Category Archives: Logan

Alexis, Brandon, Carla, Dae Hee, Johnathan, Linda, Logan, Mom, Nature, Night, Self-Portrait, Self-Portrait Project, Travel

Selfie Project – April

May 2, 2019 Christopher D. Bennett 7 Comments

Seems like a good time to share my favorite pictures from THE SELFIE PROJECT from April.

I’ve been trying to be more interesting with the pictures, or at least more interesting with my life, since it felt like in January and February I didn’t do anything.

I don’t know if I’m accomplishing that or not, but at least in the month of
April I did leave the Cyclone State once. So that is something.

Here are my favorites from April:

April 1

April 3

April 5

April 6

April 7

April 8

April 9

April 12

April 14

April 16

April 17

April 18

April 19

April 21

April 23

April 24

April 27

April 28

April 30

As of this writing, I haven’t taken my picture for today, but my May 1 picture does involve a giant check, so May is shaping up to be quite the month!

Andy, Candid Portrait, Kim, Logan, Micky, Mom, Shannon, Tamara, Teresa, Vest, WPC - Submissions

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 189 – DESSERT

April 29, 2019 Christopher D. Bennett

Yet another solid week of submissions! DESSERT hit double digits in submission making it, at least a few weeks in a row of double digit submissions.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You cam to see the submissions:

Robyn Augustin

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Teresa Kahler

Tamara Peterson

Teresa Kahler

Katelyn & Aubrey Augustin

Kim Barker

Christopher D. Bennett

Logan Kahler

Mike Vest

Micky Augustin

Andy Sharp

But enough dwelling on the past. Time to look to the future. We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future! This week’s theme:

GREEN

GREEN! What a great theme! But what is a GREEN photo? Well, a GREEN photo is any photo that involved the color GREEN. But of course, the word GREEN has more than one meaning.

For example. Here are the 10 most effective ways to reverse climate change in order of their effectiveness. I bet a couple will surprise you:

1. Refrigerant Management (Phase out HFCs)
2. Wind Turbines (Onshore)
3. Reduce food waste
4. Adopt a plant-rich diet
5. Tropical forest restoration
6. Educating girls
7. Family planning
8. Solar farms
9. Silvopasture (combining pastureland with climate-cooling trees)
10. Rooftop solar

Are you wondering about how Educating girls has such a big impact on climate change. Here is a little more information:

The problem: Today, more than 130 million girls are denied the fundamental right to attend school and lay a foundation for their lives. The situation is most dire in secondary classrooms.

Economic barriers include lack of family funds for school fees and uniforms, as well as prioritizing the more immediate benefits of having girls fetch water or firewood, or work a market stall or a plot of land.

Cultural barriers encompass traditional beliefs that girls should tend the home rather than learn to read and write, should be married off at a young age, and, when resources are slim, should be skipped over so boys can be sent to school instead.

Schools that are farther afield put girls at risk of gender-based violence on their way to and from, while other dangers and discomforts are present at school itself. Disability, pregnancy, childbirth, and female genital mutilation also can be obstacles.

The education gap also matters for global warming. According to the Brookings Institution, “The difference between a woman with no years of schooling and with 12 years of schooling is almost four to five children per woman.” Women with more years of education have fewer, healthier children and actively manage their own reproductive health.

In the poorest countries, per capita greenhouse-gas emissions are low. From one-tenth of a ton of carbon dioxide per person in Madagascar to 1.8 tons in India, per-capita emissions in lower-income countries are a fraction of the US rate of 18 tons per person per year. Nevertheless, changes in fertility rates in those countries would have multiple benefits for girls and women, families, communities, and society.

Solution in progress: Nobel laureate and girls’ education activist Malala Yousafzai has famously said, “One child, one teacher, one book, and one pen can change the world.” An enormous body of evidence supports her conviction. For starters, educated girls realize higher wages and greater upward mobility, contributing to economic growth. Their rates of maternal mortality drop, as do mortality rates of their babies. They are less likely to marry as children or against their will. They have lower incidence of HIV/AIDS and malaria. Their agricultural plots are more productive and their families better nourished. They are more empowered at home, at work, and in society.

