Jones In Motion

Yesterday was a big day. We got in touch with some of the people from our church and told them we were saying goodbye.

We're not moving to another state or even another city... just another church. The reasons are varied, and honestly there is no one single reason that would be enough to make such a drastic decision. I've been attending this church since October of 1996 (I had moved back to Tulsa the summer before) with a one-year stint at another church when we were having some "people" difficulties at our church home. So it's not a decision you make lightly, ending a 12-year relationship with a church body, and it's really hard. If I wrote each of our reasons for making this decision on a card and handed you the cards, one at a time, as you read each one you would say, "Well, that's not so bad. You can deal with that," and I would agree with you. But when we were done, you'd be holding a pretty sizable stack of cards. It's definitely a camel-with-many-straws-on-his-back situation. We love the people at our now-former church, and we have great respect for the pastor and staff, but taking all factors into account, it's just time.

I'm not naming here the church we're leaving, although if you really wanted to know and didn't know already, you could easily enough find it in the archives. Like any other church, there are some things our old church is good at and other things that it's not good at, and a big part of the reason for moving on is that our priorities as a family have shifted and we need to find somewhere that better fits what we feel God is calling us to do. And that's the last thing I'm going to say about why we're leaving the old church, because it's a great place and many good things (including a HUGE amount of Bible knowledge for me and my wife!) have come out of there, and I have no reason to or intention to say anything at all bad about it. It's an excellent place to go and learn God's Word. I would HIGHLY recommend it for someone who needs a really solid Bible foundation; it's just short of going to a Bible school where you pay tuition! I won't talk that church down, but I will be giving my impressions of some of the places we visit over the next couple of months. We have a short list of churches we're curious about, and I'll share what we think about those churches as we visit. And by about Christmas time, I hope we've found someplace to spend the next twelve, twenty-four, or fifty years!

Speaking of radio silence...

This week Tulsa lost yet another Christian radio station. Let's review this decade so far, shall we?

2001: a new Christian Rock station turns up in place of an underappreciated and undernoticed pop/rock station. Live 101.5 is on the air for about a year and a half, and then in July of 2002 suddenly Christians all over Tulsa wake to their clock radios unexpectedly playing foul-mouthed hip-hop songs. Thanks for that, Clear Channel. I'll bet those urban beat fans were surprised one day a couple of years later when suddenly they tuned in their station to hear people speaking Spanish! Ha ha, ha!

2003: the same people who run the local Christian pop station, KXOJ, introduce The Kross, a new Christian rock station. Signal isn't that good in certain parts of town, but it gains a lot of popularity... until April of 2007, when, citing lack of advertising revenue, the station is converted to a repeater station for the programming on the mother station. Oh well... at least it wasn't Coolio this time.

2006 - A new competitor in the Christian pop market turns up. Spirit 102.3 plays the same kind of stuff as KXOJ. My family likes Spirit 102.3 better than KXOJ, but sometimes we jump back and forth a little. I have a Spirit 102.3 sticker on my car. Last Monday, suddenly Spirit 102.3 turned into a repeater for a sister station, formerly AM-only talk radio KRMG. So Cox Radio can't see their way clear to keep a Christian station on the air either, huh?

So now we're back where we were at the turn of the millennium... KXOJ or nothing. Well, not quite... we have some Air 1 stations now. They're national stations, so it's not like having a local Christian rock presence, but at least it's something. And if you're really desperate, there's that Southern Gospel station with the preachers during the day. :)

R.I.P, Spirit 102.3 and The Kross and Live 101.5 . You were on our station presets when you were with us. We hope now you're in a better place!