Christmas 3

Visiting my dear sister's home -- the one that her husband prepared for her to join him in this past summer -- is always pleasant because so many things inside of it are as they should be. It is inspiring!

My dear sister's home has a floor area on the order of 450 square feet, yet she was better able to host her eight Christmas guests on Christmas day than were our nearby relatives who's home has a floor area on the order of 3000 square feet (and greater ceiling height).

Amazing is the cumulative force of all of the correct relationships between the people and things inside of that home. If you have experienced such a thing, you probably know what it is that I have been describing. If not, perhaps you'll know it when you see it.

On Tuesday I did go for a walk with my mother and I did pack up all of my things and I did drive from my parent's home to my own in Silverdale while listening to #2 in the atonement/Christ on the Cross series by pastor Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church. There's nothing like that sermon to make me want to run to Jesus (at least not that I can think of right now). I did arrive home safely.

Maybe next time I'll talk about my driving.

Christmas 2

On Monday I arose later than I had in a long time and after a while we all went off to Denny's for our Christmas breakfast. There was quite a line, but my dear sister and her husband did most of the waiting for the rest of us. I had a good old time sitting next to one of my dear sisters and talking on and on and enjoying the fact that we both have the same diet and didn't have to listen to people talking on and on about how terrible it must be to be as oppressed as I am and so on. The only problem with the whole meal that I can think of was how rude and obnoxious I was to my dad who was trying to make sure that I got something to eat.

But I did get something to eat and I did get around getting my father's forgiveness a day or two later. The rest of the celebration was spent at my dear sister's house. My gifts went over very well and I believe that I can use all of the things that I received (except the drill press which my dad just wanted to get out of his garage), particularly the new pants that fit me (I have may never have been so happy about receiving new clothes in my whole life). Then we all played a game which was somewhat similar to Apples to Apples (which I did not win) and then I took a nap and then we all watched a movie which I did not want to watch called Ice Princess. It was actually not boring (probably because the star was a young woman). It made me think thankful thoughts about how my parents managed to control any worldly desire they may have had about having their children fulfill their parent's dreams for them. I did bring myself to wonder whether or not this might be an issue that Disney took to the extreme, i.e. maybe it is alright for parents to inspire their children and push them to do certain things. After this was all over, we loaded up the gifts and drove home.

Christmas 1

I got out of worship practice without trying and the wireless internet signal that I use at home is back, so I have decided to type something here.

I left Sliverdale (Silverdale) on Friday the 23rd of December. I left a bit after 8 pm because I wanted to avoid the worst of the traffic. I succeeded for the most part, but I was slowed down by a convoy of cherry picker trucks around the junction of 520 and 405. I am glad that they were out fixing power connections though.

I arrived at my parents home around ten thirty and did some talking to my dad about various things, kinda like I did when I visited him for the thanksgiving holiday. He was positively impressed with some of the writing that I had done along those lines (no, I don't mean the thanksgiving blogging).

I spent most of the next day with my friend whom many people would label as ultra-conservative. We didn't do a whole lot, but he convinced me to give Christmas gifts to members of my family instead of going with my interpretation of Proverbs 22:16. Oh yes, we did do something: we got all muddy by successfully trying to fix a water pipe for his apartment building because he is the landlord. So that was Saturday.

On Christmas Eve Sunday I got up during the morning and took my shower before church, and as I was exiting the shower or shortly thereafter, I realized how little affection I have for a whole bunch the saints at my home church. Of course, I think that this is a bad thing because of the first chapter of Philippians 1, but I did have my dad pray about it on the way and I think that I managed to not bite anyone's head off while I was in the church building. At any rate, I don't remember finding myself being judgmental about particular things that people did in the past (these things aren't usually even sinful, so I know that I am just trying to make myself feel like I am better than them (evil!)) so that is something.

After church I accompanied my dad to his mother's apartment and we visited with her for much longer than expected to. There was some discussion about where the Christmas celebration would be held the following day. I am told that this discussion had been going on for some time. I think that the basic idea was that everyone except my grandmother had decided that the bulk of the celebrating would be done at my dear sister's home, but that my grandmother was still sure that it should be done at her own home, even though this majority was supposed to have been explained to her numerous times. So someone (I actually don't know who) must have got the idea that we should show up at her apartment on Christmas Eve in an effort to make her feel better. The problem was that she was quite tired and didn't really want to see us all right just then. Even so, my dad and my grandmother and I all waited around for the rest of my family to be show up with cookies and such. I didn't know about all of this when I walked in the door and I was quite hungry the whole time and then all there was to eat were candy and M&Ms.

