Jon Acuff's Blog, page 175

Spotting a missionary. (& Caption this photo)

(In the Stuff Christians Like book, a book that declares and fulfills on the promise that God will make you rich if you buy it, I have a chapter about the danger of complaining around missionaries. You can't whine about the amount of cinnamon in your coffee because most missionaries have a spider story that will trump your caffeinated woes. But how do you spot a missionary? Great question and one that Malin, a dentist missionary in Kenya answers in an awesome way. The photo of the family is t...

The guy writing the check during the offering.

My friend, who is a Jehovah's Witness, once asked if Southern Baptists used offering baskets with mesh bottoms. He'd heard they did that because then if you tried to tithe with change, it would fall out and loudly proclaim you as a cheapskate. That would hopefully guilt you into giving paper money next week.

I told him it wasn't true and that I hated that his side got Prince.

The offering can be a funny thing though and I haven't written about it often. But recently I experienced something...

Building benches instead of frisbees.

My dad uses his feet like hands, much like a gorilla opening a banana, when he loses frisbees in the pond at the disc golf course.

He's not above stripping down to his shorts and diving in to recover discs. The pond is dark brown and is populated with turtles, snakes and frogs. If his disc lands in it, he walks around with his bare feet feeling in calf deep mud for it. Just typing that last sentence made me squirm a little.

But the course we played in Atlanta didn't have that problem. There...

Trying to find a new church.

Last weekend, my wife and I started looking for a new church after attending North Point Community Church in Alpharetta, Georgia for 6 years. We went to Cross Point, which is where Pete Wilson preaches and we loved it.

During the service, we found ourselves comparing notes between the two, trying to feel out this new place that over a period of years, if not decades, will play an important role in our lives. And I realized 5 things about finding a new church:

1. You will notice silly things.

At ...

Quietly distancing ourselves from Mel Gibson.

Every day that he's in heaven, Solomon better literally thank God that TMZ and paparazzi didn't exist when he was doing his nonsense.

I know some horrible Mel Gibson audio tapes were recently released, but can you imagine the audio from Solomon?

"Hey, I'm thinking about marrying 10 more wives. Probably going to get some of those ladies that are into child sacrifice and establish some high places where we can tape some epic episodes of 'Girls Gone Wild.'"

US Magazine would have had a field day...

Seinfeld vs. U-Haul & what's your craziest moving story?

Recently U-Haul sent my youngest brother, who like me moved last week, an email.

It was about 40 hours before he was supposed to pick up a truck for 12 hours on Saturday from 4AM until 4PM. With an 8 month old and a young wife he was excited and nervous about their first big move. What did U-Haul's email say?

It confirmed for him that he would be picking up a truck on Friday for 6 hours, instead of Saturday at 12 hours. My brother, a lawyer, instantly recognized this trick. Instead of calling s...

5 people you meet in any small group.

(I've hung out with Greg Darley a lot. Whenever I'm at a conference and feel like I don't know anyone, Greg will magically appear and everything is right with the world. He's got a great heart for ministry and a great sense of humor. I thought his post today was funny and true. I hope you do too.)

The obvious and most chosen route is to go with in a small group setting is the book option. You all choose a book, which the first one brought up has to be the 5 Love Languages. But in every...

Nouning ourselves.

Last week, I made the brief mistake of getting into an argument with author Donald Miller on Twitter about the concept of "story."

I say "mistake" because Donald Miller is an expert on story. Arguing with Donald Miller about storytelling is like arguing with Billy Graham on running a Crusade or arguing with the Situation on the Gym/Laundry/Tan approach to life. (A Billy Graham reference and a Jersey Shore reference in the same sentence? I should be so simile ashamed of myself.)

I say the...

Not knowing whether to sprint or be still.

On Sunday afternoon, my wife sent me to Costco to "buy a mattress," with my brother Will. That is exactly what we did. We bought a mattress. Hours later, back at the house, she said, "Where's the box springs?" I, having not been told to purchase box springs, said, "What box springs?"

This discussion went round and round, finally settling on the decision that no adult in their early 30s could possibly believe that a bed could be complete without a box springs. Although I tried to tell my wife i...

Reacting to Anne Rice.

Christian blogging law requires that you write a post about what world famous author Anne Rice recently said about Christianity.

I wasn't going to, but Cornelius, the white dove who brings me official Christian blogging rules, made it pretty clear I had little choice.

So what did Anne Rice, who wrote about vampires long before it was all twilighty and cool, say? Here is what she posted on Facebook:

"For those who care, and I understand if you don't: Today I quit being a Christian. I'm out. I...