Monday, March 31, 2008

What Is A Saint?

The other day I was reading about a guy named Ambrose Bierce, a writer in the late 19th century. In his writings he would use words in different ways to be funny, ah how the 19th century writers were amusing.

Anyway, he redefined the word "saint" one day to be this: A dead sinner, revised and edited.

Now that seemed interesting to me. I know what he was going for, saints are simply people who died, but once dead their stories were made to be much better and they were venerated. Yeah, okay, but think about it. If Christ has made us new, aren't all of us who follow Christ technically saints, and aren't all our stories "revised and edited"?

I hope so, it's the only chance I have!

II Cor. 5:17 ~ This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! (NLT)

T

Saturday, March 29, 2008

Quote Of The Day

Was reading my Bible this morning and this line just made me laugh. It's in II Kings, Israel had just been taken by the Assyrians and ceases to exist as a kingdom. The writer is talking about how the sins of Israel caused this catastrophe, then he says this:

They worshipped useless idols and became useless themselves.

I don't know why, but that line just seemed awesome to me. But then I really started thinking, how often do we do that here and now? Do we have any useless idols that are making us useless (I mean, I can think of a few, and most of them hook up to a TV in some way...)?

It's a tough question, but a valid one. What are you spending time with that is useless, and thereby making you useless...?

T

Thursday, March 27, 2008

If You Can't Say Something Nice...

It's an old cliche. I still remember where I first heard it, Bambi. Thumper's mom ingrained it into him so much that he was able to quote it. "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."

So why bring that up? Well, I talked to a high school student today that I won't name who doesn't attend our church at all. But somehow or another people in our student ministry thought it would be okay to talk about them behind their back... at one of our student ministry events...

You know, I understand that not everyone is perfect and we're all trying to be better, but this does sadden me when someone who doesn't know God and sees the church as a joke, yet is still willing to talk with me, has this happen to them. It's simply not right. I don't know who said it, they didn't want to tell me their name (which shows you what kind of class they have), but come on people, let's try a little harder, please. We're supposed to have Christ in our lives, His Holy Spirit living within us, and God is many times in the Bible simply defined as love. Let's all try to be a little more loving...

Beloved, let us love one another. For anyone that loves is born of God and knows God. He who doesn't love, cannot know God for God is love. ~ I John 4:7-8

Monday, March 24, 2008

We Have It So Easy

Today I was listening to the international news, something that's seems harder and harder to do here in America, and I realized just how easy we have it. I heard about problems with China and it's treatment of people in Tibet, plus worried people in Taiwan over the same problems. I read at theworld.org about drug trafficking in Mexico being such a problem the army has been called in, about Mgabe still trying to hold onto power in Zimbabwe and rigging elections, all sorts of things people deal with in our world. And what's one of our top news stories on AOL? Miley Cyrus telling a paparazzi that he's bugging her.

Wow, do we ever have it rough...

T

Easter Blahs

Yesterday was Easter, an amazing day that I am incredibly thankful for, but here's my question. Did it seem blah to you? Lorie had been saying all week how it didn't "feel" like Easter, and then at church people seemed really, really out of it (there wasn't a whole lot of singing going on), it was hard to keep my mind in the sermon, and then after I really did little than sit around. Did anyone else feel this?

T

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Real World, Day 2

It's really late, but here's the highlights. We didn't get to a service we had planned to attend today, we got lost (apparently there's an E East Street and a S East Street, not confusing at all...), we ate lots of pasta which was waaaaay better than the last time we had pasta here, and Stephen Myrick has the quote of the day. "If you walked a day in the life of my shoes..." Glad to see college is making an impact on the young man.

T

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Real World, Day 1

Well, today is the first full day of Real World. We all started last night, but that doesn't really count, it's fun and all, but this morning at 6:45 is when the real fun began. Everyone got to school, that's good, and everyone got home from school, which is also good. Right now Justin and Adam are cooking dinner. Tacos never seemed so complicated. It may have had something to do with the marathon games of pool and PIG, but who knows.

I also got a taste of the real world today too, my basement flooded last night. One of the sump pumps stopped working, how wonderful. Thanks to Milt and Noah for all their hard work today. Thankfully, it's all fixed and nothing irreplaceable was lost.