Education is the most powerful lever available for breaking the cycle of intergenerational poverty, while mitigating emissions by curbing population growth.

Education also shores up resilience to climate change impacts. For example, a 2013 study found that educating girls “is the single most important social and economic factor associated with a reduction in vulnerability to natural disasters.” This decreased vulnerability also extends to their children, families, and the elderly.

[Editor’s note: Increasing women’s involvement in the energy sector also leads to “more effective clean-energy initiatives, greater returns on investment in clean energy, and expanded emissions-reduction opportunities, according to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.]

Work to be done: In 2011, the journal Science published a demographic analysis of the impact of girls’ education on population growth. It details a “fast track” scenario, based on South Korea’s actual climb from one of the least to one of the most educated countries in the world. If all nations adopted a similar rate and achieved 100 percent enrollment of girls in primary and secondary school by 2050, there would be 843 million fewer people worldwide than if current enrollment rates sustain.

The encyclopedic book What Works in Girls’ Education (Brookings Institution Press, 2015) maps out seven areas of interconnected interventions: 1) Make school affordable. 2) Help girls overcome health barriers. 3) Reduce the time and distance to get to school. 4) Make schools more girl-friendly. For example, offer child-care programs for mothers. 5) Improve school quality.
6) Increase community engagement. 7) Sustain girls’ education during emergencies. For example, establish schools in refugee camps.

SOURCE: https://www.greenamerica.org/climate-change-100-reasons-hope/top-10-solutions-reverse-climate-change

But I digress. I look forward to seeing your GREEN interpretations.

HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

The picture has to be taken the week of the theme. This isn’t a curate your pictures challenge. This is a get your butt off the couch (my personal experience) and put your camera in your hands challenge. Don’t send me a picture of you next to the Eiffel Tower, when I know you were in Iowa all week. I will point out that I have let that slide some in the past. I will not in the future. Since it is literally about the only rule.

Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date. It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very environmentally friendly Monday.

Formal Portrait, Logan, Nature, Photo Journal, WPC - Reminder

A Photo Journal – Henry Carroll – Page 32

April 26, 2019 Christopher D. Bennett

Last Saturday Logan stopped by to show me his super sweet gimbal and to borrow my Rode microphone to see if it is something that he wanted to add one to his arsenal in the future.

I hadn’t actually touched the Rode in probably 4 or 5 years. I guess that isn’t 100% true. I picked it up and put it in the Photography Closet. But I haven’t actually attached it to the microphone in several years.

When I pulled it out of the closet I was shocked to find out that the battery was still alive. Which was a good thing because I was also shocked to discover it used a 9 volt battery.

After playing with the gimbal for a bit, Logan and I went out to McHose Park to take a picture for Page 32 for THE PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT:

Page 32 – Contrast movement and stillness in a single frame.

We took a few other images while we were out there:

Next week when we check in with the PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT, we might check in with one of these pages:

Page 36 – Use shutter speed to capture anger!
Page 37 – Use aperture to capture melancholy.
Page 43 – Take a picture that only works in black & white.
Page 84 – Photograph a lie.
Page 109 – Photograph a word to change its meaning.

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This is your reminder that this week’s WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE theme is DESSERT.

DESSERT

A DESSERT photo is any photo involving a delicious, tasty DESSERT.

Happy photo harvesting!

