Christian Challenge at MSC

This week we invented (or rather used with permission) the Ultimate Hop Scotch course. And now, I want a chance to share this amazing invention with everyone else.

The process is rather simple. Here are the materials You will need.

Required Materials
1. 100 or so pieces of sidewalk chalk.
2. Your choice of sobe energy drinks.
3. At least a couple of willing volunteers.
4. About four hours of time, depending on your level of detail and length of the course.

Optional Materials
1. A bunch of 12″ square cardstock for making uniform squares.
2. Cheap knee pads, or better ones if you can afford it.
3. A good pair of cheap work gloves, so you don’t totally dry out your hands.
4. A night of good weather.

Now, here comes the fun part.

Creating the Ultimate Hop Scotch Course
1. Gather your materials, and head to wherever you have a long, busy sidewalk. Do this at night though, otherwise you may be ran over by busy people trying to get to wherever they are going. Get into your gear (gloves and knee pads).
2. Take some photos to document the beginning of your amazing feat.
3. Send one person to the end of the course, to speed up the drawing process.
4. Take your 12″ square cardstock and lay it at the beginning of the course. Grab your favorite color of chalk, and draw a line around the paper.
5. Move the paper to the outside edge of the square you just drew. Draw lines around the square again.
6. Repeat until you get to the end of the course.

That’s really it. Of course, if you just do a single line of squares, it will get boring very quick. Here are a few suggestions to add some spice to your Ultimate Hop Scotch Course.

• After a couple of single squares, make two squares, side-by-side, and then another single.
• Try offsetting your single square.
• Turn corners.
• Make three (or four, or five if you’re really sadistic) squares wide, and put X’s through the ones NOT to step on.
• Emulate various video game characters, such as pac-man or Mario Bros.
• Make a maze.
• Add some long jumps.
• Make the course color coded.

There ya go. Stay tuned for photos of our attempt, and possibly even video, all coming soon!

I have been involved in an effort to start a church in Palisade for a few years now, and on Sunday night several of us we in Palisade for a church service.  Everything went well although, as usual, we did not have the attendance that we had hoped for.  However, as we were praying at the end of our time together I had one of those moments where I knew that God was changing the way I think about him.  Just before we started to pray Darrin said that he was going to read two of his favorite Psalms.  Without even thinking about it I just picked up my Bible and turned to Psalm 67, as if he had told us that he was going to read it.  Just as I started to read Darrin said, “I am going to start with Psalm 67.”  That was when it got weird.  The problem was that I knew it was not luck.  I just know Darrin well enough that when he said he would read his favorite Psalm, I knew which one it was.  Then God asked if I can hear his voice and respond to it the way I did when I heard Darrin, so that when God speaks I can react immediately simply because I know him.