Christmas

Well my wife and I already exchanged gifts. She did a wonderful job picking out gifts that I love especially Zelda for the ds and Mario galaxies for the wii. I am excited to go home for Christmas. I do feel bad though because this will be the first time Krista has ever been away for Christmas. This is the first time I will have gone home since February I think. Yeah so it's always good to get back home and see everyone. I love Christmas but hate winter it's a pardox and no that doesn't mean two doctors (say the word paradox aloud). Well I need to go but last random thought why does it always feel icky when you put on used socks. In fact I think I would rather put on used underwear. Don't know why later.

Dumb Ideas

1. The Customer is Always Right- Whoever thought of this was definitely a boss and never did customer interaction. Sometimes people are just simply dumb and think they know what they are talking about but really have no clue. Sometimes you wish you could explain to them how dumb they are but unfortunately even though they think every channel is in HD because they have an hd tv they have to be right because they're the customer.

2. Parents just want their kids happy- What idiot thought this one up and why do so many idiots buy into it. My parents didn't want me to be happy they wanted me to grow up to do right knowing in the end that would lead to my happiness even if I didn't like it now. Warning for all who believe in this theory even though it will make them happy don't let your kids use your credit card.

Chick Filet

So we went to chick filet tonight because I burned dinner. I'm usually not a horrible cook but tonight we threw it out. The problem was I was looking for a lid to cook the vegetables and forgot to keep stiring the meet. Oh well. We got to go to chick filet instead which I enjoy a lot. I love this restraraunt because the people are so nice there. It is christian owned and I believe the managers are required to be Christians also and you can really see the difference it makes. Also, it's very clean always a plus when you got to go potty. So that's about it oh and the new ep by jon foreman is out and for sale even on itunes. I bought it but haven't listened to it much yet but it sounded good. Very slow mostly acoustic.

Switchfoot

Jon Foreman (lead singer of switchfoot) is coming out with a solo ep on Nov. 27. Three more will be released with each season also. Sounds cool should be good.

What's happened in a month

So yeah it's been forever but that's how it goes sometimes or really most of the time. So most recently my work truck was broken into and some stuff stolen. Never fun to deal with. They could have at least asked for the keys so the window didn't have to get fixed. Oh well. One of my favorite things is a dream I had. Justin Timberlake was singing to a small group of people (no I don't listen to his music). Well he did something horrible in my dream. He attempted to cover a switchfoot song. I remember when I heard it come on my first reaction in the dream was to yell out "Don't mess it up." Unfortunately he did. No one clapped afterwards and Justin was sad and I told him that it's just to hard to sing like John Foreman and he shouldn't try to cover his songs anymore. Then end and yes that is a true story. We decorated our christmas tree and my wife christmasfied the apartment and it looks very nice. That's all for now.

Poop

I stepped in poop the other day while working at someones house. I'm still not sure if it was inside the house or outside. I think the chances were better inside.

I hate making up a title

So I am just sitting here thinking, I always seem to make friends with people that are somewhat weary of churches. Not so much that they don't like church or hate it, but are very afraid of the bad that can come out of it. I wonder if maybe I am meant to work with these people. I like the ideas of churches that aren't churches. In other words they don't fit the typical stereo type of churches. Yet, there are some things about stereotypical churches that I love. I really like some of the old traditions. There's somewhat of a richness to them. I seem to be finding many people that miss tradition in the church. I went to a Catholic mass a long time ago and I found that to be one of the most beautiful things about the church. My favorite was that they kissed the Bible before opening it. There's an awe and respect in those traditions. Sometimes I feel like we are trying to be so modern that we aren't offering anything that really soothes the soul just the emotions. I hate to be hard on churches because I know they try and they honestly mean well. Jesus offered a lady living water and I feel like in the church we are going to offer her a twelve step plan of how to get that water. I know there is life in Christ and obviously certain things well help us experience that to the fullest like devotions, but I don't think there is a real plan to go by. Faith is a messy thing. It requires faith. There's no certainty of what's around the corner there's just certainty that God will be with us on the way there. I don't think the reason Jesus is so attractive is because he was happy or good looking. I think it's because he was real. The problem is that society does not want us to be real, in fact I am not sure that most people know who they really are. Most people are a made up from a mix of their friends and become around them somewhat like them. To be real though is to be vulnerable because if someone doesn't like it that means they don't really like you and not just your acting skills. If someone didn't like us or there was something we needed to change then that would be work and that's not the American way. It's so much easier just to live our lives through the telivision as though we were actually on the screen having those experiences. If we really did have them though that would require change which just wouldn't be comfortable. I remember a guy at work who would always walk by and say how ya doin and before I could respond anything besides good he was gone. My other co-worker said next time I should tell him I 'm crappy and see how he responds. Unfortunately I never did that, because that would be way out of my comfort zone, but maybe it's just time for me to get real.