Andy, Angie, Animals, Boone FUMC, Carla, Formal Portrait, Jen, Jodie Cue, Kim, Logan, Micky, Naima, Photoshop, Tamara, WPC - Submissions

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 187 – FAVORITE COLOR

April 15, 2019 Christopher D. Bennett 1 Comment

The weather last week was all over the place in Central Iowa. Beautiful one day. Windy enough to blow down one side of the Burger King garbage corral the next. Then beautiful again. Then a few snow flurries the next. Then beautiful again. While the weather was all over the place, it didn’t dampen participation rates for FAVORITE COLOR at all.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:

Jodie Cue

Kim Barker

Jodie Cue

Logan Kahler

Micky Augustin

Tamara Peterson

Andy Sharp

Christopher D. Bennett

Andy Sharp

Carla Stensland

Jodie Cue

Angie DeWaard

RELIGION

RELIGION! What a great theme! I can feel what you’re thinking. I can feel it from here. I see through you. All the way to your back button. You are thinking that it sure is super convenient that RELIGION is the theme the same week as Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter and Passover for that matter.

You’re thinking that I rigged it so that RELIGION would be the theme the same week that all the chreasters will be going to church.

There are two things you need to know:

#1. I don’t use the term chreaster. I don’t look down on chreasters. They obviously feel there is at least some need in their life for church, otherwise they wouldn’t show up twice a year. If they are only coming twice a year, the church needs to do a better job of making them want to come the other 52 weeks of the year.

There is a story for why they only show up twice. It could be that they tried to get active in the church and had a bad experience with an overbearing volunteer supervisor. It might be that they sat in somebody else’s pew and were told to move. It can be that they were made to feel unwelcome because of the way they dressed, wore their hair, their personal hygiene, or whatever. Maybe the time they came, the reverend’s sermon made them feel like they weren’t rich enough to belong because he mocked people that buy suits from JC Penney.

Time would be better spent figuring out why some people only show up twice a year rather than pointing out that they don’t reach your gold standard for church attendance

I don’t know their story. I don’t judge their story. Everybody is walking their faith journey and I won’t judge people for where they are on it. I hope people won’t judge me for where I am on mine.

#2. Themes are assigned randomly. I have no control over it.

But, what is a RELIGION photo? A RELIGION photo is any photo that deals with RELIGION. It doesn’t have to be Christianity. It could be Islam. It could be Judaism. There are 12 major religions. Christianity is the largest with 2.04 billion followers. The smallest is Judaism which as 14.5 million followers. Which is a startling number when you recall that 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust.

That is the 12 major religions. Overall there are over 4,300 religions practiced worldwide. That is a tremendous amount of RELIGION photo opportunities.

I look forward to seeing your interpretations!

HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Jen Ensley-Gorshe is the latest person to show taste, class, and sophistication by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. Jen, in fact was the first person to sign up using the tools on the website to sign herself up. You may not have heard that this was a possibility because I haven’t actually made them public knowledge yet, so I was super impressed with her diligence. Jen is married to longtime subscriber Derrick Gorshe. They have 4 amazing kids and recently moved to a new house. I have known Jen since we were wage slaves to the Evil Clown Empire. Both of us are now fabulously wealthy and only show up for work because we want to.

If you see Jen out and about, feel free to give her a knowing glance and teach her the super-secret Photography 139 handshake.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very religious Monday.

Art, Christianity, Dad, Logan, Photo Journal, Youth Group

A Photo Journal – Henry Carroll – Page 68

April 12, 2019 Christopher D. Bennett 4 Comments

The journey to taking the picture for Page 68 of THE PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT is one that came completely out of nowhere. I certainly didn’t see it coming. I don’t think anybody saw it coming.

It all started when I got home from Youth Group a couple weeks back and saw a bunch of text messages on my phone from Logan. It had been a fascinating night at Youth Group. Pastor Doug came and talked to the youth about the multi-million dollar public relations disaster for the United Methodist Church that was the Saint Louis Conference.

If you aren’t Methodist or don’t follow the news, the Saint Louis Conference was a conference where a bunch of Methodists got together to decide what to do about homosexuality. Just like Jesus wanted. People getting together in big meetings, with a ton of parliamentary rules, to discuss a topic he wouldn’t care about.

He’d be like, “You guys do that. I’m just going to be over here loving people. You might want to think about joining me.”

