Christian Conversations

This is something I have been thinking about for a while now and I think I’m ready to put it out there. I’d like to practice active listening skills, and I also like to talk about Jesus. Even though I’m not seeking a full-time ministry position, I still want to be active in the church and still want to minister to those who are in need. The way I’d like to go about that is by having Christian Conversations with anyone who needs to talk out a struggle they may be having in their life, or who needs to talk through a Biblical concept they are having trouble understanding.

This idea may sound a bit abstract, because it is! I’ll use the “Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How” method to try and explain it a little better.

Who

Really, this is for anyone. Having a struggle you want to talk about in a non-judgmental setting? Is there a passage you want to explore but don’t have a place to discuss it or a person to discuss it with? Maybe you’re having a faith crisis and just need to talk about it? Want to talk about a praise you want to share? Or maybe you just want to talk about Jesus, the Father, the Holy Spirit, or anything else related. You’re who I want to have a conversation with.

What

First, I think I need to define what it is not. This idea is not clinical in any way. If you’re having a mental health struggle or crisis, I suggest you seek a professional counselor or therapist. I will be happy to help you find a professional in your area, but I am not licensed or equipped to help with any clinical mental health issues.

Ok, so what is it then? Basically you talk, and I listen. I’d like to help you as you dive in and talk through whatever spiritual problem that is on your mind. This is not a bid to convert anyone to a different way of belief, but to help you get to the heart of what is causing your spiritual pain or frustration. I’m cautious and don’t really want to call this Christian counseling, I think of it more like Christian coaching.

When

In the evenings, for 50 minutes to an hour. Similar to a counseling or coaching appointment.

Where

Zoom or a similar video platform. We could have a phone conversation, but I’d rather have a face to face conversation if at all possible. If you’re in my local area I’m sure we could meet for coffee and have a chat.

Why

I want to help people! I’m not in full-time ministry anymore, but I still want to answer the call that we as Christians are called to do, that is to minister to each other. While this concept isn’t “full-time ministry”, I do hope that I will have some great conversations. I’d love to become so busy that it turns into a full-time, “pay the bills” ministry work. But for now, this is just something I want to do in some spare evenings to help people and help the church.

I also want to practice skills such as active listening and goal setting. These skills aren’t necessarily clinical in nature, but are a big part of what a counselor would be using in session. But we won’t be applying them to mental health issues, but spiritual health issues.

How

You talk to me, tell me what is on your mind and maybe what you want to accomplish or how I can help you. I’ll urge you to keep digging and help you to better understand the nature of your spiritual struggle. I’ll ask you questions to help you think from a different perspective. We can have the scriptures open as we talk, or we can just talk about concepts and principles. Unlike clinical counseling where the counselor is a listener only, if you’d like I can offer my knowledge and can suggest scriptures that may help clarify things. But only if you ask, I’ll be keeping my mouth shut – for the most part.

One more thing to note. I’ll not be keeping any session notes on file. Since this isn’t clinical, nothing is protected by HIPAA or any other type of legal protections, so I won’t keep anything in writing. However, I will have to report to authorities if I hear of any harm done or serious threat of harm to oneself, or to any other person.

Having said all that, I think these scriptures sum up all that I want to accomplish. “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” – Galatians 6:2. “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” – Romans 12:15. And, “Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another.” – Proverbs 27:17.

Let me know if you’d like to have a Christian Conversation or if you have any questions.

Life Comes At You Fast!

That is a very true statement. Life came at us fast and our family is having to make some changes. We left Texas at the very end of 2020 and moved to Tennessee where I began serving as the youth minister at a congregation in Madison. Ten months later, the day before my 40th birthday no less, I was let go from that position.

We promised our children this would be our last move, that we’re in our permanent home, and we intend to keep that promise. You see, between my Air Force career and serving in ministry my daughter has had to move during the school year three times, and my son twice. This move was particularly hard on him. I have no desire to put my family through another move, especially when we haven’t been in our current house for even a year yet.

