Sitting on the bus, just getting holy
Sorry for not writing over the past few days but I have been traveling. I got to go to a meeting of pastors and elders in our denomination. It was a great time and I got to meet several more people interested in partnering with us on our adventure. Now I am studying for my Old Testament final. I have to quote the professor of my course as I find it so enlightening but also very funny:
Holiness is not contagious. That’s a principle. It does not happen automatically. You can’t accidentally get holy. You can’t say, ‘I don’t know what happened…I was sitting on the bus next to this guy with a reverse collar –he must have been a priest or something–and when I got off the bus, I was less sinful.’ It just does not work that way…there has to be a transformation of you.
–Dr. Stuart
This is a problem we have in the Church today. People say, “Well, I went to church.” But are their lives changing. Just sitting, going through motions does not bring you closer to God. It’s taking the truth and making it a part of your life that brings you closer to God. I’m not saying this to discourage anyone from doing just that but more to say to the Church about what it is we are doing. Are we speaking the truth in ways that a person going through the motions will hear and want to transform their lives? If they are in the church going through the motions, its obvious that they are somewhere in their hearts searching for that way to get closer to God but are we meeting them to help them along their journey.
Are we the church going to just sit next to a person who is spiritually wanting, never reaching out to them but just content to have them in the church building?
Alex is growing up too fast
I have to say that my son is growing up way too fast. Like many other parents, I am sitting here remembering when Alex was born; how we held him so. Today however, he lost his first tooth. My boy is growing up. Tonight the tooth fairy is going to show up and he’ll get a quarter in exchange for his tooth. Luckily, he thinks a quarter is a lot of money. Now he is trying to knock out his other teeth. Yes, he’s my son.
MODERN-TIME MAXIMS FOR THE INTERNET AGE
~ Home is where you hang your @.
~ The e-mail of the species is more deadly than the mail.
~ A journey of a thousand sites begins with a single click.
~ You can’t teach a new mouse old clicks.
~ Great groups from little icons grow.
~ Speak softly and carry a cell phone.
~ C:\ is the root of all directories.
~ Don’t put all your hypes in one homepage.
~ Pentium wise; pen and paper foolish.
~ The modem is the message.
~ Too many clicks spoil the site.
~ The geek shall inherit the earth.
~ A chat has nine lives.
~ Don’t byte off more than you can view.
~ Fax is stranger than fiction.
~ What boots up must come down.
~ Virtual reality is its own reward.
~ Modulation in all things.
~ A user and his leisure time are soon parted.
~ There’s no place like http://www.home.com.
~ Know what to expect before you connect.
~ Oh, what a tangled Web we weave when first we practice.
~ Speed thrills.
~ Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach him to use the Net and he won’t bother you for weeks.
Special thanks to Mikey’s Funnies for this humor today.
What is this?
Sorry for no post yesterday. I had hoped that I would have been able to post something about the Carolina Panthers football team going to the Super Bowl but that was not to be. So I left yesterday empty as a kind of moment of silence.
Today as I am still in a football mourning stage, I just wanted to babble about things that come into my head like “Is light a particle or a wave?” (Sorry to those of you that don’t know about this great debate – research it and stay up at night thinking about as I do). Oh, I did come to a conclusion though – Yes. (For those of you that know Boolean logic).
I also wonder how some things are invented. I know Post-It notes were an experiment gone bad. They tried to make the next great adhesive but it didn’t work. Then they figured out that it sticked just good enough but didn’t leave residue or make a permanent bond and 3M said, “Wow, that would be great on little pieces of paper.”
But how did spandex get invented? And why? Could they de-invent it?
I also wonder how people don’t get excited in reading Scripture. I mean, I was reading tonight about how when the Israelites were lost in the desert, God provided food from heaven on a daily basis. The Israelites called this food manna. You know what manna means – “What is this?” because that’s what they said when they saw it. (Exodus 16:15) For the longest time, I thought manna might mean something like “Gift from Heaven” or “Food from Heaven” or “God giveth” or something profound. But no, it was just the Israelites response as God provided for them on a daily basis and their response - “What is this?” I guess if you live with miracles every day like living through the plagues, parting of the Red Sea, following a cloud/tower of fire around the desert, then some nice food falling from heaven every day (except the Sabbath but the food was doubled up the day before) is no big deal.