I have no doubt that Jesus would be throwing all sorts of shade at the modern church. Not just the Methodist Church, but all the pedo-church down the street and the church across town that makes divorcees second class members and the church out in the country that spends a fortune on having a beautiful building but turns it back on the suffering widow and the starving child.

Borrowing from Carlos A. Rodriguez:

Here’s what Jesus did NOT say:

Welcome the stranger, if he has money.
Feed the hungry, who earned the food.
Love your neighbor, when it’s good for the economy.
Give water to the thirsty, once they pay their dues.

Rule. Don’t server.
Be first. Not last.
Take and keep taking.

Borrowing from Barbara Brown Taylor:

The only clear line I draw these days is this: when my religion tries to come between me and m neighbor, I will choose my neighbor… Jesus never commanded me to love my religion.

Remember, 100% of the people you hate were created in God’s image.

There were basically two plans on the table. (That isn’t 100% accurate, but you don’t want to be here all day do you?) One plan was called the Traditional Plan and it was basically, “Hey we’re going to take a couple verses in Leviticus out of context and then forget about literally almost everything Jesus said and pretty much make that our thing. You cool with that? If you don’t agree and step out of line, we’re going to hit you with a bunch of punishments.”

This was put forward by the super conservative churches that our drawn to Christianity because they think it is a way they get to judge other people. Which I get, judging other people makes you feel really good about yourself without having to earn that feeling. It is almost like found money.

My understanding is that this super bigoted plan was put forth by these conservative churches with the intention that it would never pass. Then they could cry foul, take their ball and go home. Their ball being that they could break off from the rest of the Methodists and have their Klan lite meetings without anybody bothering them.

The other plan was the One Church Plan. It basically said, “Hey guys, we aren’t all going to agree on this one issue, but this whole Jesus thing is a whole lot bigger than one issue. So let’s let each church and Pastor do their own thing. If officiating gay weddings is your bag, we dig it, go do it. If it isn’t, that’s like super judgmental, but we won’t force it on you.”

Well, the Traditional Plan passed. So yeah. Sucks to be a Methodist.

But the news isn’t all bad. The Traditional Plan is super unconstitutional (because of a bunch of super boring technical financial issues) and has been sent to the Methodist Judicial Council where it will crash to the ground faster than a Boeing 737 Max 8.

Now the youths weren’t being super talkative. So I had all the people in the room that wear glasses stand on one side of the room and told them for the purpose of this exercise, what would they do if I told them that they were only allowed to come back to Youth Group if they gave up their glasses wearing lifestyle.

Many of them threw their glasses off. They said, they would be willing to cover up who they were to keep coming to Youth Group and that made sad. I dare say melancholy.

Now this exercise was I’m sure was subconsciously based on the C.S. Lewis quote:

“I believe in Christ, like I believe in the sun – not because I see it, but by it I can see everything else.”

But then something that will go on the list of my favorite things that I have ever seen with the youth group happened when two of the youths told me that what they would do if they were kicked out of Youth Group for living a practicing eye glass wearing lifestyle. They said that they would build a giant pair of glasses and put it on the church building.

They were being probably about 40% facetious and another 40% punk, but I thought: “My God! These kids have created the perfect metaphor for the situation we are in.”

Much of the rest of the night’s conversation surrounded the gender fluid and transsexual kids that they knew and ways that they can be their allies in what is probably the worst roughest part of life. High School.

The conversation lasted well past the time we are supposed to close up shop. I feel that is was a successful night.

When I got home it was then that I saw all the text messages from Logan. They were pictures of old doors. One had my Dad’s name and my Uncle David’s name on it. The other had artwork drawn on it, by my Dad. I had never seen these doors. I didn’t know they existed.

My Dad passed away two days before Christmas when I was nine years old. My Uncle David passed away before I was born. This artwork had to date back to the early 1960s.

