7 Habits & The Church

It's been about 10 years since I last read this book. Now that I am working through it again I am able to internalize it much better. Definitely a book that is worth re-reading. In my opinion it would behoove church leaders to check this book out. From what I have seen the church at large needs to re-examine it's mission and goals and objectives. I think we will start seeing more of this viewpoint with Generation Y'ers. Generation Y people and to some extent gen X'ers are examining their faith's goals and objectives and are finding that they are inconsistent with current practices. One example is the "mega-church" with it's multi-million dollar building and expensive fixtures. The question is, "Why did we spend $10 million on a new church instead of going for a modest structure and planting a lot more new churches?" Counterpoint, how Spartan is too Spartan? I recently attended service at a new church plant. They are meeting in a former grocery store (for now). They do plan to build a "real" church. They purchased chairs for seating and they have a band for the service. This all seems reasonable. But when does reasonable become too much? The gen Y'ers I know would be more than happy to meet, study and worship in someone's house or out in a field. More later...

Pave Hawks go to Sri Lanka

Check out this brief article and some pictures of our Air Force sending some helicopters to help out in Sri Lanka.

The meaning of life

What is the meaning of life? It is up to you to determine that.

Washed my flash drive

Well for the second time I've washed a flash drive. The first flash drive came through ok, although my level of confidence in it's reliability dropped significantly. This drive seems to be sealed much better. We shall see later today how it faired. This has got to happen more often than we'd think.

UPDATE: The drive seems to have made it OK. Both drives are made by SanDisk. One is the Cruzer Micro and the other a Cruzer Mini. The only issue I've had is that the caps don't seem to fit very well now... too loose.

Be careful to make sure that ALL moisture is removed from the drive. Water can real a do job on your device by causing corrosion between the legs on the SMT components. You can try and remove by flushing with rubbing alcohol and placing the USB drive in a container of uncooked rice.

XP and the 7 Habits

I am currently reading Extreme Programming Perspectives and The Seven Habits of Highly Effective people. The thought that really struck me is how 7 Habits is about being principle centered and that's what XP is about. While the waterfall model is all about a rigid framework, XP is focusing on certain key principles and what needs to be done when we stick to our principles. From personal experience it seems like we come with up rigid frameworks and steps when we are trying to get a group of people that aren't operating under the guidance of the same principles to produce something. And not surprisingly, no matter how detailed your process, the person operating outside of those guiding principles will find a way to break the process or bend it in a way that is contrary to the principle that is the fundamental reason for the process. So, my experience leads me to believe that no matter how many processes you put in place and no matter how detailed they are, if the developer isn't committed to the same principles, you aren't going to get the end result you were wanting. On the other hand, if everyone is committed to the same principles it seems like you don't need much of a framework to get the desired end result.