Posting a Christmas video has now become a tradition in the Smith family.

Two years ago I posted a video of us putting up our Christmas tree, last year I posted a video of some crazy Christmas lights down the street and this year I’m posting a video of Colbie.

The video of Colbie might not be what you expect, though. It’s of her crying. So, you’re probably thinking, “What kind of parents post a video of their kid crying?” But, it’s a video of her crying when she saw our Christmas tree, so it’s ok. Yep, she cried when she saw a Christmas tree. The thing that brings most children joy, brings Colbie fright.

You see, this all happened when Colbie took a long nap. So, Jasmine and I saw this as a perfect time to put up the Christmas tree. And when she woke up and saw this big tree taking over the living room, this was her reaction… (more…)

If money were no object, I would want ____________ for Christmas.

Merry Christmas!

We discussed Christmas albums the other day and you found out that I liked *NSync. Yes, I even put the “*”.

So, now we gotta decide the best Christmas movie of all time. My favorite is “It’s A Wonderful Life” because of all the awesome memories watching it every Christmas with the family. Love it.

The other three Christmas movies I can’t miss watching during the holidays are “Home Alone”, “Elf” and “A Charlie Brown Christmas”.

I will say that I absolutely cannot stand “A Christmas Story”. There I said it. I know some of you hate me now.

I can’t think of any religious Christmas movies that I love. Actually, I really can’t think of any religious movies that I watch during Christmas time. Missing the whole point on that one… Maybe.

With all the Christmas movies out there, which movie is your favorite one?

I said I wasn’t going to write a post on this, but I’ve been seeing so many things going on lately, that I felt I needed to at least talk about it a bit. Usually I talk about the positive things that social media has to offer. But, lately I’ve been noticing that some of the negative things have almost been outweighing the positive. I think a lot of it has to do with readers misunderstanding what is being written, but still, it’s so annoying when you know what you mean, but nobody else does.

The first case I am talking about is when MercyMe’s front man, Bart Millard, wrote “XMas” instead of Christmas, which started a huge uproar from people who wanted to keep “Christ” in Christmas. Here’s that tweet for ya:

If Bart has 140 characters to use on twitter, everybody knows you shorten what you can. Also, I guess those folks didn’t know that “X” really means Christ. People just need to think before they respond. That’s a lesson for all of us. It was definitely a misunderstanding.

On to the next one.

Mark Driscoll has two reputations within the church. One is that he is very over the top and another says he is very biblical. I think he’s both with maybe some inconsistency thrown in there. But, when a leader is in the spotlight it is easy to point fingers at what some else is doing wrong when really all of us have something we need to deal with.

Well, after watching this Avatar video that was posted of Pastor Mark preaching on Avatar, I thought I was going to hell. Literally. I guess that’s where the “over the top” comes in.

So naturally, when Pastor Mark made a comment about enjoying Jay-Z’s music, people went ape-$%^#. Now, I’ll be the first to admit that I love Jay-Z. J Hova has rhymes like no other. I do try to get the edited version and fill in words like “love you real good” or “poop”, but him and his band have serious talent. His bassist, Tony Russell and drummer, Tony Royster Jr. are among the best in the world, in my opinion. So after seeing his response to Avatar and then seeing that he enjoyed Jay-Z’s music confused everyone, including myself. Then Pastor Mark came out with some feedback in the form a post after everyone was calling him out.
Here’s an excerpt from that post:

Now, if he would have posted that in the first place maybe people probably would’ve gotten that, but again it’s that twitter rule of 140 characters or less. Some people are saying that the post was released just because of the way people reacted, but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt. I think that’s what he thought all along about Jay-Z. I also think he means what he’s saying about Avatar in the post- that it’s a well done movie and it’s not a sin to see the movie, but it is if you adopt the hindu behaviors portrayed in the movie. I will say that with all the things he has said over the years about relevant topics including culture, The Shack, stay-at-home dads, and yoga and the way they are always perceived wrong, he might need to find a different way to communicate effectively, though. Matt Chandler even pokes fun at the way Mark communicates here. Not many people can do what Mark does and I’m guessing he’s reaching someone out there, so not much of us can say stuff. I mean, I’m guessing people have come to know the Lord through his ministry, just maybe a yelling God that I’m not used to, but maybe some people need that. That would definitely be some interesting data to see.