Logan is the someday to be Pulitzer Prize winning editor of the Boone News Republican. For reasons that aren’t clear, but also aren’t important, his job landed him at Paradox. I think the best way to describe Paradox is that it is an art and antique and craft store. Yes, Boone has a ton of them. But Paradox is different. The kind of things they sell in there are strange. Maybe even a little twisted. Basically, not the type of thing you’d expect to see in Boone.

Somehow Logan got a tour of the entire building that Paradox owns. It used to be Ensley Photography Studio, but right now it is being rehabbed into something entirely different.

On the second floor of the building there is an old vaudeville stage. In this area, there is a door. On the window are the names Gerald D. Bennett and John D. Bennett. In a pile of doors off to the side is a door that is the work of Doc Bennett.

From talking to my Mom, Logan figured out that this building used to be apartments. My Dad lived there after divorcing his first wife. Uncle David lived there with his first wife. This was in the early 60s. They were still there almost 60 years later.

I told Logan that I needed to see these doors and to see if they would sell one of them to me. Logan went back and setup an appointment to get a tour again on that Saturday.

It was on this tour that I took the picture for Page 68 of the PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT:

Page 68 – Let a window do all the talking.

Now the actual purpose of Page 68 in THE PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT isn’t to find a window with artwork on it. It is actually to put a subject next to a window and take their picture lit by the light coming through the window.

However, when the wording is “Let a window do all the talking”, you better believe that I haven’t had a window talk to me like that window talked to me.

Here are a few other pictures I took of artwork, some of it kind of creepy, that I absolutely can’t believe are still there 60 years later:

After the tour I did inquire about buying the door from the husband and wife team that owns Paradox. They said, that they would have to think about it, but they thought that they would. I gave them one of my super fancy Photography 139 business cards so that they could contact me. I haven’t heard from them yet, so I may have to go back in and inquire again.

The next time we check into the PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT, we will look at Page 90.

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This is your reminder that this week’s theme for the WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE is FAVORITE COLOR:

FAVORITE COLOR

A FAVORITE COLOR photo is any photo that involves your FAVORITE COLOR.

Happy photo harvesting!

Animals, Art, Black & White, Brandon, Candid Portrait, Holidays, Johnathan, Logan, Naima, Photoshop, Self-Portrait, Youth Group

I Know What I Did Last Mother’s Day…

March 5, 2019 Christopher D. Bennett

Reminder that tomorrow night the Boone First United Methodist Church Youth Group will be holding a fundraiser for their mission trip to Rapid City, South Dakota in June:

Cost is a free will donation. Come eat some delicious spaghetti. Throw a few ducats into the till. Heck, even stick around and enjoy a wonderful worship service. Support a good cause and borderline great kids!

Hope to see many of you there!
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While I work on the 2018 backlog, the most recent folder I cleared out was from pictures I took on Mother’s Day.

They range from pictures of my nephews grilling to pictures of me working on a self-portrait project (that heavily involves updating classic Photography 139 image “Blue Steel”) and pictures of Naima.

Enjoy:

The original “Blue Steel” was considered too sexy to hang on the wall of Salon 908. I’m not going to bother trying to get Blue Steel Redux on any public walls. However, one of them could be part of the Canvas Wall Project.

Andy, Becky, Carla, Drone, Flat Earth Joe, Kim, Logan, Michelle, Railroad, Shannon, Steph, Tamara, WPC - Submissions

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 180 – TRANSPORTATION

February 25, 2019 Christopher D. Bennett

A great week of participation for the theme TRANSPORTATION. Despite the blizzard or perhaps because of the blizzard a lot of people got some great TRANSPORTATION photos.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:

Christopher D. Bennett

Kim Barker

Michelle Haupt

Tamara Peterson

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Andy Sharp

Carla Stensland

Stephanie Kim

Logan Kahler

Becky Parmelee

FACELESS PORTRAIT

FACELESS PORTRAIT! What a great theme! But what is a FACELESS PORTRAIT? It is a portrait of somebody that doesn’t include their face. It is that simple.

I look forward to seeing your interpretations!

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HOUSEKEEPING
A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very faceless Monday.

