no greater thing than for all of us to come out Thursday night, April 15th 2010, to support Ryan and Danielle with the release of ‘This Valley’ his brand new CD. Out of ‘This Valley’ birthed songs rooted in the word and telling the God story in their lives. Ryan has worked vigorously on this project and the album sounds AWESOME!! The release is tomorrow night at 7pm in the auditorium at Cornerstone Chandler. Nyke our Camber Pastor will be interviewing Ryan about the still birth of their first child and all that has come with this hard season for he and Danielle. It will be a powerful time to share in music, story and community. Bring your family and friends to come enjoy this night!

If you can’t make it out to Arizona for the show, but, want to purchase his new Album CLICK HERE!!

My amazing Promise designed all the artwork for Ryan. I think she did a KILLER job and, yes, I am totally biased! 🙂

Worship Leaders Network :: ONE DAY SEMINAR :: April 17th

This coming Saturday, April 17th 2010 the Phoenix area Worship Leaders Network is hosting a ONE DAY SEMINAR at Phoenix Seminary. This will be incredible day for Muscians, Worship Leaders, Worship Teams, Pastors, the Theologically Curious, Music Lovers, Christ Followers, etc… I really hope to see you at Phoenix Seminary for a time full of incredible Theology, conversation and community. Help me get the word out to other Worship minded people in the Phoenix area. If you know a musicians or Pastors that should be at this event…shoot them a link to this post for all of the info! See you there on Saturday.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER BY WEDNESDAY, APRIL 14th, 2010!

Worship Leaders Network – ONE DAY SEMINAR
“RETURNING TO TRUE WORSHIP…IT’S ABOUT TIME!”

The teaching ministry of John Hubley, TH.D.
and the Mindheart Foundation
For Biblical Studies

Saturday, April 17, 2010 from 8:30AM – 2:45PM
Phoenix Seminary

4222 East Thomas Road
Phoenix, AZ 85018
(www.phoenixseminary.edu)

PLEASE REGISTER BY WEDNESDAY, APRIL 14TH, 2010!!

Seminar objectives:
(1) To present the true worship of the triune God though the study of keystone passages of Scripture relating to the five major themes.
(2) To apply these truths to the ministries of pastors and worship leaders in the practice of corporate worship, whatever their organizational associations.

The biblical concepts and principles of worship covered in the seminar integrate into whatever traditional or contemporary forms or styles of corporate worship pastors and worship leaders embrace. It’s the view of this seminar that the Holy Bible is the inspired Word of God and therefore the sola Scriptura of wisdom about true worship.

It is also the view of this seminar that the culture of worship services in the churches of Christ, from the ancient past to the present moment, are the product of the Holy Spirit when they lift up Jesus Christ as the risen, crucified and ascended LORD. The seminar focuses wholly upon biblical passages and principles of worship.

SEMINAR AGENDA

8:30 AM         Registration
(Coffee, Continental Breakfast provided)

Session I:     Worship As Obeisance To Christ

Session II:    Worship As Participation With Christ

Session III:   Worship With Mercy & Justice

Session IV: Christ, Our True Worship Leader

Lunch and Fellowship.     (LUNCH PROVIDED)

Session V:   Embracing An Overall Gospel Praxis
.
The seminar utilizes five general sessions presenting a biblical theme and text followed by participant interaction. Each thematic session is taught by John Hubley, and each interactive session is facilitated by Gary Bloomquist.

Cost:   $40 per person, $35 for 2 or more from the same
church/organization.   (Cost includes all sessions, a notebook of all resource & summary papers, breakfast & lunch.)
Full and Partial Scholarships available

Registration: rbloomquist@cox.net

For more information: Gary Bloomquist:   602-568-2075

http://www.worshipleadersnetwork.org

gary@worshipleadersnetwork.org

Derek Webb & Sandra McCracken :: Ticket Giveaway Contest

Arizona Friends….

My good buddies at Mission Community Church in Gilbert, AZ are doing a series of Grand Opening Concerts in conjunction with their new facility that just opened. They’ve got some AMAZING talent coming in the next 4 weekends and I’ve got tickets to give away to some of these concerts. I’ll be giving away tickets for the concerts on my blog. It’s pretty simple to enter…all you have to do is leave a comment saying, ‘GIVE ME THOSE TICKETS’ on the blog and you’ll be in the running for the free tickets.

This weeks concert and giveaway is for Saturday, April 10th @ 7pm with the AMAZING Derek Webb and Sandra McCracken.