All this has me trying to think of life before social media, when we didn’t know what everyone was doing and everyone’s random thoughts. Whether we like it or not, social media has given each of us a voice. Either to put out a thought or idea or to lift up someone else’s idea or bash them for being wrong. The thing I know all of us kept thinking while seeing all of this going on is “What if this same effort that is being put into bashing people for their thoughts was out into building clean water wells or finding other ways to help other countries that are less fortunate and their people who really need it?”

Whether you agree with what Bart did with XMas or Pastor Mark’s views and how he communicates those, I’m pretty sure they both know Christ. Oh, and Rob Bell. That might receive more comments than Driscoll and Millard combined.
Haters gonna hate.
Some of you might disagree with my opinion on those, but writing XMas or yelling and playing things on the safer side is better than playing it on the less strict side, even if life will be a little less exciting.
The only thing with that is that could make people outside of the church think that Christians can’t have fun, which is totally not the case. Whatever.

What we need are people who keep leaders in their prayers.

Those are my thoughts and most of this is me writing while thinking out loud.

I know you have been misunderstood because everyone has. I remember the last time it happened to me. I was telling someone why it’s important for a church to be relevant and up to date. They thought people should go to church for Jesus and not worry about the material things in the church. That was quite a discussion that I will leave for another blog post…

So, what point were you trying to get across the last time you were misunderstood?

Here are a few things that I enjoyed in 2010…

“Permission to Speak Freely: Essays & Art on Fear, Confession and Grace” by Anne Jackson was beautiful.

A yearly subscription toRelevant Magazine.

And Jon Acuff’s new book is a hilarious view on all things “Dave Ramsey.”

Since you folks are so pretty, I’m giving away those items listed above to one lucky reader.

The winner will also receive A jackalopekid t-shirt

The contest ends Tuesday, December 14th at 11:59pm Mountain Time.
I will announce the randomly chosen winner on Wednesday, December 15th.
Just in time for Christmas.

All you have to do is leave a comment below answering this question…

What is the best gift you have ever received?

Merry Christmas from jackalopekid.com!

***Update: MichaelDPerkins won the spectacular prize pack! Congrats!***

found on Picasa

This Christmas everyone should make a nativity like this one. Really. Nothing says I want to celebrate Jesus’ birth like a pork nativity scene.

Caption Please…

As you know, I love Macs. The operating system just makes more sense to me than Windows does and the design of the machine is also pretty spectacular. It’s like the designers and engineers thought of every single detail. They are just a blast to work on.

My first experience with a Mac was with a 15″ Macbook Pro I purchased back in 2006. I owned that until I purchased a new Macbook Pro earlier this year. This time around I went with the i5 17″ Macbook Pro because it seemed to have a much larger screen in the store and I thought that would be an added bonus giving me additional screen workspace. Well, after using it for about three months now, I actually like the 15″ better. I found this out through using it in everyday situations. The 15″ just seems like the perfect size. So yeah, my next Pro will most likely be back to the 15″. Thought I was sure on that decision, but glad I at least tried out the big screen. If you are contemplating making a switch to a larger screen, or even a smaller screen, I would recommend making more trips to the store than I did…

I’ve been happy with all other products I own now or have in the past from Apple. Those include an iPhone4, Apple TV and an iPad. Apple can do no wrong. I just know someone out there will have something to say about that.

So, are you a Mac or a PC and why is that?

First of all, let me just say I love this time of year. We celebrate Jesus’ birth, spend time with family, play in the snow, get new toys, eat great food, yada yada yada.

Ok. So, don’t laugh at what you’re about to hear.

*NSYNC’s Home For Christmas is my favorite Christmas album of all time. I even know to put the “*” with NSYNC. Wow.

Your view on who I am has probably changed now and you now know something new about me that’s slightly embarrassing.

The main reasons are that it was the first Christmas album Jasmine and I listened to together and it was background music for our first kiss.

…That was awesome.

I know most of you will answer this question with Mariah Carey’s album, but I want to know…

What is your favorite Christmas album?

No stop-motion this year.

Here it is. The Christmas tree is up.

Do you have your tree up yet?