There was also the UNO game which had all sorts of new rules that I didn't like and I began to behave in accordance what Paul Adams told me is passive-aggressiveness by drawing many, many cards from the draw pile whenever I was made to draw. I did this in an effort to make people feel bad, but it didn't work. I did finally manage to decide to control myself and learn the new rules and play the game right. I wonder if that had anything to do with the sermon which was about self control. I don't remember thinking about the sermon very much that afternoon.

Lots of exciting things to not talk about

You'd think that since so many exciting things have been happening to me, I would be able to type about them. Well, I guess that you probably wouldn't think that since I haven't typed any of them for you to know about. I guess that I will just tell you about my visit from my friend Brandon who visited me on Saturday and Sunday. Please note that this is not the Brandon who visited me several months ago and was married to Virgiliana (I still think that Virgiliana is a killer good name!).

Brandon and I used the same room for sleeping during a particular school year in Pullman when both of us were undergraduate students at Washington State University. After Brandon was recognized by a particular person at Seaside Church and he found out that I had managed to live near Brandon for a whole school year, he told me that his respect for me had increased, as though I had just gone to war in Iraq with a contentious woman as my close companion.

What this Seaside Church attender didn't know is that the reason that I met Brandon was this: I was attending a Christian college group for the first time and I offended his roommate so much that he became weary of speaking with me and referred me to Brandon. All three of us can get along great these days, but I was the person who couldn't experience anything marginally unpleasant without exclaiming, "Sue!" I had been living by myself for a school year before I moved into Brandon's room and I needed to learn how to come home from school and think about someone besides myself (I could write a blog entry just about that). Brandon could see that I needed a lot of help, and that is why he decided to put me in his room as opposed to someone else's.

My, wasn't that fun? Let me also mention that if cleanliness is next to godliness, I don't want any part of it because godliness is a unit. Why in the world would you want to go doing things outside of godliness (that just sounds evil)? If you have godliness you should be content with it and enjoy the profit (1 Cor 6:6).

So Brandon and I ate dinner and watched Pride and Prejudice because it is a killer good movie and he hadn't seen it yet and then we walked to the park in the freezing weather and had two fights (the latter of which I won!) and we read 1 Timothy and we read 2 Timothy and we prayed and we slept (in separate rooms). Oh, I forgot to type that we walked back from the park in the freezing weather?

I had some pictures taken at church, but they look quite lame, so let me refer you to this old picture.

Spiritual blog #1

My spiritual posting on my church's pastor's blog.

http://wakingthesleeper.blogspot.com/2006/12/while-thy-servant-was-doing-his-own.html

Messages

On Friday I decided to leave work a whole half-hour early. I was glad that I did so because as I was driving home, my cellular telephone informed me that someone was trying to call me and I decided to answer it even though I didn't know who was trying to call me. Sometimes the people who call my cellular telephone are hoping to communicate with the person who posessed my cellular telephone before my grandparents purchased it from at a garage sale and gave it to me for my birthday. The text messages that they send me are kind funny:

"hey babe I miss u i wish i could b there to watch moview with u and charles"

"Hey wuts us bey go sorry i was such a jerk but the only reason i was being puff was because well u were being very rude as well for no apparent reason an"

"d i was just trying to defend my self i think we could be nicer to each other"

"y arnt u talkin back to me"

"this is chris if u couldn't figure that out"

I think that some poor teenager had her cellular telephone confinscated by her parents who sold it because of her (possibly worthless) friends wouldn't leave her alone. Oh well. I think that talking to these people and telling them that the cellular telephone is now all mine is kind of fun.

I was actually being called by Alan from Seaside Church who was calling to invite me to the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit at the Pacific Science Center which is in Seattle. It seems that Luke and Jamie from Seaside Church had purchased tickets from Jamie's employer or something like that, and were unable to use them because of a schedule conflict.

So on Saturday I drove to Alan's house and we boarded a ferry and traveled to Seattle for the display which was difficult to see because only dim lights could be shone on the documents, and then intermittently.