I’m not looking for another ministry position, for several reasons, but a big one is it would likely require us to move again. My long term goal is to work as a counselor/therapist, but I am in graduate school working on my education so I can eventually gain licensure to become a counselor. My only recent marketable skills are rather niche in nature being ministry, military intelligence, and aircraft maintenance. Any of my past computer technology and web development skills are out of date. So I am searching for non-clinical positions within the mental health field. I’ve been applying to intake coordinator, case manager, or similar positions in the areas surrounding White House, TN.

Please keep us in your prayers, thoughts, and vibes as we navigate this situation. And please let me know if you have any non-clinical mental health open positions. Thank you!

Richie Reads: “You Are Special”, by Max Lucado

Since our congregation hasn’t been able to meet because of the social distancing suggestions, we have been recording and posting our worship services on YouTube. I also started recording videos for our kiddos who aren’t able to go to their Bible classes. We’ll sing a song or two, read a story, make a very light application, and close with a prayer. Each video has gotten better as I learn more about videography, I may have taken a step backwards once or twice, but forward mostly.

I hope these are useful for you and your families in these strange times of social distancing, and I pray you all stay healthy.

Ministry Tech – Part 1

Let me start by saying am not an Apple hater! If you like Apple products, that’s great, keep using them. But they’re just not for me. Having said that, I don’t hate on you, Mr/Mrs Apple user, so please don’t hate on me for my preferences. This series of posts is not intended to bash on Apple, simply to highlight the tools that I use on the platforms that I choose to run.

At the Office

I’ll start with the tools I use in the office, both at work and at home.

Hardware

Computer: Dell Inspiron 5765 
It’s reasonably priced and has all the power I need for my day to day work. It comes installed with Windows 10 Home, which I promptly removed and replaced, but more on that later. At the office I connect it to a larger external monitor as my primary display and the laptop becomes my secondary. It sits on a stand and I also use an external keyboard and mouse. At home I just use it as is, with the addition of a wireless mouse – I dislike touchpads.

Operating System: Xubuntu 16.04 LTS (Linux)
I’m not an Apple user, but I don’t use Windows either. Xubuntu is what’s called a Linux distro (distribution), a “flavor” of Linux. Its actually based on another distro called Ubuntu, but it uses Xfce as its user interface instead of Unity that comes installed with Ubuntu, which I strongly dislike. I find Xubuntu to be extremely light weight and fast. Where Windows has always been clunky and unreliable, your mileage may vary.

UPDATE: I ran into a problem with Xubuntu a while back. The system would boot up and run, but anytime the hard drive was written to the system would crash. If this wasn’t my professional/work computer I may have worked through the issues, but since I need it to be reliable I switched back to Windows 10. It has actually surprised me quite a bit, its a huge improvement over previous versions. All other software I use remains unchanged.

Software

Using Linux does mean having to find replacements for more common applications on Windows or iOS, but that doesn’t mean they’re not as powerful, oftentimes they’re on par if not better than the more mainstream.

Most software on Linux is open source (free) just like the operating system itself is. Again, don’t let that word “free” fool you, they’re still very powerful. There are packages out there that cost, but by and large they will be open source. The developers would certainly appreciate donations if you find their software beneficial.

Bible Software: Xiphos
I like Xiphos because its just a solid performing software with great support from the developer. Its based on the Sword Project’s module system. Most of the library you can access through the Sword Project is public domain, so the materials are older and not as vast as you can get through Logos or Accordance. I have several Bible translation modules installed, all in synced tabs in the main pane of the program. When you move from tab to tab, the tabs stay synced to the same passage. Strong’s Greek and Hebrew displays in a small pane to the lower right on my “standard” translations while I usually have Clarke’s Commentary on the right side bar. You can configure the support panes based on the translation, so when I’m using the ESVS (ESV w/Strong’s Numbers) the right pane shows a larger version of Strong’s Greek/Hebrew instead of Clarke’s.

Productivity: Google Apps / Google Drive
I use Google Apps for pretty much everything document related. Its all based in Google Drive, so everything I write in Google Docs: devotionals, lessons, sermons, papers for school, etc, are all automatically saved in Google Drive. This is awesome when I’m co-teaching a class or work with other folks on material like camp or VBS, because sharing is ridiculously easy in Google Drive. I also use Google Slides for my presentations for Bible classes and sermons. Google Sheets is comparable to Excel. Importing from and exporting to other formats is great in Google Apps as well. I have exported Slides to PPT several times for sermons and only had to make minor tweaks. I generally export to PDF for school work.