Nerds

You are probably think I am going to talk about a certain sort of people well I'm not. Advertising companies always say that you have to have a great name to sell your product. Well there is proof that this is not true in the wonderful candy Nerds. I am eating them currently and thought this really isn't a great name but a great candy. You can dispute they may sell more if they they were named something cooler like Halo bites, but does the name really matter that much. There is one thing I did not want to try because of the name once though, they were squid balls from an oriental market. The taste matched the name. Now if they had called those halo bites I would have eagerly tried them. So maybe the name helps you buy the first time but it doesn't provide consistent buying. The taste does.

Brother (hospital)

Well for those of you who don't know my brother is in the hospital. We would appreciate your prayers as we aren't totally sure what will happen. His lung collapsed the other day and he went to the emergency room. He is currently in stable condition and they have put a tube in him to let air out, so it can reinflate. So far it has not inflated but it should and if it doesn't they have to perform surgery to do that. He's currently on a lot of medicine. It's just sad for me to think about this happening to him, because he's just one of those great people that you think nothing bad should ever happen to. If you've ever met him you will know what I mean by that I'm not just saying it because I am his brother. I feel confident that all will work out well, but please continue to pray.

Good bye to a Blog

Unfortunately Terry Linhart will soon be closing up shop on his current blog. As the world mourns there is a light at the end of the tunnel. He is opening a new blog focused more on his youth ministry. You can catch the new blog at http://ymerge.typepad.com/

A Swing and probably a miss at Theology

So something the other day got me thinking about the word holy and how I want to be holy. So I thought about it and I started to wonder if this was something I could gain or something that only God could give me? So a big verse on this for me is 1 Peter 1:13-16. The end thought of it "Be holy because I (meaning God) am holy." So it's something God commands (ooh scary word) us to do. Therefore (king James version?) it's something everyone should be striving for as christians. But can we make oursevles holy? When Moses comes to the burning bush he is told to take of his sandles because it is holy ground. I don't know about you but I don't think the ground can strive very hard to be holy, which leads me to believe that holiness is something God gives something or someone. Yet, the more I think of it I think it is holy only because God's presence as there and I'm not sure if it would remain holy after His presence left. So what is this holiness well in the verses mentioned above it talks about not conforming to the world but to be holy. So that leads me to think that holiness is something we can attain. Yet, when I think about the ground being holy I think that maybe we are holy because when we do those things we are closer to God. Well I'm not really sure on this, but I think it's a mix of the two. It is something that we can work at but, God still is the one putting it on us.

Wedding

My friends Andy Shaw and Amanda Fales got married this weekend. It was one of the funnest weddings I've been to besides my own. It's always great to be with a group of friends. We had a ton of fun just being us. One of my favorite moments is seeing Jonathon Bacon being the only person out on the dance floor dancing to sexy back. It puts a smile on my face every time I think about it. Bacon is probably the only one who has dance moves but the rest of us had fun trying to. My favorites are the ones from the Charlie Brown Christmas that we did along with our new Halo dances we made up. The wedding itself was beautiful and the two make a great couple. I feel privileged to have been in the wedding let alone attend it. It's another great memory to add to the books.

Are they really poor?

So I heard them talking on the radio the other day about poverty. This of course would be talk radio and I listen to it because I'm becoming old. They said something like 40% of those in poverty have cable tv. Some of you would say that's crazy not true. Let me tell you it is and I wouldn't doubt if the number was higher. Trust me I install these people every day. I actually heard someone say the other day I don't know how I'm going to get the money to buy food for my baby as she's holding an infant in her arms and I proceed to work on their cable. I feel sorry for the child and what it's being put through, but it seems to me the answer is simple. They have tv phone and internet. Get rid of the tv and internet at least and find the cheapest phone possible. There is something wrong in society when tv takes precidence over food. Apparently they would rather watch what they could eat then have it. I am all for helping out the poor in this country, but I don't think the answer is more money as government usually wants to throw at them. I think the answer is Education and Love. I've recently thought it would be really cool if the church would go hold a seminar in the poor parts of town that taught on how to spend your money wisely. Obviously there are parts where money is needed and I have no problem giving to those, but I think more importantly people need to see where they have fallen to and need someone to help them see that there is hope to get out of the mess they are in.