(Derek Webb was the front guy for Caedmon’s Call and also recorded on the ‘City on a Hill’ records. AWESOME guy!)

I’ll announce the winner this Thursday and I’m giving a pack of 4 tickets away. Get your entry in and best of luck!!!

TO ENTER TO WIN TICKETS: Leave a comment on this blog post saying ‘GIVE ME THOSE TICKETS’ or something like that in the comment section. Make sure that your email is the correct email when you fill out the comment section, so that I can contact you if you are the winner!

Ready, Set, Go…….

Night of Woship & Ryan Axtell CD Release Concert…

For all the Arizona and Cornerstone people…I wanted to let you know that we’ll be doing a couple worship related events coming up here in the next month.

Night of Worship – March 25th, 2010 – 7:30pm – Auditorium @ Cornerstone Chandler – FREE

Ryan Axtell – CD Release Concert w/Special Guests ‘Raining and OK’ – April 15th, 2010 – Auditorium @ Cornerstone Chandler – FREE

Leprosy, India and Awakening…

Videos of the Cornerstone Chandler Team hanging with the Lepers:

One of the most powerful things in this video is at the very end as one of our Pastors, Jeff Gokee, gets in front of a camera to try and talk about what he had just experienced. I was overwhelmed as I watched my very strong, manly, passionate and truth speaking friend get lost for any words to speak. I love the picture and the brokenness in the last scene of the video. Brokenness is what we need to awaken a generation to actually do something for those in need. God, ‘break our hearts for what breaks Yours’!

The next video is an interview that Jeff did with Suresh and a Leper from the colony they were in. Watch her face as they chit chat about Leprosy and then watch her light up about the last question. The UNBELIEVABLE joy and hope for Jesus in desperate people is electrifying. I wept as I saw her ooze of joy for her Jesus. What a saint!

To have the kind of capacity for joy as an outcast from society, a woman shunned from normalcy, the lowest of the caste, ‘the untouchable’ just absolutely blows my mind. I could just sense the Spirit in me leaping for His love for her as I watched the video. I could feel Gods love for this woman and for these people in my heart. POWERFUL stuff! In the same breath I could sense God moving in me saying, ‘You MUST love people like her like I love them’!

To GIVE to Harvest India click the icon below:

What grabbed your attention most in this what you saw in this post? Leave a comment!!

Pray for Kate :: Do Something Now

This past weekend my wife (Promise Tangeman-Wurzell) and I had the chance to go be with the McRae Family. Many of you know of the McRae’s because of their 6 year old daughter Kate who is battling against an aggressive brain tumor. If you aren’t clued in on Kate’s situation check out her website at www.prayforkate.com. Kate’s parents, Aaron and Holly, have become good friends of ours as they moved to Arizona last year to be on staff with us here at Cornerstone. We quickly grew to love the McRae family and our hearts break with them as they plead with God for the total healing of their daughter, Kate.

We were able to hang with them most of the day Saturday for a photoshoot of their family and we had the most amazing time. I’m amazed when we get the chance to be with the McRae’s by the way they continue to process this together as a family. Saturday was a day full of laughter, fun, ice cream, photos, going on secret spy missions with the 3 kids (Olivia, Kate and Will), Will showing his awareness to his fashion on multiple occasions, etc… We finished the day with some Olive Garden at their house, an American Idol contest (where we all judged the performers and sent them to Hollywood) and some heavy talks about their sweet girl Kate. I have to say, personally, Saturday was a day of true Christ-filled community. It was the kind of day Promise and I needed really bad. This family truly is one of the best families we know and we’re so honored to be in their lives in the midst of all that’s in front of them.

Today, sweet Kate has just checked back in to the hospital for her 6th and most intense round of chemotherapy treatment. The treatment, as I understand it, is so intense that they’ll need to be in the hospital anywhere from 4-6 weeks. They’ll be taking her system down to a place where they can reintroduce good stem cells that they harvested months ago and the hope is to reset the body with positive, healthy, cancer free cells! It will be one of the longest stays in the hospital since her brain surgery last July and they will all need huge prayer and huge encouragement during this time.

I write this to remind us all not to forget about Kate and the McRae family. They desperately need our prayers. Kate desperately needs the miraculous healing that Jesus can bring to her body. I want to ask you to take these pictures from my blog and do something with them as they begin this treatment. These pictures were taken this past weekend and Kate looked AMAZING, she has a stunning beauty and joy about her young life. Their family is a great looking bunch too (not to mention that Patrick their GoldenDoodle is the coolest dog on planet earth).