There are other office type programs out there than run on the system rather than online in a browser like Google Apps. Libre Office is probably the biggest one.

Graphics: Inkscape and Gimp
Inkscape is a vector drawing program, similar to Adobe Illustrator. I use Inkscape a lot, like, a lot a lot. I use it for my presentations in Google Slides, for graphics on my congregation’s Facebook and Instagram pages, for activity flyers, for the graphics on this site, and more.

Gimp is a raster drawing program, similar to Adobe Photoshop. Most of what graphics work I do is in Inkscape, but it doesn’t print well, so I usually end up exporting to PNG from Inkscape and opening it in Gimp to print. Gimp is also far better for editing photos than Inkscape.

Desktop Publishing: Scribus
Scribus is a desktop publishing program, similar to Adobe InDesign or Microsoft Publisher. I have been able to do most printing from Gimp, but I did design our new contact/connection cards in Scribus. I just exported them to PDF and sent them to the local printer and everything turned out great.

Those are really the big ones you’d have to get used to in a switch to a Linux environment. There are other things I use that are either the same or very similar to Windows/iOS, or are Linux specific tools that I prefer to use over the ones included in the distro I’m using.

Here are some odds and ends I use that should be familiar to most people: Google Chrome, Firefox (occasionally), Thunderbird (email), Google Earth, Audacity, VLC, FileZilla (FTP), etc.

Next time we’ll look at mobile devices and apps. 

Hats off to you, technology!

So, as I’m sure you know that working full time and having a family makes it hard to go to school at the same time. Well, I’m currently behind a few weeks (like, 5) and need to catch up quickly before I run out of time!

I’m getting to the point, I promise! This week was spring break for our kiddos. We went to Montgomery, AL and Panama City, FL to see family and friends. Each way was about a 10ish hour drive, we broke each into 2 days. I drove from Texas to Montgomery, then down to Panama City. While there, the preacher at the congregation my in-laws go to asked if my wife does all the driving now. I was a little confused and told him no, I do most of the driving. He said when he was in school his wife did the driving so he could read for his classes. Duh! She drove home.

OK, here’s the technology part. I go to an online school that uses Blackboard for assignments and I prefer e-books, so I use the Kindle app on my tablet to read. Well, you need internet for either of those to work! So, I used my phone as a WiFi hotspot, connected my tablet to it and did about 4 weeks of reading for one of my classes in 2 days. I took the quizzes for 3 of those weeks at the hotel we stayed in last night.

I could never imagine having this kind of connectivity when I was a kid! My kids are in the back seat watching DVDs while playing on their own tablets. I got to stare out the window for 8+ hours at a time when I was a kid.

Anyway, that’s my mini weekend take away. Technology.

Any of you have fun stories about technology in school or ministry (or whatever)?

The Update Blog

Well, its been some time since my last blog post! A lot has changed since November of 2015. Allow me to fill you in…

If you read my previous entry about life changes ahead, those changes did indeed happen! God has blessed my family and I with the opportunity to work with the Westside Church of Christ in Alvin, TX. I have been the full-time Family Life and Youth Minister since April of 2016. Aside from the challenges of moving across the country, renting then buying a house, and getting to know teenagers who didn’t want to see their old youth minister leave, things are great! We love the congregation and don’t plan to leave until they throw us out!

I have separated from active duty service in the Air Force and have joined the AF Reserve. I opted to go back into aircraft maintenance. I travel about 6 hours to attend drill, but I decided to do that rather than retrain again (6 months in technical training) to go into a new job closer to home.

I’m still plugging away at my bachelor’s degree of Bible/Ministry at Amridge University. I’m almost there, if all goes well I should finish my coursework this fall and graduate spring of 2018! Next will be my master’s in professional counseling.

Next order of business, I’m thinking of changing my blog name to something more descriptive. I hope that my followers won’t have to update their links or re-follow me, I’ll have to to some more research about that.

I hope to be posting more blogs soon, maybe not weekly, but more regularly.

Thanks for reading, have a great weekend!