Ribs anyone?

Looking for some BBQ pork ribs that'll make you drop to your knees, raise both your hands, and thank the Lord for creating pigs?! Visit the Blues City Cafe in the heart of downtown Memphis, Tennessee!!! I'm still licking my fingers!!! I just can't figure out why every time I try to cook ribs they end up tasting like dry tar on a hollow bone. Anyways, these guys at Blues City Cafe in Memphis have indeed perfected the art!! They are the Mozart of rib cooking! The Picasso of BBQ! The Michael Jordan of the grill! The Michael Vick of the ..... oh....... oops.

HUNKA-HUNKA BURNIN' LOVE!

I may never recover from this one. Yes..... I went to Graceland........ willingly. I'm not sure what it was. I mean we had to pass through Memphis! I guess I figured since we were so close we just needed to go ahead and take the plunge! I mean, what could it hurt, right? 

Well, let me just say, if Branson, Missouri is known as the Redneck Riviera then Graceland must be Hillbilly Hotel. Don't get me wrong..... I love Elvis! I really do! This sin't about Elvis Presley. It's just very interesting to me the demographic of people who compose the vast majority of what I lovingly refer to as Graceland-grazers! They can be described by the following bulletpoints:

• Over 50.
  
• White.
  
• Brightly colored shirt made of at least 75% polyester.
  
• Dark socks with sandals.
  
• Oversized Camera hanging from strap around neck.
  
• Oversized Fanny-pack hanging from waist.
  
• Oversized fanny hanging from body.
  
• A hat that appears to be way to big for the cranium it houses.
  
• Breathing through the mouth in amazement as they stare at the jungle room.
  
• A look of awe whenever they see any of Elvis' white ceramic monkeys.

I guess I had fun. It definitely wasn't boring. No more boring than it would be walking around Saturn as you watched hundreds of native Saturnites tour the planet with you. I'm not making fun of people like this. I just feel really out of place when I'm around hundreds of them! Besides.... I wonder what Elvis would think if he knew thousands of fanny-pack armed fans were shuffling through the hallways of his Memphis home each day taking pictures of his parent's bed. WOW! We humans can be a weird sort.

GOD Bless Oklahoma City

During the McMahon trek to Georgia Heather and I visited The Oklahoma City Memorial in downtown Oklahoma City. I wasn't expecting to be as moved by this experience as I was!

I can still remember watching the events of that day take place on the news when I was in the 11th grade. A federal building in Oklahoma City had been destroyed by a massive homemade bomb of fertilizer and explosives hidden away in a Ryder truck. 168 people had been killed in the worst act of domestic terrorism to date. Many were children who had been in the day care on the 2nd floor. The Ryder truck had been parked right in front of the day care just before it exploded. It would later be discovered that Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols were the mastermind of this evil plot.

What would cause someone to plan something so wicked and sinister? Even if he was acting in retaliation against the government why would he plan to kill innocent people? 

As I toured the museum and walked the memorial yard with my wife I felt as if this memorial stood not simply to honor those killed but also to remind all of us that there is real evil in this world. Satan and the demons are real. Their plots and hierarchy are cunning and insidious. The destruction they cause is dark.

Light does overcome darkness, however. One day Satan will finally be destroyed. Jesus Christ has defeated the devil through His magnificent work on the cross. And, as Revelation tells us, every tear shall one day be wiped away..... forever.

My New Favorite Song!!

I have decided that my new favorite song until further notice is "Society" by Eddie Vedder. It was on the Into The Wild soundtrack. I actually posted a blog a long time ago on this page about what I thought about the book Into The Wild and how it impacted me. This song by Eddie Vedder expresses the heart of this book and Chris McCandless amazingly. I highly suggest you download the song from i-tunes right now and then listen to it while reading the lyrics. You can google them. Then comment this blog and let me know how it spoke to you!!!!!

Red Rocks of Sedona

Along our journey headed east we stopped in Sedona, Arizona. Honestly, I had never heard of this place before but when we got there I wondered why! Sedona is famous for the blazing red sandstone formations most famously known as the Red Rocks of Sedona. As I toured Sedona I felt like I was a gun-slinging character right out of 3:10 to Yuma. 

We took a trolly ride tour through Sedona and for about 3/4 of the tour we were the only people on it! As we sat in the trolly on wheels with the jackalope head hanging from the rear-view window speeding through Sedona I felt happy. It's moments like these you don't get too often.

I'm trying to learn to slow down and enjoy the simple moments in life. A bumpy ride in a Sedona trolly. A moment standing in front of a giant red rock towering high above the ground like an indian warrior. A moment talking with our New Age tour guide about how long she's lived there and why she believes that Sedona's mighty red rocks have magical vortex power. I've been reflecting recently on how the passing moments of life are gifts that we will never get back. Once they are gone they are gone forever. So as the famous line from The Shawshank Redemption goes, "Get busy living, or get busy dying."

I don't believe that the mighty red rocks of Sedona have magical vortex power. But I do believe the One who made those rocks is mighty indeed.

The Grand Canyon

On the way from California to Georgia, Heather and I were able to stop at the Grand Canyon. Actually it was about 70 miles out of the way but how do you pass up the Grand Canyon?!

As we pulled up to the south rim we couldn't help to drop our jaws and say "sheeesh". I think we stopped on the perfect day! The sky was clear, the air was crisp, the sun was bright, and the colors of the canyon catapulted from the cliffs like a fire! We must have stood there for ages as we took in the beauty. After the obligatory picture in front of the majestic canyon we walked across the street to the gift shop to buy our daughter something. While we were in there I saw a book for sale on the shelf called DEATH IN THE CANYON. It was a book about hundreds of people who have died in the canyon. It was the actual stories of what happened! From suicides to drownings in the river to hiking accidents to everything else!! I decided not to buy this for my daughter and instead opted for the Grand Canyon building blocks.

I wonder what it must have been like for the first men who discovered that gigantic hole in the earth. I wonder how long it took them to grasp the beauty of what they were beholding. I wonder if any of them found it possible to be an atheist after seeing it? But most of all I couldn't shake this nagging thought............ I wonder how many people have accidentally dropped their expensive digital cameras in it?

Journeying On

What a ride it's been over the past few months. The LORD has been up to some serious stuff in the life of the McMahon fam! After much prayer, struggling and wrestling HE confirmed to us that the next season of our life was to be spent ministering to students in the Hotlanta area at 12Stone Church. WHAT?! SERIOUSLY?! Honestly we never saw this coming. Once we finally got up the nerve to be obedient and put the house on Novi Drive on the market the LORD showed us how serious HE was about this. 36 hours later a lady wanted to buy our house for cash in a market that's as dead as a Kansas City Royals Baseball game in the middle of September.

After a transition that turned out to be pretty emotional for a plethora of reasons, we pulled out of California with the G.P.S. system programmed for the big GA. As we crossed over the California/Arizona border somewhere near Needles at dusk we wondered if we'd ever return to this sunny state we knew as home for a little over 5 years. I guess the Father only knows. Now as we begin a new journey we feel like kids going on their first roller coaster ride at a theme park. A little scared. A lot of excitement. And an incredible desire to enjoy every moment of it, one day sitting with good friends and Bible heroes of old being able to tell them, "Dude....check out what we did!!"