NES QUiZ

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/309770

I scored 1300 and it called me a newby. Oh well.

Itunes

Have you ever gone to the free download of the week on Itunes. I think it's a great thing and sure there's a lot of the music I don't like but there's some I do and I download it. Have you ever looked at the comments on this section though. Every time there are tons of people saying that Itunes needs to put up better songs for download. Is it just me or is there something wrong about complaining that you don't like the free songs. It's free. They aren't forcing you to take it. Sure it's fine you don't like it but don't complain about not liking the choices because you aren't paying for it. To me it shows the attitude of our American society. We all too much believe that we deserve something. We think that we are entitled to things that are not ours. This may be a little thing about not liking their picks but I think the attitude behind it is a big thing.

Life Change

Well I did not get accepted for the position, but I am keeping my eyes and ears open for other ones. You ever have that feeling like your life is going to drastically change over the next few years? I'm starting to feel that at the moment. I have a feeling my current surroundings will be replaced with many new faces and new goals and ambitions. I'm not really sure what to expect, but God is definitely up to something.

I got to see some old friends this weekend. It was a lot of fun. We got to play video games and talk some about old times and have fun in the new times. It has made me realize that I really miss people. I need to be more involved in peoples lives and helping them. It's the form of how I am going to do this that I am struggling with. We will see what ends up happening.

hmm

So I applied for a job at a church the other day. I am really hoping that it is going to work out because I keep feeling this huge desire to work with people in ministry again. I think this year off from the church has been really important for me though. God definitely had his hand in it and I think he is ready to move me again. This past year has helped me in many things such as:

1. Marraige- It has allowed us a lot of time to spend with each other instead of being caught up in many other things. I think the extra time has gotten us started off on the right foot.

2. Seeing others- It has helped me to see others needs and how much I really have as well as how people really do treat others.

3. My Relationship with God- It has helped me to realize that this is what I really need to make it through each day no matter what job.

Birthday

Yeah so today is my birthday, but more importantly and cooler it is my wifes birthday. That's right we have the same birthday and were born the same day about 5 hours apart. It's like were twins, but not because then we definitely wouldn't be married. I wonder how many other couples have the same birthday. Maybe we should be in the guiness book of world records or something. By the way that's a really long book title and what record did guiness set anyway.

Google Analytics

So I looked at my google analytics today and saw all the different countries where people were coming from and below it said Visits from other territories and there where 11. This freaked me out for a second. You may think why do I care if peole from other countries visit my site, well I don't I welcome them. It's just that I misread territories and thought it said terrorists.

Reason for Christianity

People always want reasons for God's existence and although this has not been well thought out my be yet, I was thinking that the fact there is not as much chaos in the world as there could be is good evidence. For instance think if all were to just live for themeselves with no concept of a higher being or a right and a wrong we would have a mass world of rampant thieves and terrorists. No one would give to others. So maybe this only proves the point that there are some rights and wrongs, but I think if you kept going deeper with that thought it would lead you to the need for some higher being.

Worship

I know that God enjoys the praise of his people so don't get me wrong, but I wonder if part of the reason we praise God is to put ourselves in our place. I think sometimes praising God helps us to realize how insignificant we can be sometimes (in a good way). I'm not saying this is the main purpose of praise but just a side thought.

Nothing

I can always think of things to post while I'm driving for work and then when I get home nothing. I think it's cause I somewhat view home as a place to shut my brain off. Anywho I heard a funny joke on tv that won't be funny because I'm typing it, but oh well. A comedian got up and they applauded and he said "thank you or as my dislexic friends say thank you" They looked at him stunned not sure what he meant and he said. "It doesn't affect speach."

Gift Cards

So we just got a gift card to send to a couple who just got married. Unfortunately, we couldn't make it to the wedding. At the bottom of the card it has a little message index and I never know what to write there. Today I finally came up with something. I wrote, "Don't spend it all in one place." Is that funny or just dumb. I'm thinking as I'm writing this that its sounding dumber and dumber but I can't really change it now. Oh well.

New Video

Hey I made a background video for churches a couple years ago and just posted it on youtube here. It starts of a little slow but gets better. This was probably my first real experience with video editing. You can see at the end I finally learned how to overlap video.