Unfortunately, I have never been to utilize the hebrew language in any direct way. A lot of the writing wa quite faint and may have been difficult to see, even in good light, but there was a big long peice of psalms with perhaps five entirely intact columns which was nice to see, and the annotations beside the artifacts were quite well done so that people who had enough time could figure out which verses of english text corresponded to a particular line on the scrolls.

If you are entierly ignorant about the Dead Sea Scrolls as was a lady whom I met in Junior college who had determined that the Bible had been corrupted by the Catholic Church in the middle ages so that we could never know what God wanted to tell us, please go and find out about them. I won't pretend to be smart enough to tell you all about them, but I am telling you, "It is worth your time."

I got syndicated

Well, sort of. Alright, not really. But I did get invited to type into one of the blogs that my pastor uses, which is also linked to my church's cultural links page. I started it out with links to several of the posts which I built for this blog.

Because of this new blog, it is likely that my future blogging which turns out to be directly related to spiritual things will be appear at:

http://www.wakingthesleeper.blogspot.com

Plug plug plug

On Tuesday I received a telephone call that I never expected to receive. This call came from a pastor of Adult Ministries in Pullman who is named Ceasar Paul. Strangly enough, I worked under him as a children's church teacher at the Evangelical Free Church of Pullman which I attended for three years while I also attended Washington State University.

The reason for his call was inquiry regarding my employment, spiritual development, general well being, etc. I am still suprised that a pastor of a medium-sized church which, last I checked, was short on leadership, in a busy university town where people are coming and going all of the time, had time to make sure that I hadn't forgotten about Jesus even though he had no particular reason to think that he would ever do ministry with me again.

So let me go ahead and advertise for this local church body thusly:

It is most convenient that WSU, which was the only University that I wanted to go to (for reasons pertaining to my major, the amount of money that I wanted to spend, location, etc.) was the only University that would accept me (by the time that I got around to applying to universities, the University of Washington wasn't even looking undergraduate engineer's applications). All of that is to say that I didn't go to a bunch of different Universities and visit churches and rank them. All that I could really do regarding my spiritual leadership was to pray. And I did pray because I had heard enough stories about people attending colleges, even "Christian" colleges and falling away from godly behavior and spiritual disciplines and fellowship with Jesus for various reasons. These reasons included not having a decent church to attend.

God did answered my prayer just the way that I wanted Him to (it must have been a good thing to pray for huh?). The man who was the pastor at my local church body in Monroe at the time told me which church to visit first and I was able to determine immediately that I did not need to go church shopping. I found out later that the Evangelical Free Church of Pullman is not the only local church body in Pullman that seems to work, so there is no excuse for college students in Pullman who somehow manage to forget about Jesus while they are there.

Oh, let me brag about the Senior pastor there for a minute (Lead pastor for you Acts 29 people) who is truly a pastor's pastor--both in practice and in qualifications. You may have heard Pastor Mark Driscoll tell the story of Porno Boy Vs. Hebrew Man toward the beginning of a sermon series from 1st Corinthians which was called Christians Gone Wild. I don't know exactly which Porno Boy Pastor Mark was talking about, but I do know which pastor he was talking about, and it is just amazing to me that this hyper-educated (both in science and in theology) person has whatever it takes to run around and teach loads of Bible studies to biblical ignoramuses, many of whom can't see their own ignorance (particularly some of those King James only people).

So don't skip church when you're in Pullman. Oh, and look for the Foundations for Marriage class on Tuesdays @ One Way books.

Oh, let me also say that having an elder of my church sitting just a few rows away from me during my graduation, decorated so that everyone could see that his academic acheivments were quite extensive was quite a pleasant suprise for me. I think that Christians should be everywhere.

Thanksgiving 4 (shortness)

I am quite thankful (to Jesus) that I get to work for a company that let me leave work two hours early today because of the blizzard that fell upon Poulsbo suddenly so that I could avoid wrecking or being stuck at work all night.

Thanksgiving 3 (lengthiness)

On Saturday the 25th of November, I observed some more of my father's work, which he pointed out to me. After this I took my brother to my church's other annual thanksgiving season event: The Cranberry Sauce Bowl.

