When I feel most alive … go ahead, take your shoes off!

As Liz and I have been looking for a church in the Richmond area, we have been going for several weeks to KingsWay Community Church, a church in the Sovereign Grace Ministries family of churches.

One neat thing that I really like about this family of churches is that they are committed to creating new music for use in worship through the gifts talented song-writers in the church. This means that I am unfamiliar with almost all of the songs as I visit this church for a few Sundays. I know some of them because I went to a similar church when I lived in Orlando last year, Metro Life Church which was also a Sovereign Grace Ministries church. But still, most of the songs are new to me.

But interestingly, singing these new songs have made my worship much more alive. I have felt free to look at God in ways other than the same songs I am used to singing or have sung for years. These new songs are challenging me to worship God in a new way, to celebrate His wonder and grace and gifts in new words, with new melodies, and new attitudes in my heart.

I like it! And I think God is pleased as well, because as it says in Psalm 33:2-3 - “Praise the LORD with the harp; make music to him on the ten-stringed lyre. Sing to him a new song; play skillfully, and shout for joy”, Psalm 40:1-3 - “I waited patiently for the LORD; he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the LORD.” , and Psalm 144:9 - “I will sing a new song to you, O God; on the ten-stringed lyre I will make music to you”.

I think it is important for us to always be singing new songs to the Lord. It helps us to not get too familiar in how we are worshipping God. When we get too familiar with the same order of worship, words, songs, and prayers, I think our minds and hearts begin to disengage and we don’t connect with God in worship in Spirit in truth. A new song brings freshness and newness to our worship of God, and an eagerness for the Spirit to work in new ways in our lives. Let’s not stop writing and singing new songs of worship!

Recently I have been taking a lot more pictures since I got my new camera, a Sony DSC-P200. It takes great pictures, but the problem is that I want to be able to show them to people online. There are a lot of programs that will let you EXPORT photos and create web pages from your iPhoto library but this is a time-consuming process that is a one-time thing. That means that you have to manually re-create new pages if your library changes. This isn’t acceptable for someone who takes a lot of pictures.

So I over the last year have found several dynamic page-creating programs that will build a dynamic web site from your iPhoto library and host it on your computer.

WebPhoto
myPhoto
iPhotoWebShare

They each have their advantages and disadvantages. iPhotoWebShare is by far the easiest to set-up, but myPhoto has the most features (and most difficulties as well).

I am using iPhotoWebShare for now, since it is working well and I like it’s ability to let you download the full size image. I like that it’s controlled in a preference pane in the system preferences and not some extra application.

If you would like to see my pictures page, check it http://scottpaulis.webhop.org (If it doesn’t work, I have my laptop away from home somewhere with me, and you’ll have to try again later!)