Sunday Sunday Sunday!

Lessee here...it's about 12:10 AM...which means that in 7 hours and 50 minutes I'll be onstage in Hallandale, warming up the ol' saxophone and the vocal chords. Exciting stuff. I probably sounded like a complete dork when Allen, our Magnification Pastor (think: overseer of everything related to the creative arts at FRC, including but not limited to music, stage design, tech, atmosphere, etc.) called me and asked me if I wanted to play down at the Hallandale campus. My voice jumped an octave or two, but I don't care, because I've been itching to spend a Sunday or two at some of the other places where we do our weekend thing.

By the way, if any of you reading this happens to be a saxophone player who likes to help lead worship on their horn, give me a call because it's a little lonely being the only one (sad face).

In other news, my arms and chest, especially the right side, feel like a sac of of potatoes that have been dropped down several flights of stairs. Not that I'm complaining. I was warned that the first week of hitting the gym will do that to you, so I had a pretty good idea of what was coming. I've just never been so painfully aware of the location of all the muscles in my torso before, that's all (and don't poke me, either. I'll whine and nobody wants to see that).

I'm still waiting for the High Def feed to finish exporting to the Doral drive*, so I'll write some more. Steph and I had dinner at Chili's tonight, which was pretty fun. We had a good time, swapping one liners with the waitress, talking about how great it was to be engaged, and poking fun at the group of guys across from us whose seemingly sole reason for eating at Chili's that night was to check out the waitresses' butts.

At this point I'm pretty stoked as to how we're doing morally. Most of that I think comes from the fact that we spend so much time around her family. I'd say the majority of our time (I can't really think of an accurate percentage for all you numbers people, but it's probably somewhere in the high 70s or 80s) is spent at her house either directly engaged with or just in the presence of, her family.
It also helps that they're so much fun to be around. It's especially great for a guy like me, whose background is so different. Most of the time I feel so out of place among the disfunction and disconnect that marks so much of my extended family, so it's a real breath of fresh air to be among a group of people who know how to resolve issues and be at peace with one another (for the most part). Plus, they treat me like one of their own.

The time we spend with her family really has gone a long way towards fostering a really good relationship between me and them and us and them and us and each other, which in turn is helping make the whole transition towards marriage that much easier for us, I think.

We do get some alone time, though. Steph and I go out on dates at least three or four times a week, be it lunch dates or walks or coffee, that sort of thing (we don't really do movies unless it's at one of our homes), and we're really good about finding chunks of uninterrupted time when we can unpack and really discuss the deep things.

I dunno, it's a neat balance, and I don't take it for granted. I'm sure if we put ourselves in the wrong situations, we'd probably be struggling with purity a whole lot more than we do, but I think we've managed to get to a place where we're trusting that the physical side of our courtship will figure itself out okay on the other side of marriage. I hope it stays that way, because as much as there's that part of me that wants to push that line (you know what I'm talking about), the sense of peace and simple innocence that marks this deal is the one of the most amazing feelings I've ever known, and I wouldn't trade that for anything.

Anywho, enough about relational stuff. Lately I feel like a broken record. Maybe I'll try to get in a fight with Steph next week so I can talk about resolving drama in relationships or something. I dunno....I'll figure something out...anyway, for now, I'm off.

*we put Saturday night's sermon on the screens the next morning at our other campuses. In order to pull that off, somone's got to cut together the video and put it in a format the other campuses can use. That someone is Kyle and I tonight.