The Cranberry Sauce Bowl is a soccer event which is generally set up for kids who are not often called children. It usually takes place at a city park. This year the city park fields were closed because of unusually high amounts of precipitation and saturated soils, so the game was held on the land of a family of church members who lived on relatively well-drained soil. I usually play the whole game through, but this time I only played for two points because I wanted to converse with my dear sister during the whole rest of the time. I am speaking of the dear sister who was became married this summer. She had just returned that morning from a visit with the family of her new husband. His family lives in Colorado. I have been told that this family is still duly (i.e. positively and with great magnitude) impressed with my dear sister. My dear sister told me that being married to her new husband is better for her than not being married to her new husband. She also told me that sex is heavenly, so I am quite happy for her. We discussed the topic which I discussed with my dad so late into the night and she cut the hairs on the top of my head so that they became shorter than they were before she began to cut them.

On Sunday morning, I arose at about five and loaded the Illuminate 2 and drove back to Bummertown just in time for work in the Seaside Church building. I had no idea that I would be driving in snow which slowed me down and impared my vision so that I read a roadsign incorrectly and took a wrong exit. I was somewhat distressed about the increased possibility of wrecking, but somehow, I arrived safely.

I suppose that that is the end of my thanksgiving trip story.

Thanksgiving 2 (lengthiness)

This post contains a description of the activities in which I participated this last thanksgiving weekend.

I left work on Wednesday about 1/2 hour early and drove to my home in Sliverdale (Silverdale). I was quite tired because of a critical mistake that I had made the night before (running/walking ~4.5 miles to my community group in the dark, the cold, and the rain), so I went to sleep for a couple of hours. While I was sleeping, traffic conditions in the region of the road trip I had planned improved as multiple cars became reached their destinations.

Let me warn you: A bed is like a time machine; you climb into a bed and close your eyes at one time, and when you open them, you find that you have traveled in to the future! If you don't believe me, check your alarm clock at the beginning and end of your next bed rest. You will find that I am right, so be careful with your bed.

When I awoke, I cleaned my dishes and loaded the Illuminate 2 and drove it down to Bummertown (Bremerton) and loaded it with fuel. Then I travelled in it through Gag Harbor (Gig Harbor) to Monroe where my parents and my sister and my other sister and my brother and my other brother live. I determined that my car traveled ~30 miles for every gallon of gasoline that it had burned and I was quite happy about that.

Upon my arrival, my mother and brothers were in bed, but I talked to my dad about how in the world God might give me a wife. I won't tell you much about that conversation because I am annoyed by men who think that they know who they are supposed to marry when they really don't (did you hear the story about the lady who was approached by five or so different men, each of whom told her that God's will for her was to marry him (thereby implying that anything else would be disobedience)?). I will tell you that my father and I do not seem to conflict regarding what I should be doing regarding this matter. Oh, let me tell you a funny little thing that my dad said to me years ago: "You've gotta get married sometime--If you're gonna get married."

The next morning I arose at seven or so and ran about a mile in a loop (no particular destination). To run in daylight and without much traffic was nice. Upon my return I ate something and played multiplayer video games with my younger brothers until my dad wanted to show me the pictures of some work that he had been doing. During this computer time (for my dad's pictures and music and videos are inside of his computer) I noticed that the time of the meal was drawing neigh, I decided to begin housecleaning, for my mother had been working on housecleaning and the meal since the beginning of the day. The housecleaning was not completed even as my father's mother arrived from Monroe. We were joined by three other ladies from the same town for eating. After the meal, I drove my grandmother home and spent the rest of the evening doing visiting with my family and staying up way too late continuing to talk to my dad because we weren't through with the exciting topic of the night before.

Upon Friday morning I arose at seven or so again because I am used to rising at six. I remember that a particular church event took place on this day. It is an annual event called the "Pizza Bowl Split." It costs thirteen dollars. It involves eating normal pizza, which I can not do because I am a phenyleketonuric, and it involves bowling, which can be fun if I am with people whom I really like and who like bowling. It also involves helping children have fun, which I am not generally good at unless I actually know a fair amount about the children who need to have the fun. I have been to numerous children's camps and other children's activites and I always find that I am most helpful doing support work, especially technical work, or utilitarian setup/demo work (as opposed to decorating, cooking, craft time setup, etc.). So instead of going bowling and eating with my brothers (who weren't going because of reasons of their own), I decided to spend the time with my mother who was driving around the cities in which the Pizza Bowl Split took place because she carries the church credit card. Um, that means that I was traveling with my mother because of her company and conversation, not because of the church credit card. During this trip I found out that neither Target nor Mervyn's carry cheap slacks in my size.