Black & White, Kim, Logan, Michelle, Self-Portrait, Tamara, WPC - Submissions

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 179 – SELF-PORTRAIT

February 18, 2019 Christopher D. Bennett

Another week with subpar participation despite being perhaps the easiest theme of this set of 52. Weather I’m sure contributed. This week central Iowa is supposed to get two more snowstorms, so we’ll see how many people struggle through the elements for this week’s theme.

But you didn’t come her to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:

Kim Barker

Michelle Haupt

Tamara Peterson

Christopher D. Bennett

Logan Kahler

TRANSPORTATION

TRANSPORTATION! What a great theme! But what is a TRANSPORTATION photo? A TRANSPORTATION photo is a photo that involves any aspect of TRANSPORTATION. A car, a train, an airplane, an airport, a bridge, a road, railroad tracks… the list goes on and on. It bottles the mind! Truly mind bottling!

As always, I look forward to seeing your interpretations!

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HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very transportive Monday.

Formal Portrait, Kim, Logan, Macro, Self-Portrait, Steph, Tamara, WPC - Submissions

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 178 – EYE

February 11, 2019 Christopher D. Bennett

I would describe the amount of submissions this for the theme EYE as fair. People might be coming out of the winter doldrums even though winter weather doesn’t seem to be going anywhere for this week. Maybe next week won’t be so bad.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:

Logan Kahler

Stephanie Kim

Stephanie Kim – These mosaics are in the Chambers Street station in Manhattan.

Kim Barker

Christopher D. Bennett

Tamara Peterson

SELF-PORTRAIT

SELF-PORTRAIT! What a great theme! What is a SELF-PORTRAIT? It is a picture of yourself. Sometimes called a selfie, but a selfie and a SELF-PORTRAIT aren’t the same thing. A selfie is a SELF-PORTRAIT, but a SELF-PORTRAIT isn’t necessarily a selfie. A selfie has to be taken on a cell phone to be a selfie. Regardless, take a SELF-PORTRAIT with your cell phone camera, your 35mm camera, your pinhole camera, or your DSLR camera. Doesn’t matter. Just take a SELF-PORTRAIT and submit it.

I look forward to seeing your interpretations!

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HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very self involved Monday.

9 Emotions Project, Alexis, Anders, Andy, Animals, Baby Got Rack, Baier, Bethany, Black & White, Boone FUMC, Brandon, Carla, Colleen, Derrick, Elainie, Flat Earth Joe, Iowa State, Jay, Jesse, Johnathan, Jorge, Laura, Logan, Michelle, Micky, Mom, Nader, Naima, Nate, Nora, Russell, Sara, Shannon, State Fair, Tenderloining, Teresa, Tim, Willy

Blessings – 2018

November 22, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett 4 Comments

I hope everybody had a great Thanksgiving! It is the time of year where we are supposed to count our blessings.

I thought I would share a few of my current blessings:

I am blessed with a great family!

I have plenty of friends that share my love for the Cyclones!

I have a job I don’t hate going to, where I work with several people I don’t want to punch in the face.

I have an amazing church family!

I have an amazing friends family!

I’m blessed to share my life with Naima!

This is really just a handful of the blessings in my life! But I’m already getting this out late, so I’ll cut if off here. I’ll just end with a passage from a Rob Bell NOOMA video that really spoke to me:

“So the verse in First Timothy, it says command those that are rich to not put their hope in wealth… and then it goes on and it continues… and it says, but to put their hope in God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.

That phrase, a God that richly provides us with everything. All that we have is a gift.

Food. It is a gift.

Clothes. Gift.

Roof. Gift.

That breath you just took. It’s a gift.

Now there are some that will say: No, you don’t understand. I’ve worked for what I have. I deserve it. It is mine. But like it says in the book of Deuteronomy, Chapter 8: You may say to yourself, my power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me. But remember the Lord your God, because it is God that gives you the ability to produce wealth.”

I thank God for the embarrassment of riches in my life!