If anything, we got the message that being prepared is a good thing. Lorie and I had almost everything off the floor, at least all the stuff we cared about. All we lost was an empty box and something that didn't fit the house anyway, so no big loss.

More news from Real World forthcoming :)

T

Monday, March 17, 2008

Sorry It Was So Long

Sorry to everyone about the Stations Of The Cross being so long last night. We really did not expect it to go so long and a big apology to those who had to leave early.

Also, we didn't get a chance to talk with everyone since it went so long. We'd still love to hear from you, what you thought of it, what you liked, didn't like, etc. There's a section in the discussion board for Sunday Night Conversations, post in there and let's hear from you :)

T

Friday, March 14, 2008

What If God Actually Showed Up?

The other day I was reading one of my favorite stories in the Bible. I'm going to paraphrase, but if you want to see it, it's in I Kings 8.

King David has died and his son Solomon his now king. Now David had wanted to build God a home since for hundreds of years God had been moved around in a tent, otherwise known as the Tabernacle. But God said David couldn't do it, instead Solomon would get to. So Solomon does, and he goes all out (remember, he's basically building the first church, the one where God is going to live with the Ark of the Covenant, all that fun stuff). He builds this great big temple and on the day of dedication prays a prayer that God will come in and live here.

But this is where it gets crazy. He prays, the priests put the Ark in, then God shows up, and I mean physically. A cloud of smoke shows up and fills the temple (kind of like the cloud that led the Israelites in the desert with Moses). In fact, the presence of God is so strong, the service has to be stopped and all the priests go outside, basically letting God settle into His new home.

I always wonder why that doesn't happen every Sunday in every church. I've heard so many pastors pray that God would show up to their church service, what would happen if God really did show up, a big cloud of smoke, and messed up all our plans? What if God came down so strong that we had to leave because of the presence of God?

Something to think about, and maybe hope and pray for a little taste of this Sunday at church...

T

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

New Sins

Sorry I didn't post all weekend. My dad was here (well, he still is, he's leaving in a bit though).

But this morning, this caught my eye. I think most people have heard of the seven deadly sins. Apparently the Vatican is adding three more. Pollution, mind damaging drugs and genetic experiments. They also put a lot of emphasis on social justice. Basically from what I read they were trying to make people see that not all sins are as self-involved as the old list (they were all things that really only effected you, how you felt, etc. where this list is how your sins hurt others).

It also got me thinking how well we in North America did on the original seven, not great, and how we're doing on the new ones, maybe even worse...

T

Friday, March 07, 2008

A Day Of Rest

So here's one for you history buffs. This day, almost 1700 years ago (321 AD) Constantine I was emperor of Rome. On this day he decreed that the "dies Solis Invicti" (translated, the Sun Day) would be a day of rest for the entire empire.

And we managed to reverse that in only 1700 years...

btw, my dad's coming to visit this weekend. Make sure you say "hi"!

T

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

Hexapus

No, it's not a spelling mistake, they've actually discovered a hexapus, or an octopus with six legs.

http://news.aol.com/story/_a/worlds-first-six-legged-octopus-found/20080304092309990002?ncid=NWS00010000000001

Isn't it amazing that with all our technology and everything we think we know we're still discovering new creatures that God made, and not little ones either, a hexapus!

T

Monday, March 03, 2008

That Desperate For Friends?

This weekend we had the 30 Hour Famine. Numbers aren't in yet, but the eleven people who participated did great, including helping out at our food pantry for a few hours (which was lots of fun on empty stomachs).

But today I was reading the news as I usually do online,. picking out the stories that look interesting, and two seemed to go together so I had to read them. Apparently some people just really, really need friends. What started it was the story about Scarlett Johanssen auctioning off tickets to go to a movie with her. Alright, I can give her that, all the money's going to charity. But the bigger one is Paris Hilton. She's the queen of reality TV alright, but here's her new show idea that supposedly is coming. It's to find a best friend. From AOL:

"Rumor also has it that the socialite will be starring in a new reality show where girls will compete to be her new best friend. Hmmm -- can't wait to see how many people this show attracts."

I mean, really. Are we that desperate?

Gal. 1:10b ~ If pleasing people were my goal, I would not be Christ’s servant.

T