This activity took longer than I expected it to, but I have found that I can bestow honor upon my parents by considering their activities worthy of my observation and consideration, so I consider that time as well-spent.

I believe it was upon Friday night that I watched Walk the Line with my father and oldest brother.

Thanksgiving 1

My worship pastor has a consistent tendency to include somewhat rhetorical questions with the list of worship songs which are to be played in church. I have included several of these questions below:

"Do we have anything to be thankful for, I know it sounds trite, but when was the last time you truly felt thankful? Is it because you've nothing to be thankful for, or are we all still lying on the grocery store floor blue in the face to get our way? God loves a grateful heart."

I have included this one because quite a number of us have seen children who fail to respond well to the goodness of their parents, and we think to ourselves, "The ungrateful little whelp, after all that is done for him! I am glad that I don't throw temper tantrums like that."

But you've got to think:

2 Peter 3 says that people somehow manage to forget the previous judgements of God so that they can say that God is slow in bringing the judgement which is hanging over them, even though God is being patient for their benefit. So if you are not a Christian and you know that God is calling you to humility and gratitude for the sacrifice of Jesus, go to those both of those places--at once!

On the other hand, if you are God's child, do not be ungrateful by denying God's:

1. Wisdom--by telling Him that you know what you need better than He does
2. Power--by assuming that you don't have what you think you need because He can't give you what you think you need
3. Love--by thinking that God is withholding good gifts from you because He wants to punish you for sin or to see you suffer (Hebrews 12 indicates that suffering is discipline which is to result in your sanctification, not punishment for sin which has already been laid upon Jesus).

Additionally, it occurs to me that anything less than gratitude toward God is idolatry, which is evil. God has described idolatry as adultery for the purpose of showing us how evil it is.

The Integration of Choice and Election (simplified)

I used to be quite confused because I couldn't understand how anyone could be to blame for failing to choose Jesus (which the scripture clearly teaches) while at the same time God receives glory for being gracious and choosing the people whom He is going to save, excluding all others (which the scripture also clearly teaches).

During my first year at Washington State University, a calvanist minister came to the house that I later moved into and admitted that we all get to choose Jesus or Satan, sin and death! Now is when you are all supposed to draw your breath in quickly because of your suprise. After he said that, I began to think of this little line of reasoning, and before long it was finished.

I know that this line of reasoning is quite simplified and that is has been torn apart by sharp people like James (whom I haven't had the pleasure of speaking to in some time) and Warren, but I don't remember how they did it. Perhaps they will comment.

It works like this: We all must choose. Choosing Jesus brings glory, honor and immortality. Choosing pride, sin, or anything else brings well... Satan, sin and death in Hell.

Now a believer might read this and think to himself, "Well then, why doesn't everyone just choose Jesus right away?"

Inconveniently, this choice is not a free choice because all of the people who are making this choice now are influenced by sin which has been programmed to preserve itself by the one who knows that Jesus will smash sin if He is chosen (Yes, I know that He will smash it later anyway). So the sin inside of people is a serious impediment to logical decision making -- so much so that the choices which are made can be predicted correctly in every instance. I.e. because of the sin that is in them, people will always choose pride, self, Satan, sin, death, anything but Jesus. But Jesus is not to blame because Jesus did not choose Satan, sin, or death or anything else for anyone (alright, He did choose death for Himself once, but not for anyone else).

Conveniently, Jesus has decided to be nice to some people whom He chose beforehand. These people are sometimes called the elect. Jesus opens the eyes of these people so that they can see reality (kinda like the eyes of Elisha's servant were opened) and they are given wisdom to know where pride and sin and so on will take them. Then they choose Jesus and they are translated to the kingdom of light.

How it is that Jesus is able to save people is another topic.

Helmsman Strategies

I typed most of this entry several days ago and hesitated to publish it because it sort of assumes that I know things about driving that other people do not know, but Chris from Seaside told me this morning that he thought that I should publish it, so here it is.