It reminds me of that old candy bar – “Whatchamacallit”. Which makes me think – How did they invent chocolate? Never mind but I just want to say “Thank you!!!!”
Tailoring your web experience
From Yahoo.com –> Tailor made for you – RSS
Did you ever wonder why I have all those button across the bottom on the website? What is that orange “XML” or “RSS” box on all these websites anyway?
RSS stands for Real Simple (or Standard) Syndication. That means that the content from those websites is put into a special format that can be imported into other websites or things call RSS Aggregators.
This technology allows you to monitor the content of a multitude of websites all on a single page. This is such a growing technology, that the next version of Windows (“Vista”) is going to have RSS reading capabilities built into it.
Personally, I use “My Yahoo” as my RSS Aggregator. That means on a single page, I can see the headlines from my favorite bloggers (Write some more djchuang!!), the latest photos uploaded from Ken Liu, what is shipping next from our Netflix queue, and the sermons from my home church, Lake Forest, and our sister church Warehouse 242. Anytime I see a headline that I am interested in, I just click on it and it takes me right to that post on the website.
So if you are a person that goes web surfing and finds a site that you really like – instead of adding it to your “favorites”, add the RSS or XML feed to your Aggregator so you not only know about the website, but can see instantly if there are any new articles that are worth reading/hearing/or viewing.
Read the article from Yahoo to learn even more about this way of experiencing the web.
Ice Cream is good for the soul
I saw this “joke” and said that this is totally something my son, Alex, would say and do. Enjoy
ICE CREAM IS GOOD FOR THE SOUL
Last week I took my children to a restaurant. My six-year-old son asked if he could say grace. As we bowed our heads, he said, “God is good. God is great. Thank you for the food, and I would even thank you more if mom gets us ice cream for dessert. And liberty and justice for all! Amen!”
Along with laughter from the other customers nearby, I heard a woman remark, “That’s what’s wrong with this country. Kids today don’t even know how to pray. Asking God for ice cream! Why, I never!”
Hearing this, my son burst into tears and asked me, “Did I do it wrong? Is God mad at me?” As I held him and assured him that he had done a terrific job and God was certainly not mad at him, an elderly gentleman approached the table. He winked at my son and said, “I happen to know that God thought that was a great prayer.”
“Really?” my son asked.
The man replied, “Cross my heart.”
Then in a theatrical whisper the gentleman added (indicating the woman whose remark had started this whole thing), “Too bad she never asks God for ice cream. A little ice cream is good for the soul sometimes.”
Naturally, I bought my kids ice cream at the end of the meal. My son stared at his for a moment and then did something I will remember the rest of my life.
He picked up his sundae and without a word walked over and placed it in front of the woman. With a big smile he told her, “Here, this is for you. Ice cream is good for the soul sometimes, and my soul is already good.”
- Thanks to MikeysFunnies.com
The Winter Olympics are coming
Is anyone else out there really excited that we are only a few more days away from the Winter Olympics? I lived in Minnesota for eight years as a child so the Winter Olympics have always been more special to me than the Summer Olympics. I remember watching the American hockey team beat the Russian hockey team in 1980 and then going to the Hockey Hall of fame to only watch it a couple more times with my dad. We weren’t die hard hockey fans but the Olympics move people to be fans of sports they would not normally watch.
Why is it that we get so excited watching the Jamacian Bobsledding team? Or when we see a skier have a huge fall only to get gold two days later in another event? I think we see in these athletes a determination that we sometimes don’t feel in our own lives. That they have a purpose and they go for it. Many times we don’t know what our goals are or what purpose we have in our lives. The irony is that we were all created with a purpose in mind. Our Creator didn’t just create us to exist!!! He created us for a purpose. Each of us has a specific purpose in this world (actually, multiple purposes over time). No one’s is more important than another’s but they are all different; unique.
Is your purpose to be the best parent to your child? Is your purpose to be a friend to the one lonely person in the school cafeteria? Is your purpose to do that something special for the homeless? Is your purpose to walk through life with your friend who was just diagnosed with cancer? Is your purpose to find out more about Jesus Christ?
Seek out your purpose!!!