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Apr 30, 2006
the heretic I'm a bad Christian, I guess. I'm supposed to like Contemporary Christian Music. I don't. I'm supposed to like the Left Behind Series. I don't. I was supposed to like The Passion of the Christ. I didn't. And now, I'm supposed to be all up in arms over The Davinci Code. I'm not. Apparently this book poses a big threat to us. For the life of me I can't figure out why. Since I'm supposed to be preparing for the big threat before the movie comes out, I bought the book and tried to read it. I made it about 50 pages. Man it's a terrible book. And I'm not talking about the claims about Christianity that were made. I didn't make it that far into the book. Anyway, here's the jist of it, if I have heard correctly. Apparently, Christians have been lying about the bachelorhood of Jesus over all of these millenia. Jesus apparently hooked up with Mary Magdalene and had some kids. This bloodline still exists today, and there is this secret society of art scholars that hold the keys to this secret. Aparently there are four of them that know this secret and they all get killed off. First of all, I just want to say that 24 totally ripped that off this season. Secondly, the Mary M./Jesus thing has been done before. There's nothing original here. Third, why would a secret society form to a. keep the knowledge alive and b. keep it a secret. I guess that gets explained later in the book. I can't imagine it being interesting, however. Regardless of all of that stuff, here is my point: why are people so worried about this. So, it isn't true. And, he claims to base it on "historical research." The thinking is that people are going to watch this movie and have their views of Jesus/Christianity/Religon/Whatever else shaped by this. Christianity as we know it is going to colapse over this. Maybe that's a bit overstated, but here's the thing: I remember a few years back when Passion came out, and it was billed as that "greatest evangelistic oppertunity ever." And guess what, it wasn't. People barely even talk about it anymore. The fact is, movies really don't affect us as much as people want to believe they do. So some people may watch the Davinci Code. They may even have questions. Some people may even initially buy into the sensationalism of the event, and profess to belive some of these claims. But, this movie will NOT have any long term effect. It will come and go, like most other films. I just hope the movie is better than Left Behind. posted
by Unknown @ 11:16:00 PM Apr 26, 2006 the momentum shift I still don't get momentum. But, it seems to get me. Tonight I taught at FOCUS. Over the past few times I've taught, my teaching has raised to a new level. I don't say that to pat myself on the back or anything. It's just part of a shift that I've been aware of. I've been fairly comfortable speaking in public for a while, but I haven't been as confident as a teacher. As my confidence as a teacher builds, I've noticed a shift in my teaching style. It's kind of fun to be able to tangibly see yourself grow. Anyway, something I've heard from veteran teachers is that when you are going to teach on a certain topic, you will be tested in that area throughout the week. I haven't really expirenced that to this point, at least not in a sense that I was aware of it. And, that wasn't so much the case today. However, since I was assigned this topic over a month ago, I've really had a feeling that this message was going to be important (I was teaching on James 3:1-12, taming of the toungue.) As the time has gone on, I became more and more excited about this night. And it's not like it's a fun topic to teach on. But, I felt that it was going to be a key night. And, throughout the day, there was a lot that convinced me that tonight was going to be important. Because, while I was not tested on taming of the tongue, I got a severe beatdown in the spirtual warfare department. As I stated last post, momentum was really good over the last week. This morning that ended. Pretty much first thing in the morning. I walked out to my car, and I noticed some glass next to it. As I wondered why there was glass next to it, I noticed my rear passenger side window was busted. I looked inside, only to find that the only thing missing was a crockpot. That's right, someone busted my window to take a crockpot. Not my cd player. Not my cds. Not the 5-10 dollars worth of change in there. Just the crockpot. And, then there were little things, such as a copier jamming, spilling water all over my pants, and dumb stuff like that. But then, another biggie. I can't go into details, but I'll just sum it up by saying that maybe I should start looking into a new job. Something to pray about. On top of that, I didn't get a chance to eat lunch, so by the time I got home, I was really hungry and really weak. So I started eating. Only, because I was so hungry, I ended up eating too much, which made me kind of sick. So, I take a 30 min nap, and when I got up, I was a