Although my driving has a number of critics (e.g. Josh from the UCBin Pullman, Pat from Seaside Church, Chris from Seaside), I have been informed that I have had the benefit of a superior driver's education class (i.e. superior to the driver's education classes of those complimenting mine). For this reason, I would like to share several driving tips with you:

1. When driving at night, avoid directly into headlights which are attached to cars which are traveling toward you. Instead look directly at the white line to your right. Try to keep your car just to the left of it. Of course, if you are tailgating the car which is in front of you, be sure to pay attention to its brake lights too. Oh, and watch out for traffic control signals and signs.
2. When waiting at the front of a queue in a left had turn lane, keep the all the wheels and tires of your car pointing straight ahead of you. Restrain yourself so that you do not point the steering wheels to the left until after you have already driven the car into the intersection. This increases the distance between your path and the car parked in the left hand (or left foot, for that matter) turn lane of the street you wish to enter. This can also keep you out of the path of the oncoming traffic to your left if you are rear ended.
3. If your car is covered with snow or ice, be sure to clean this ice and snow off of the transparent surfaces so that you do not become the next lazy, yet destructive person to smash into a pedestrian because he was unable to see out his car window.

Of course, this leads to the following obvious question: Where is your favorite speed bump, and what makes your favorite speed bump your favorite speed bump?

Which Button Should I Push?

The other day I was walking by a lady who works in the same building that I work in. She was staring at her computer and speaking out loud, "Which button should I push?"

In as much as I am always trying to be funny (kinda like now) I seized the opportunity thusly:

"Well, if you want to be married, you should probably push the big button marked 'COMMIT.'"

"Oh, and if you are a conservative or a pro-lifer, you should probably not push the big red button marked 'ABORT.'"

I suppose that I should have ommitted that last conditional.

Go therefore and do likewise... After you have read all of my other blog entries.

Churchbuildingdock

Chris Swan: Notice that this blog posting's title is not "Churchdock," which sounds better than, "Churchbuildingdock."

On Friday the 28th of October I drove the Illuminate 2 all of the way to Red Sea Church in Portland. I have been told that Portland is the least churched city in the United States of America. This means that the church building corresponding to Red Sea Church has a large part of its mission ahead of it, although it has been in dire need of a refit.

I became the least part of this refit which took place on the date mentioned above. ~70 men of the Acts 29 network spent ~400 man-hours on this building which had appeared as yet another part of a disfunctional neighborhood.

Upon my arrival I was quite pleased to hear that one of the men who was a pastor of mine at the Evangelical Free Church of Pullman while I was in Pullman was in attendance with the elders of Alathia Community Church which began with them in Issaquah Washington. He reminded me that I was the only college student who came into his church and immediately asked for a docrinal statment, remarking that this was beautiful for him to observe. I had not realized what an impression I had made.

To see so many men working on so many different parts of a semi-symmetrical structure with multiple levels made me think of the battle-damaged Enterprise starship getting fixed up in spacedock for another mission, hence the title of this blog posting. These parts included

1. Painting of many rooms with multiple ladders and multiple paint colors in each room
2. Construction of two counter tops with framing and sheetrock
3. Construction and wiring of one sound booth with a platform, framing, and sheetrock
4. Installation of eight ceiling fans utilizing one one man lift
   
5. Much landscaping
6. Much demolition of visually archaic furnature
7. Demolition of crack shack (quite common in this neighborhood)
8. Plumbing for new sinks (with new counter tops) in four restrooms
9. A fair amount of pressure washing
10. Other things

Seeing the success of the mission, which was almost without conflict through the submission and proper reception of instruction that must have taken place, made the accompanying aggrivation seem small.

Even so I have determined that I am quite happy that I have an engineering job which does not require any skill regarding paint. I spent most of my time there doing interior painting while standing on a ladder. I am not particularly proud of my work, for it was slow and its results were often sub-par, although they did improve. I don't know why the leader pointed that job out as "unskilled."

On the bright side, the Illuminate 2 managed another 350 wreck-free miles, dispite my allegedly poor handling, which a spiritual superior has had the effrontery to point out; it must be quite bad, but I am yet unconvinced. The man paid me an extra 25% for the drive, most likely this was a tip for not wrecking. What do you think?