Ode to Mt. Dew

When you're feeling kind of blue
and you don't know what to do
You can drink a Mt. Dew
and you'll feel better too

The stuff that comes from heaven
In a day I will drink seven
Although the clocks still at eleven
It keeps your engine revin

It is good to feel green
when it's Mt. Dew you've seen
It will keep you cut and lean
Cause you'll jump up like a bean

Evan Almighty

I saw this movie last night and it wasn't half bad. Quite cheesy. Don't go if you're looking for laughs there aren't a ton, but there are some good themes in the movie. The one is his idea of wanting to change the world but he has no clue where to start. That's kind of where I am at currently. I would love to change the world, but how. They say one Act of Random Kindness at a time. How would you start to change the world?

Unity

Have you ever been in the midst of a crowd maybe at a concert or a rally. You can feel the energy and power of the group. Gen 11:6 talks about this how if we come together as a group we can do pretty much anything. There is strength and power in numbers, even if it not for the most righteous of causes. Think of the various churches around the earth and if they were united to stand for God what we could really do.

Helicopter

If a helicopter flies up in the air and hovers for 15 hours, then goes straight down will it land in another country or right back down at the same spot.

Missing the Church

So lately I have really been missing the church. For those of you who don't know I used to be a pastor and am currently working at comcast for the time being. Talk about a job change. I went to granger community tonight, and heard the amazingly talented Jason Miller. He had a great message on worship and not losing the beauty of it and what it is and a whole lot of other stuff, but very good. Yet, I felt myself feeling sad after leaving. Why? Because I miss the church. I miss working in it influencing people, being influenced by people. I'm scared and really excited at the idea of getting back (more excited) into a church position. I've even had some weird dreams of just missing the church but that's a whole other story. I think most of all I miss the relationships. Well pray for me and my wife and we figuere out what God wants us to do on this.

Game

I thought of a game at work the other day. A guy said that he has a zune and you can send pictures and music wirelessley. He said he often finds other people wirelessley at the mall. So we decided next time he should take a picture of himself and send it to someone in the mall and tell them to find him. It's like where's waldo.

Ipod shuffle

So since Terry Linhart said to post what our ipod shuffle I did it and this is what I got.

1. Ending of a Story by Never Ending White Lights. Bought this cause the guy did a song with switchfoot I found on the internet. Unfortunately the song wasn't on the cd. Oh well.
2. Take by Skillet.
3. Amatuer Lovers by Switchfoot. Surprised it took this long for a switchfoot song to come up.
4. If we were Lovers by All Star United. Old song but fun. It was like #1 in Japan.
5. Water Under the Bridge by Jars of Clay. They are a classic band. I would like to see them in concert again. They are just really good muscians.
6. God of Wonders by Caedmons Call.
7. Locked in a Cage by Skillet. This is a great song. Sounds wierd but great message. Their old stuff was a lot better.
8. It's all who you know by Newsboys. This was a great cd especially "lost the plot."
9. There is a River by Jars of Clay.
10. Soul Meets Body by Death Cab for Cutie. Very good musicians and good music. Jeremiah Lauber introduced me to them for which I am quite thankful. This some of my favorite styles of music.

I'm surprised more switchfoot didn't come up, thats sad. My favorite song of theirs "Life and Love and Why." It has great words and a great progression of music.

Computers

So I thought I would post ways on how to keep your computer healthy. Why? I don't really know just cause I like computers.

1. Use a virus scan but only one of them. Having two tend to conflict with each other and are both working at the same time killing processing speed. I recommend avg, because it is free and good.

2. Use a spyware scanners at least weekly. I recommend ad-aware or spybot S&D. You can use two virus scans cause unlike virus scans they are not constantly monitoring your system. They only check it when you tell it to.

3. I also like to use C Cleaner. It fixes your registry which is very important to your computer. It also cleans up cache and interenet files.

4. Have enough ram. People know this now but ram is really important.

5. Eliminate all those programs in the bottom right corner from starting up when your computer does. This can often be done in the programs options or go under the start menu and click run on the right. Then type in msconfig and hit enter. Then click the startup tab. This lists all the files that start up on your computer when you start it. Uncheck unnecessary ones so they will not start up with windows (this does not delete the program it just keeps it from starting up when you boot windows.)

6. don't download files you don't know what they are that end in ".exe" this stands for executable which will launch a program. So if you don't know what the program is and you get it in your email and looks suspicious don't download it.

7. Keep your computer cool. This is huge. A cold computer runs faster. I reccomend at least 2 times a year opening up the case taking an air duster and blowing it out. Dust makes things hot and bogs it down. Really dust the processor which should sit right about the middle of the mother board in your computer and have a fan just for it.