bit cranky and wasn't feeling too well. The thing is, I was convinced that Satan was trying to stop me. Which fueled the fire. So, I got to the church and took care of a couple of details, and then went to do my runthrough. Whenever I speak at FOCUS, I always go down into the toddler room and do 2 practice runs. So, I do the first practice run, and it goes pretty well, other than a rough spot toward the beginning. So, then I go upstairs and take a break. I go back down to do my second runthrough, but I stop and pray for a few minutes. Here's the thing: I'm not really good at prayer. Seriously, I'm not. I'm just 14 months removed from writing a post about how I wasn't praying anymore because I don't know how. I'm still not much better at it. But this prayer was one of those where every word flowed like I was reading it right out of Shakespear (not with the Victorian language or anything like that.) Some people have a spiritual gift for prayer. I don't, but for this moment, I had a spiritual giftcard for prayer. It was pretty amazing. So, I go and do my second runthrough, and after I made it through the part where I had stuggled earlier, I stopped. I felt at peace, that I was ready. So, I went upstairs. As the service started, we started having glitches left and right. We had trouble with the audio on a video. There were some worship cues that got missed. It was several things right in a row. So, as it came time for the teaching, I felt that the battle was on. So, I paused, and shared much of the story that I am chronicling here. And then, I led the group in prayer, for God to seize the night. Again, it was like I still had some balance left on my spiritual giftcard, because it flowed so well. After that, I went into the teaching time. It's hard to gague how these things go. Sometimes it seems like a disaster but people connect. Sometimes it seems like you are on the top of your game and it connects with nobody. At a service that late, body language can be difficult to read. With that said, my thoughts are this: I think it went so well that I wish I had done better. What I mean is this: the vibe I got from the room told me that people were engaged. I had their attention like I've never had it before. And while what I said was good, with that kind of engagment, I wish I had said more, expounded better, and so on. Then again, one of my prayers over and over was for God to edit my message, to make it His, and for me in this role to be like my role in my job--to simply deliver the message. At work, I don't write the mail. I only deliver it. So, while it's hard to trust the human element of preaching, I am convinced that what I taught tonight was what I was supposed to teach. It was an important night. Our attendance was the highest of the quarter after a steady decline. I'm convicned the message was an important one. And the fact that so much had to be overcome to pull it off makes it more rewarding. What struck me the most in all of this is this acute awareness of the spiritual realities of what was going on. And it's something that has hit me in two other services, on I was the worship leader in those, not the teacher. I keep feeling like something major is going to happen. I don't know how, because I don't have gifts of prophecy. All of this adds up to what Tommy and I were discussing at the end of the night . . . God is awesome, and I still suck. Which makes it even cooler that I get to be involved. posted
by Unknown @ 11:44:00 PM Apr 24, 2006 physics and the like I don't understand momentum. I understand the concept in terms of motion. I just don't understand it in the metaphorical sense. Take sports as an example. When a team has momentum, they become unstoppable. They can't make a bad play. And the other team can't buy a break. Things go like that until momentum shifts. Then the other team can do no wrong. It's an interesting concept. Sometimes in life we seem to gain momentum. Or lack it. I'm sure it wasn't too long ago where I wrote a post about the lack of momentum in my life. Right now, I'm on a hot streak. Work is going well. School is going well. I'm on a hot streak. And I can't figure out why. I don't think I'm doing anything differently. If I am doing anything differently, I'm not doing it better. Some of my best performances at work have been situations where the end result was not a positive one. It's just that the hole was too deep, and even a great digging effort couldn't get me out. So maybe I'm just in an area where all of the holes are shallow. Which brings me to my point: how does momentum shift like that. why does everything go work one week and everything right the next? Why isn't it more even. And I don't mean that in the sense of why can't things be more even to make my life more complicated. Rather, I just can't make sense of the whole concept. posted
by Unknown @ 11:07:00 PM Apr 19, 2006 it beats getting a job I think I am going to write a book. Will you buy it if I do? If I can get at least 10 people to pledge to buy it, I think I may write it. posted
