Author: Jonathan Blundell

I'm a husband, father of three, blogger, podcaster, author and media geek who is hoping to live a simple life and follow The Way.

Quote of the day

“We’ve found different ways of expressing it, and recognized the power of the media to manipulate such signs. Maybe we just have to sort of draw our fish in the sand. It’s there for people who are interested. It shouldn’t be there for people who aren’t.” — Bono on faith, quoted in “U2 at the End of the World”

Falling at Your Feet

I’ve heard this song over and over again but never heard it as a Gospel song till this morning – suddenly (after Sunday’s service) it painted such a great picture of Luke 7:36-50.

Falling at Your Feet – U2

Every chip from every cup
Every promise given up
Every reason that’s not enough
Is falling, falling at your feet

Every band elastic limit
Every race when there’s nothing in it
Every winner that has lost their ticket
Is falling, falling at your feet
I’ve come crawling, falling at your feet

Everyone who needs a friend
Every life that has no end
Every knee not ready to bend
Is falling, falling at your feet
I’ve come crawling, now I’m falling at your feet

All fall down
All the manic days
The faces that you pull
All the x-rays not under your control
The graffiti rolling down off of your tongue
And the compromise you make for someone

Every teenage with acne
Every face that’s spoiled by beauty
Every adult tamed by duty
Are all falling at your feet

Every foot in every face
Every cop stop that finds the grace
Every prisoner in the Maze
Every hand that needs an ace
Is falling, falling at your feet
I’ve come crawling, now I’m falling at your feet

All fall down
All the books you never read
Just started
All the meals you rushed
And never tasted

Every eye closed by a bruise
Every player who just can’t lose
Every pop star hurling abuse
Every drunk back on the booze
All falling at your feet, all falling at your feet

All fall down
All the information
All the big ideas
All the radio waves
On electronic seas
How to navigate
How to simply be
Don’t know when to wait
Explain simplicity
In whom shall I trust?
How might I be still?
Teach me to surrender
Not my will, THY will

new techie goals

I’m working on a new Intranet site for work today. Last week I was working on new WordPress themes for a possible encounter website redesign (you may have seen them on my Flickr stream).
While working on the Intranet site I’m using CasadeBlundell.com for “filler text” and it got me thinking about redesigning that site as well. It’s gotten a little stagnant.
All of this led me to think about a few goals/challenges I’d like to figure out/complete before to long (some of them are personal, others are work related).

  • Finish a redesign of the encounter website
  • Redesign CasadeBlundell.com
  • Redesign our departmental Intranet site
  • Find out how to combine multiple RSS feeds into one – hopefully without using third party software. I’d love to be able to let people subscribe to one RSS feed and get the latest from my twitter feed, Flickr feed and of course my SSL feed. I’d eventually love to have an option to combine all my RSS feeds with Laurie’s RSS feeds as well so people can truly stay up to date with what’s going on.
  • Get a better grasp/understanding of CSS – this is coming slowly as I build these other sites
  • Learn PHP language – coming along even slower

I think those are the main ones for now – but who knows I may think of several more on the way home – you can check my Twitter feed for updates on the way home 😉

Bush’s ungiven speech

On October 1, 2001, President George W. Bush did not give the following speech to a special
session of Congress. The speech did not interrupt regularly scheduled broadcasts on television
and radio. It did not interrupt and change the current of history either…

But what if he had…

Read Bush’s ungiven speech, as written by Brian McLaren, author of Everything Must Change: Jesus, Global Crises, and a Revolution of Hope, which we plan to read this month for Headphonaught’s Book Club.

Headphonaught’s Book Club v.2

Well, last week I mentioned a book club that’s being formed by my mate Thomas.
During the week Thomas decided that rather than using Google Groups to host the discussion/forum Facebook would be a better route. I’ve used both and don’t have a huge preference between one or the other. Of course in both groups I’ve been involved in, there hasn’t been super amounts of discussion either. I’ve got Thomas’ thoughts below – but what do you think? Do you prefer one over the other?

Thanks to everyone who has shown an interesting in getting involved… especially JD over in Texas and Dan in Glenrothes for their encouragement and support!

OK… so this is where we are going with this >>

1) I have set up an “invite-only” Facebook group > the admins (JD, Dan & myself) will invite people who have expressed an interest in being part of this journey. Facebook gives us the tools to do this >> invites / discussion posting etc >> and encourages community – you have to be a member of Facebook and your identity is known to the group (no nicknames etc). This will make us more honest and accountable >> key prerequisites for an egalitarian community.

2) We are considering a number of books… but a couple of front runners are THE TIPPING POINT [Malcolm Gladwell] and/or EVERYTHING MUST CHANGE [Brian D. McLaren]. We can run multiple discussions, if desired… this can be as linear or non-linear as we want it to be.

3) One thing I am interesting in… as well… is meeting up with folks in Glasgow for f2f conversations. Ally & Jay have expressed an interest in this too. I would encourage you to look at this option in addition to online.

4) Using Facebook will, I hope, allow us to get know each other a bit better. Hooking up and conducting one on one conversations is encouraged.

I hope this makes sense… I don’t want to exclude folks not on Facebook… but the tool is the best one we have. If anything, you now have a legit reason for joining up.

I you want to join up… leave a comment, drop me a note or hook up with me, Dan or JD on Facebook.