I have IM accounts.  More than one.  It’s kind of lame.  I could have just changed the “handle,” but I’ve lost passwords, grown disinterested and used twitter and other forms of social networking. 

However, Jenn and I have a Mac, which we love and rarely do we get to use the video chat feature.  While we’re here in Montana I’ve tried to set up video chats with my family back in California and since I lost the password and “eyeworkatchilis” is no longer accurate as a screen name I thought I’d create a new account and start chatting with some of my new found friends.   

So, wether you need to dust off that screen name or sign up for the first time, let’s join the revolution and bring back that immediate communication tool known as the instant message.  

Here’s my new screen name: paulhaugen1981

I’m going to try and be on more regularly and check it on my iphone as well.  Let’s rock some video chatting or audio chatting too! Â

I’m stuffed!

I saw this on Nancy Beach’s blog.

These are two staff members at Willow Creek and homeboy pulled this off with the help of some staff and volunteers using Willow’s facility.

I thought I planned a pretty sweet evening and proposal for my bride.  

This guy wins.

I have been anxiously awaiting my vacation for some time now.  While I love my job, being in the midst of planning for a huge Christmas after we’ve just had two very big fall series’ which of course came after two rather large Summer series’, it was definitely time to get away.  

So, me and the Mrs. are on a little trip to Montana for Thanksgiving with her side of the family. We flew in on Friday and spent yesterday chopping down trees and burning them in an open field (no, I’m serious, I have pictures of me with a chainsaw that I’ll have to post here).

Today, we listened to church on the radio as it’s too big of a drive into town and then drove along the highway until we found the perfect Christmas tree, at which time, my father-in-law took out his axe, chopped it down and then threw it in the back of the pick-up.  I love this family!

It’s been snowing off and on which is very cool and the views are spectacular.  Two days in and I’m already feeling refreshed.  I love vacations!Â

This weekend was great.  We had three amazing services on Saturday and Sunday where Steve delivered a message only he could and where we did 4 songs.  This is a fairly normal weekend, but then we had our third worship night this year. 

Worship nights are amazing and this one was the best one yet; a great crowd, great music and lots of it, and an amazing time with the Lord.

We got to the church at 2:30 to run through all the songs (no days left in the week to do an extra rehearsal) and after we finished (at 5:15) we took a quick break and then played for another hour and a half, and at the end of the evening my voice was gone and my chord-making hand was killing me.

Of course, I should have gone home and slept or relaxed, but instead decided to go out with friends.  By the time I went to bed on Sunday I was feeling bad, but when I woke up in the morning on Monday I was thrashed; coughing, sneezing and feeling exhausted.

I guess the moral of the story is that I need a little more training before I’m fully ready for the rock star lifestyle, because I apparently can play one full day of music and then I’m no good for three days.  Slash would be so proud.

Thanks Erica.

My beautiful bride is blogging again; it’s about time.

Go give her some blog love here.

And yes, I’ve updated my links on the right.

I realize I’m now a day late on this, but since everyone else seems to be chiming in with their thoughts on the election, I figure it’s as good a time as any to give you my thoughts; not that you care.

I think there is a segment of the population that has made President-elect Obama out to be the anti-Christ, or the devil or some horrible monster that is looking to find all republicans and Christians and rip their heads off (maybe an exaggeration).

I think there are a lot of people who dubbed John McCain as the next Ronald Reagan when four years ago they said he wasn’t conservative enough to run on a republican ticket.

I think whichever candidate won they were going to step into a mountain of problems and now that Senator Obama has won he needs our support and our prayers.I think Obama seems like a relatively good guy and I think that while he has a desire to help all people, including the lowest of the low (something Republicans or for that matter Christians could take note of) I think the way he wants to do it, history will show, just does not work. 

There is a thought from some people I know that we are losing ground in some battle that the Christian-Right needs to stand up and take back this Christian nation of ours, to which I would say, wake up friends, we’ve passed that turn a while ago. 

American Christianity, settled and complacent, has taken care of itself over the last couple hundred years.  We, and I’m a part of this too, have rested comfortably in our “safe haven” from the rest of the world and ignored an AIDS epidemic which is now worldwide, poverty and hunger in our own cities and towns and we have made non-Christians the enemy. 

Instead of loving people we have called them names and made them outcasts.  Instead of helping people we’ve said “they brought this on themselves” and instead of really being the hands and feet of Jesus we all got richer and richer while people around us sunk further away from finding real peace.

The Bible commands us to pray for our leaders and rightly so.  Barrack Obama is my President as of January 20th and I will pray for him regularly.  I hope he becomes FDR or Abraham Lincoln, because if he wins, we all win.  In all of this, though, the truth is that unless the church becomes the church and takes the gospel of love and peace to all people, any social institution that President Obama sets up will be meaningless.  The Church of Jesus is the hope of the world. 

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for He has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free, and that the time of the Lord’s favor has come.” 

Luke 4:18-19