Lake Neuron

John Bloom (whom some of you will know as drive-in movie critic / “Monstervision” host Joe Bob Briggs, and others will remember from the “God Stuff” segments which used to appear on “The Daily Show”) has posted a gut-wrenching remembrance of Harry Guetzlaff at the Door web site.

My father is a huge “VeggieTales” fan, and for his birthday I gave him Phil Vischer’s memoir, “Me, Myself & Bob: A True Story About Dreams, God and Talking Vegetables.” I didn’t expect him to read it right away, because when I gave it to him last week he mentioned being in the middle of another book. But he picked it up and apparently couldn’t put it down.

In case you don’t know the back story, Vischer is the creator of VeggieTales and the voice of Bob the tomato. He grew Big Idea Productions into a huge company — and then lost it all, due to a variety of factors including his own self-admitted hubris and a prolonged legal battle with a video distributor (he ultimately won the legal battle, but by that time he’d already lost control of the company). Vischer still does the voice of Bob, writes one VeggieTales script a year and consults on two others.

I knew my father would be interested in anything VeggieTale-related but was afraid he might be put off by the losing-it-all aspect of the tale. On the contrary; he was fascinated by the story, admires Vischer’s frank self-assessment and says there’s enough material for several sermons in the book’s concluding chapters. (Dad may be retired, but he still thinks like a preacher.) Vischer, who fancied himself the next Walt Disney, got caught up in the idea that Bigger is automatically Better, and in the process he lost track of some things that should have been at the center of his vision.

I already knew some of this story from Vischer’s blog, but I’m going to have to take Dad up on his offer to loan me the book so that I can read the whole story for myself.

I agree 110 percent with Gavin in being troubled by our occasional obsession with the rapture. As a Christian, I think it’s imperative for me to make every moment count, to live as if Jesus were coming back at any moment. He could be here tomorrow, or we could have another 100,000 years. But it’s not necessary or desirable — or possible, for that matter — to figure out in advance God’s plan for the end times, and anyone who tells you they know exactly how or when it’s going to happen is selling you a bill of goods. There are some Bible scholars who claim that the book of Revelation, on which much of this speculation is based, isn’t even supposed to be about the end times, but rather was John’s attempt to write a symbolic message about the occupying Roman forces while he was in exile.

I’m constantly amazed that some of the same people who were absolutely sure they had end-times symbolism all figured out in the 1970s — and were proven completely wrong by the breakup of the Soviet Union — are still making a living peddling their latest versions.

Anyway, Gavin linked to this, which absolutely made my day:

Motivational posters for the emergent church.

(Hat tip to John at Locusts & Honey.)

These are funny, but I still like the Star Trek ones better.

Well, my copy of “The Midget, The Speck and The Molecule” arrived today, at long last, and I’ve already listened to it twice. Terry — er, I mean, Camarillo Eddy — and the boys have done it again.

When I looked up the Swirling Eddies lyrics for my previous post, I was reminded that their new album, “The Midget, The Speck and the Molecule,” is being released today. I ordered it just now from the DA web store.

I was shocked and dismayed to learn this morning that the great cartoonist Doug Marlette was killed in a car crash while I was in Bolivia. I don’t take the Nashville paper any more, and it had been a while since I kept up with “Kudzu” on a regular basis, but it had been one of my favorite strips. Marlette was both a comic strip artist and an editorial cartoonist.

The appearance of Rev. Will B. Dunn, one of the main characters in “Kudzu,” was based on the Rev. Will Campbell of Mt. Juliet, a friend of Marlette’s who, if I recall correctly, actually officiated Marlette’s wedding.

Marlette was a great talent and will be missed. Here’s an interview he gave to The Wittenburg Door.

I think this was my favorite blog post of the day. Dave Walker’s sense of humor just cracks me up sometime. I think he should have left the leaves for the pentecostals, but then again I’m glad he was able to share them with us, as they gave me quite a chuckle.

Do you know one of those Christians who thinks the key to evangelism is to see how gimmicky you can be, how many inside catch phrases you can use, how many T-shirts you can wear? I thought so. The blogger at Sunday School Thoughts directed me to this:

McSweeney’s has the order of worship for the church of Carl Kasell, whose voice I would still like to have on my home answering machine.

UPDATE: As of 2:45, McSweeney’s had inexplicably replaced the piece which was supposed to be linked above with a different humor piece from their files. I don’t know whether this was intentional or a computer glitch. Their permalink structure includes the author’s name, and even though the permalink still has the name of the original author, it now links to a piece by a different author. I can’t think of anything offensive or litigious about the piece that would have caused it to be pulled, however.

Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.

You scored as Art Ruch. You are Art Ruch! You’re the only person to score as “Modern Liberal” in the Theological Worldview Quiz. Your prize is a new Volvo.

Newscoma was kind enough to nominate me for the Bloggers’ Choice Awards in the category of religion blogs. I am really flattered by this, and at the same time any descripton of this as a “religion blog” makes me self-conscious about all of the goofy, juvenile material I put here which seemingly has nothing to do with religion.

On Fridays, I’m one of the regular editors of The MethoBlog, a Methodist blog aggregator, and when I’m scanning the other blogs looking for linkable posts I’m always impressed by the depth and seriousness of some of the member blogs. Meanwhile, the last 24 hours in this joint is typified by a YouTube link to “Bambi vs. Godzilla.”

Even so, the Bible said we must be fools for Christ’s sake, and, as they say in Tinseltown, it’s an honor just to be nominated. If you want to cast a vote, click on the badge at the top of this post.

(I will put the little badge in the sidebar as soon as I get home. I can’t get my sidebar widgets to work where I’m at right now.)

In all seriousness, I had already been toying with posting my sermon here tomorrow afternoon. I will use a “More” tag so that it all doesn’t show up on the front page. So when you see it, don’t think that it’s just a cheesy attempt to drum up votes.

Skippy R. at The Wittenburg Door blog has the real scoop on Procter and Gamble. (Now that I’m not on the masthead anymore, does this mean I’m safe from lawsuits?)

Jadon at the Wittenburg Door Chat Closet linked to an old video of a great song by one of my all-time favorite artists. The visuals are cheesy — the song was released in 1985. But, hey, it’s Randy Stonehill, and a terrific song, and for me, that’s more than enough:

This isn’t the exact version of the clip to which Jadon linked; that one had a few seconds clipped off and an incorrect apostrophe in the plural “gods.”