Gag Tract

The wife of one of my better friends wrote this tract, which utilizes St Anselm's ontological argument. I realize that this represents a rather poor and ineffective evangelism methodology which should never be practiced, but I think that it is quite funny. Don't feel bad if you don't understand it the first time through; I didn't even realize that the tract was making fun of itself until just recently.

This file was set up to be printed and folded, so you may want to begin reading with the far right hand column on the second page and then continue on to the far left column of the first page.

Gag Tract

Candy Party Memo

Seaside Church in Bremerton which I have been attending for a little while now has N missional community groups (where N is some integer greater than 2). The missional community group which I attend is called north. The Seaside Church north missional community group has decided to hold an outreach event called a Harvest Party on October 31st. I was asked to build the draft for a flyer. My draft has been rejected, but I was advised to post it here for your viewing pleasure.

Candy Party Memo

Getting By Without (various things)

This week and probably next week, I will be getting by without my laptop computer power supply.

Last week and the week before that, I got by without my cellular telephone.

The week or two before that I got by without my cellular telephone battery charger and received the last call that I needed to take an hour or so before all of the usable energy was drained from the battery.

Aside from the observation that I seem to be getting very good at forgetting about various things and leaving them at my parent's home in Monroe, I have also observed that getting by without things that I am used to having is an interesting mental excersize for me because it forces me to come up with new solutions to my problems which require equipment.

I suppose that the most outstanding example of this from my own life would be last year from June to December when I had decided to do without my car because I had just wrecked it. After all, work was less than four miles away from home and I really didn't need my car at Washington State University. So for a while, I just walked to work and back, but then I discovered a bicycle that my dad had purchased at a garage sale for $5. This bicycle was in pretty lame shape, but it sure made getting to work quicker and easier than walking did. I had a great time while rolling it down the bumpy hill driving it really fast. One Sunday I pedalled it to Woodinville and back (40 miles round trip). I was amazed by how a bicycle could add efficiency to my transportation system through the conservation of linear momentum so that it made up for it's own weight, even when being pedalled uphill. My dad told me that I would be suprised at the increased efficiency that could be bestowed upon me by a bicycle that fit me and was in good condition. I don't know if I will ever get around to finding out about that though.

Oh well, this week I am having a great time getting plenty of sleep and reading the Bible because I am not busy playing video games and watching DVDs from the local library. You should try it sometime.

Funniness

One of my readers told me Sunday morning that my last posting was funny and that his reaction to it prompted a reaction from those around him so that he had to explain his own. I then remembered how my friend Brandon always (often) says that some of my funniest moments come about when I am not trying to be funny. Come to think of it, I think that Paul Adams said that too. Perhaps they are right. I didn't build this blog in attempt to be funny, but it seems to have turned out that way. So in an effort to avoid continuing as the laughing stock of my friends and acquaintances, I will type out this next story which I think is funny, but maybe you will all think that it is profound and take me seriously:

On Wednesday, I failed to look carefully at a topographical map and determined that I needed to go to the field to perform a downstream analysis. This means that I needed to go observe the drainage path of stormwater from a particular peice of land to Port Orchard. If I had looked carefully at the topographical map, I would have seen that the peice of land was quite near a closed depression, even though it is also quite near Port Orchard and I would avoided much trouble and spared the expenditure of some company money. At least it was on my way home.

I got out there to about the place where the land was and started following the ditch adjacent to it. In as much as I did not realize that I was in a closed depression, I was having a hard time deciding how that water in the wetlands several hundred feet downstream from the land was to cross the road. I don't always feel good when I realize that my thoughts are disconnected from the way that things are. I did find several catch basins which I opened and looked into, but they seemed to be draining in the wrong direction.

I had left the catch basin opening tool at the office, foolishly not thinking that I would need it because I had anticipated open ditches, so I was using my bare hands to do the job and I was gettin them all dirty. This was all very well and good for the type 30 catch basins, but then I ran across a type 1 or type 2 catch basin which had a 48" lid and which I thought was for a sewer, but it did say "drain" on it, so I decided to open it.

It had only three small round holes in it near the rim, about ninety degrees apart. I tried to open it with my index fingers, but I had to use my middle fingers to get it off. I looked down into it to make my observation and was careful not to fall in because I was all by myself. When I put the lid back on, I used my index fingers again and carefully lowered the cover back into place on the frame, with the tip of my left index finger smashed between the manhole cover and the frame upon which it was to rest. I tried to lift that end up again, but I was unable. Some people had just walked by, so I asked for their help, but they were really unhelpful. They were about to try something that didn't seem to be very smart to me and that I thought would inflict futher damage upon my poor finger, when I managed to yank my finger out. My finger still has several blood blisters in it and some of its nerves do not seem to be working quite right.

