The Right Voice

I had the pleasure misfortune of attending a mega church last week. Now, McLean Bible Church is not as big as Joel Osteen’s church, but with four campuses and several different worship options at each campus, it is nothing to sneeze at. In my opinion, it is far too big to effective at doing anything but having a church service. Don’t get me wrong, it is great that it can preach the Gospel to so many people, but churches are called to do more than that. Churches are supposed to provide fellowship and teaching to the believers. The book of Peter calls pastors to feed His sheep. It is not that people are not fed at these mega churches, it is just that they are fed milk. The book of Hebrews calls churches to move from milk to meat. Milk is for infant Christians. As we mature in our faith, we are supposed to be fed meat.

Part of it is my fault, I suppose. I enjoy traditional worship (Hymns and such). Since I had no idea what was going on, I walked into the only open door I saw. I was “The Edge” with “contemporary band led worship”. That is not my style at all. In fact, I despise it. To me it sounds canned and there is such a huge lack of raw emotion. People singing them just seemingly go through the motions, as it were. I was so disenchanted by the music that I did not even pay attention to what anyone was saying. I could only even make out the words through the noise during the offertory when the chorus was “Kingdom of Heaven, rain down on me.” What does that even mean? Sounds poetic, I suppose, but no one at home is ever going to say that. Once I figured out that I was in the wrong room I contemplated leaving and going to the other room, but by that time, it was much too late for that.

After worship time (seemed like an eternity, but in reality, it was about 30-35 minutes which is still quite long) there was the sermon. It was delivered via satellite from wherever he was preaching from (Loudon?). We were graced with a sermon that lasted about 15 minutes. It was about witnessing. It was part 8 in a series. I can only assume that there is so many parts because there is only so much you can say in 15 minutes anyway. It was light and fluffy like I was expecting. I was hoping for substance, but there was hardly any. He just said to preach the Gospel which is exactly what we are told to do in Matthew 28. Thanks, I definitely could not have figured that out on my own.

So after that experience at church it was time to leave. Well, that is another story. I went to the parking garage and found my car where I parked it at F3. I saw a little bit of traffic getting out, but I was not expecting what happened. I was stuck in the parking garage for upwards of 30 minutes, then when I finally got onto Route 7, There was massive amounts of traffic. The police even get involved in the mass exodus from this particular church. It took me over an hour and a half to get home. So I all in all, I had 2 and a half hours of driving time, $1.50 in tolls and a miserable church experience. I probably won’t be going back.

Todd

John McCain ran one of the worst Presidential Campaigns that I have ever seen. It seems almost like he did not want to win. Sure, there was an uphill battle, but there was so much more he could have done to make it close, or even possibly win.

1. I live in the all-important battleground state of Virginia. I was bombarded by Obama campaigners, fliers, and sample ballots. I got nothing from the McCain camp. Nothing. On election at the long lines of the polls who was there? The Democrats. Who wasn’t? McCain people. Who won Virginia? Obama. Obama volunteers knocked on one million doors the day before the election. What did the McCain camp do? nothing.

2. The Interwebz. From day one Obama embraced the Web. He was on Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, LinkedIn, SecondLife, and multiple other Social Networking sites while McCain was nowhere to be found. McCain finally embraced the Web about two months too late. More on that in a little bit.

3. He never controlled the right narrative and always controlled the narrative  no one wanted to hear. Obama stated (for the entire campaign) that John McCain was just like George Bush. He had a response to that. About 3 weeks too late. He let that narrative control him and he was killed by it. When the economy was THE ONLY issue ANYONE cared about, McCain focused on Ayers. No one cared and it hurt him badly, yet he kept pushing it.

4. He never challenged anything that Obama said. Instead of pointing out that it is impossible for 95% of the peole to get a tax cut when 30% don’t pay taxes. He talked about a bill that Obama voted yes on in the Chicago state Senate in 2001. Who cares? No one did.

5. The financial meldown. This is where McCain’s campaign fell off the cliff. Obama stated (falsely) that it was 100% the fault of Bush and his economic policies that “McCain agreed with”. McCain did…nothing at first. Then…he did a lot more of nothing…Then he talked about Ayers and ACORN…then he came up with the worst possible solution. He wanted the Treasury to buy all the bad mortgages. Who thought that up?

6. Aside from “Country First” there were no sound bites for McCain. (unless you count “My friends”). Obama was able to lay out his plans clearly and succinctly. McCain was not. He never tried. If he had,  it would be something like “My Friends, you will spend $3,000 more on your health care, but, my friends, don’t worry. You will get a $5,000 tax credit” Whatever that means. McCain decided to focus on the strengths of his plan (which were few) instead of the weaknesses in Obama’s plans (which were more numerous).

7. Finally, everything that McCain did in the last 2 weeks of his campaign should have been done weeks, if not months, earlier. He gave a speech on election day that was full of fire and passion. Too bad it was on election day and not weeks before. he called for the resignation of Ted Stevens AFTER he was convicted. AFTER. Wow. Way to go out on a limb. Here’s what he should have done. He should have called for his resignation the day he was indicted. It would have greatly benefited many things. First, and foremost, it could have gotten Ted Stevens out og the US Senate (he was reelected BTW). It would have bolstered his position as a “maverick” (Palin too, she’s just as guilty) by going against his own party. Lastly, it would have bolstered his position as a pork buster. Lest we forget his now infamous Bridge to Nowhere? [Don’t worry though, even though he was facing criminal charges, Sen. Stevens was still able to earmark funds for Squirrel research on the bailout bill. What a disgrace.]

McCain, during the third debate, FINALLY said that he was not George Bush. He should have set the record straight during the first debate. He also came out guns ablazin’ and on the offensive during the third debate. Would have been great to see in the first two debates. He should have brought up ACORN at the beginning. Why no mention of the fact that they are under investigation in 14 states? He let him off too easy.

All in all his campaign was a failure due to both his staff for making such muddy policies and McCain himself for being “mavericky” when it wasn’t a good time to be one, and not being “mavericky” when it was time to be one.

Todd