Here’s what I’m going to ask you to do:

I want to rally another movement of prayer for Kate and the McRae Family. Would you consider taking these photos and doing one or all of the following:

*Blog: Take the pictures here on my blog and use them in a blog post asking your network of people to Pray for Kate and the McRae Family. Let people know they can follow along by sending them and linking stuff on your blog post to http://prayforkate.com :: In the post please ask people to post a blog/twitter/facebook with one of these pictures to invite their network of people to PRAY!

*Twitter: Send out a Twitter post to you networks telling people to pray for #katemcrae as she goes through intense treatment. Send your readers to http://prayforkate.com for updates and attach one of the photos in your Twitter update. Also, ask people to RT (retweet)!

*Facebook: Send out a Facebook update and post one of the photos in your update. Remind people to pray for this family and for Kate. Please tell them to share the photo and a link to http://prayforkate.com on through facebook and ask their networks to do the same

I am confident that this kind of viral blitz is an amazing way to use your online network, however big or small, as a tool to connect people for something worthy. I think people want to be invited in to pray for a girl like Kate and a family like the McRae’s. I think God loves it when we come to Him rallying for each other and trusting Him.

Thanks in advance for loving the McRae’s whether you know them personally or not. It means the world to them in this really tough season. Okay, it’s your turn to make this thing happen. Let’s light up the Social Network platforms moving people to pray, yet again, for Kate McRae!!

Prayer Won’t Be Enough…

This morning I watched a picture montage of the tragedy that is Haiti today. I watched as THOUSANDS of people stood in line in the HOT sun waiting, hoping and fighting over bags of beans, rice and oil. Many of them waited for hours just to be told that there wasn’t enough and the aid group had given out all the food they had. The already hungry people of Haiti are now even hungrier in the aftermath of the earthquake. I was struck with the reality that as Christ followers, when it comes to those in need, prayer alone will not be enough.

I had a couple interesting and diverse comments from people on a Twitter post I put out on the subject. Some agreed, some totally disagreed and said that prayer is sometimes all you can do. Personally, I could not disagree more with that statement. I would love to hear your thoughts on prayer and the needs of the poor. Do you think that it, alone, will be enough from what you know about what Jesus commands us to do?

Below is my response to the person that may disagree with me on this statement. I think Jesus sets the record straight on how we ought to engage those in need. I want to make clear that I am a FIRM advocate that prayer is an essential component to following Jesus, but, on it’s own it will not meet the needs of the poor. Here is my response:

Twitter: Watched a piece on @CNN about the lack of food in #Haiti. It’s not enough just to pray we must mobilize what we have for those in need!

I look at Matthew 25 where Jesus delivers his poignant and final sermon on ‘The Sheep and The Goats’. As you read that passage, NO WHERE, does Jesus mention that if we ‘pray’ for the least of these that it’s somehow serving their needs. Interesting, because I think Jesus (of all people) knew and understood prayer and the power of it. I find it interesting that these were His words in His final sermon:

Matthew 25:34
34″Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

When he says those things, the questions come:

44″They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

He makes this next BOLD statement regarding 34-36 to answer the question and it’s interesting that He never ONCE mentions prayer. He mentions physical, tangible ways in which we serve Him when we serve others. The outcome of ‘when’ we do these things comes in this next verse:

45″He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

He then talks about what happens to ‘the goats’ or those that did not live these things out:

46″Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”

I’ve heard it said that Matthew 25 is not so much concerned about the ‘ROOT’ of salvation, but, about the ‘FRUIT’ of salvation. It’s almost as if Jesus is saying, you cannot LOVE me and NOT engage in the plight of the less fortunate.

Again, I observe, PRAYER alone will not be enough to meet the call of what Jesus asks of us to develop as the fruit of our salvation. I’m not saying dismiss prayer, but, I am saying we better do more than just pray according to Jesus. My prayer is that Jesus would give me the courage and heart to serve the way He wants me to serve. I hope it’s your prayer too.

I’d LOVE your thoughts on this post. What do you think?

HAVE FUN WITH SUMMER: discounted rates & photo contest

If you or someone you know wants some EPIC photo’s go check out what my bride, Promise, has going on at her Blog. Also, I know lots of peeps are getting engaged in these days, if you or someone you know is looking for a kickin’ wedding/engagement photographer Promise is booking up for the Fall and also for weddings in 2010 right now.

CLICK HERE – For Promise’s Blog