There's much more to do but this is a good start. If you have questions ask. Also, to avoid most of these issues you can simply buy a MAC. I don't use MAC's myself but they are nice and run very efficiently. I like PC's very much though.

Don't Expect Much

My mom told me when I was a kid that if you ever do something nice for someone don't expect anything in return. She said God woud repay me in his own way. Pretty good advice. Sometimes we take this a little far though and start doing good things for the sake of getting a reward from God. I've always had this picture of this guy trying to run around heaven with his head full of crowns for his good deeds, saying "Look at what good things I did on earth." Yeah, not really how it's supposed to work out. The goal of those crowns is to lay them at Christs feet. When you do good things, do them for Christ and expect nothing in return except the satisfaction of knowing that you have furthered the kingdom.

Thoughts from the Past

I was thinking about this summer and the various church camps that will go on. These were always a great spiritual high time in life and I think most youth and adults wonder how do we stay on that type of spiritual high. Well I'm not sure that life is meant to be completely a high as in everythings perfect but we are always supposed to stay as close to God as possible. I know the first thing that comes to mind for staying close are devotions and prayer. In other words camp is a time often we are talking and listening to God. I think part of what we lose after these camps are EXPECTATIONS. At camp we excpect God to do something great after word we just expect life to be normal. We don't expect God to meet with us at work or school. Also, the whole talking and listening to God part tends to die down or become non-existent. I know this isn't all the answer just things I've thought of. If you have any more to add please feel free to do so.

Cleanliness

I was reading something in Proverbs today that talked about how we are pure in our own eyes. I think this happens a lot in my own Christian life. I compare my life to that of non-christians and say look how much cleaner I am than them. Well duh that doesn't do me much good. I rarely compare myself to Christ because I know what the outcome will be, but then again isn't that the goal. I remember Dr. Long talking about being like Christ. He brought up the point if our goal is to be like Christ then why don't we think we can reach it. After all God said we can do all things through him who strengthens us. Do we doubt the power of God or do we doubt ourselves?

Graduation

There have been many graduations going on lately. Unfortanetly I couldn't go to many open houses cause I work during a lot of them. I have one piece of advice that was given to me by my brother when going to college. No matter what college you choose when you get there choose your friends wisely. I think this is great advice. Even if you go to a christian college you can get caught in the wrong crowd. So choose wisely. I loved Bethel and am glad for my years there and am happpy with the friends I chose. They can make or break the path you follow God on in college. Of course there are other factors too but this plays a bigger role than most realize.

Day Off

So I get Wednesday off and usually have nothing to do. I don't have a vehicle to go anywhere so I sit around, play video games, clean the place, and post on here. My wife asked me one time why guys like video games so much and it came to me. I have read John Eldridge's "Wild at heart." It's pretty good. He says how guys need adventure and at the moment she asked that I realized that for many this is our battlefield. This is our adventure where we go and save the princess (In my case Zelda right now "Twilight Princess"). I really am not anti-video games but I wonder what danger this could cause by living out false realities and not having our own personal adventures. I remember people always saying don't play video games play a board game and get to know people. I don't think they realize though how many people we meet playing video games. Now often interaction won't go much past the game but there have been instances where I have made friends over them. Certain games are made for interaction like many on the Wii. I like this system a lot because it has cleaner games and is active and fun for any age. Ok done rambling. I'll post something better soon.

Back to Creation

So I've kind of had this discussion with some friends and I'm a little confused as to what to think on this. If you have any help out there let me know. We have talked about the fall of man and how before it was perfect. Some suggested that we should attempt in our current fallen state to retract back to perfection as best as possible. That all sounds well and good but I'm really wondering how close to that picture we can really get since we are fallen. Are there certain things that we just cannot do anymore since we have fallen (obviously communication with God is different and perfections out of the picture)? So often I think of this perfection as doing everything right but I think it is a lot more than that. A lot of what needs to change is our mindset. We don't look at the world the same and even more so we don't look at God the same. I think this is what Romans 12:1-2 is talking about in the renewing of our mind. It's a whole different outlook on life. A lot of this stemmed from a friend who saw art in a library that was rather questionable. Before the fall a naked body was normal and now it is not. It is things like that and others that I'm not sure we go back to being like before the fall. It is hard to unknow that you are naked. I don't want to limit God in what he can do but I think there are consequences to sin and some may be unreversible.