by Unknown @ 11:37:00 PM Apr 18, 2006 there's a little hal lindsey in all of us Ever since the turn of the century, with all of the years being low numbers, each year we have been bombarded with these really "neat" sequences of date and time that will "only occur once in our lifetime." For example, this year, on April 5th just after 1:02am, it was 01:02:03 on 04/05/06. That won't happen for another 100 years. Today I saw a shirt from last year, commemorating 05/05/05. Of course, this one also won't happen for another 100 years, but this one has a counterpart that will occur until December 12th, 2012. Of course, on June 6th this years version will occur. However, this time, it will mean the APOCOLYPSE!!!!!!!! That's right, think about it. 06/06/06. Remove the zeros, and you know what you get. In fact, I think that it will occur just after 6:06am, you know, 06:06:06. SO PLEASE!!!!!! get out there and get some duct tape and plastic, you know, for your windows. You need to be prepared. I think the worst part is that this means that I am going to miss World Jump Day. posted
by Unknown @ 11:05:00 PM Apr 17, 2006 wanting in Over the past few weeks, much ado has been given to the immigration legislation before Congress. I haven't followed it closely, so I don't know all of the details, other than it's going to be harsher on illegal aliens. Through it all, I have heard much on where I should or shouldn't stand on this bill based on the fact that I am Christian. Most of the arguments are in fact valid, depending on what aspect of our moral code one wishes to interpret this issue from. As I said during a panel discussion that I was a part of a few weeks ago, one of the difficult things is trying to figure out how to be a Christian in a democracy. The bible was written in a totalitarian society, so the way a citizen (or non-citizen in a lot of cases) dealt with the state is different. And I think that may affect how we deal with certain issues. Anyway, that's something to get into some other time. My point is simply this: sometimes these political issues aren't so cut and dried. All of that to say this: I'm not giving the definative "Christian" prespective here. Nor am I giving the answer to all of this. I just want to say one thing that bothers me, and I hope at least on some level it bothers everyone, regardless of what your final conclusion on the issue is. The thing that bothers me: You never hear of illegal immigrants from Canada. It's something we never think about, because it's something that is so natural to us. We all know why . . . any Canadian can come into the US without much difficulty. In fact, up until 9/11, a very large section of the US/Canadian border was ungarded. You could go back and forth as easily as someone around here can go back and forth from Kentucky to Ohio. Even with heightened security, it's still pretty easy to get back and forth. The southern border of the country is much different. I have been to Mexico 3 times on mission trips, each time to the same border town. While there, I spent a great deal of time talking to a man named Abner Castillio. I learned quite a bit on many different subjects from Abner. His grandfather had recieved resident alien status many years ago, and because of that Abner also has resident alien status. One day, Abner talked to a few of us about how difficult it is for most Mexicans to gain legal status. Basically, it's almost impossible for someone to do this by completly legal means. It is a long, drawn out, beaurocratic process that has little chance of suceeding. However, if you make it over here illegaly and then apply over here, the process is quite simple and has a much better chance of suceeding. What bothers me is this double standard: Canadians have no problem moving back and forth. Mexicans have the deck stacked against them. Why? I can think of only 2 reasons. The first, Xenophobia. While I have little doubt this is a factor in some way, I doubt that it is THE reason. Regardless, It would take an entire post to break this down properly. The second reason, and I think the more likely one, is that of economics. Canadians have money, so they have access. Mexicans don't, so they don't have access. The United States used to be called the land of oppertunity. People would immigrate here for a chance of making a better life. Most of our ancestors came over here for these reasons. As we have become more affluent, we don't seem to value this as part of our identity anymore. So, what bothers me is that so much of you immigration laws are based on wealth and poverty. What does this mean to the immigration legislation. I don't know. Like I said, these things are very this simple. But, these are the thoughts that race through my head. posted
by Unknown @ 7:02:00 PM Apr 14, 2006 the comeback kid This blog will return from hiatus on April 17, 2006, sometime before 24. Spread the word. Mark your calendar. And, until then, in the words of Mr. T., "Don't gimme no jibber jabber." posted
by Unknown @ 1:12:00 AM |