So there is my funny story. Everyone and my place of employment had a good laugh over it and it caused my boss to remember several other stories involving similar situations.

To me, the most interesting part was wondering what sort of people were going respond to me after I called for help. I wonder if you ever thought that Jesus would smash you if you asked Him for help. I wonder if you thought that asking Jesus for help would be useless because you have always seen Him pictured as a wimp without capabilities.

Oh well. I am quite glad to be unstuck.

Must I be a Leader?

I was just listening to a sermon about spiritual gifts, during which the preacher loudly proclaimed that people are not leaders without followers. I heard him say that and I thought to myself, "I must not have the spiritual gift of leadership."

So the sermon ended, I finished my video game and there was an electronic message waiting for me, directing me to this page.

Perhaps I am a leader after all. Why don't you go ahead and comment on that (just click on the radial button labled anonymous if you have no acceptable digital identity)?

Ammendment: Here is another new blog, one which may or may not have anything to do with me.

Yet Another Wedding

This is kind of funny; I am sitting here inside of the Silverdale Public Library, trying to download a sermon (which is coming very slowly) and until just a minute ago, I was watching a dressed and tagged member of the church of jesus christ of latter day saints read comic books. Isn't that interesting?

I attended yet another wedding on Saturday, August 26th in Bellingham WA. Bellingham is located nearly 17 miles south of the borderline between Washington and British Columbia. This wedding had been a long time in coming. I think that there were some who thought so five years ago, even so, I do not think that the groom had been negligent.

This wedding was much more expensive, but not much larger than the wedding which I attended on the preceding weekend. Unlike another large, expensive wedding I attended years ago, the expense of this wedding was appreciable. I think that the reason that this wedding was so appreciable was the engineering; the church building was more than large enough to accommodate the attendants and the reception area was landscaped very well with appropriately located trees and patios and grass and restrooms. The temperature was perfect also. There was dancing and music and food and some of us were halfway expecting Jesus Himself to walk along and join us all!

More Reflection on my trip to Brandon's Wedding

Well, I have finally decided to change my template because a very sharp and somewhat educated individual was unable to find the speech link in my last posting due to a lack of contrast. I do like the darker colored template better, but like I always (sometimes) say, "Functionality before style."

I remembered more stuff regarding Brandon's Wedding, so I have decided to type it here.

Sometime after I arrived in Spokanistan, Brandon let me help him out with his to-do list, which included some dinky little things like replacing pots and pans which he had earlier damaged with excessive heat.

He also had me drive him and this kid that he had been ministering to to the social security office. This kid had been named Allan. Allan needed to go to the social security office because he needed to get a social security card because he needed to be able to get a job. Brandon informed me that lots of kids could be working but are too lazy to get off of their rears and get jobs, but because of particular ministries, Alan was trying to do so, and I think that Brandon was right. Allan looked as though he had been born in the US and I was right. The problem was that his parents either could not or would not locate his social security card for him even though they had been keeping it for him since he was born. When I found out about that I decided to be thankful that my parents were able to keep track of things like that because if they hadn't, I would probably be just like Allan; hanging around some neighborhood in Spokanistan, and maybe, just maybe being ministered to by two young single guys. Instead, I get to do the ministering. Unfortunately, the social security office seemed to be giving Allan the royal runaround and he was not able to get his social security card even though it was his second trip there that day. So thank you Jesus that my parents were as organized as they were. If you want to read more good things about my parents, be sure to read my posting about my parents.

Oh, my digital camera has been found and I decided to just replace my cellular telephone battery charger because it was about shot anyways. I got one from radio shack that is supposed to work on other cellular telephones which may be economically helpful for to me after the cellular telephone that I have becomes worn out. As a result of my camera being found, I have begun dialogue with the people that found it, which is quite nice, so perhaps really am quite happy about the whole thing!

I got to be the Best Man

I spent Wednesday and Thursday and Friday and Saturday on the wedding of my friend Brandon in Spokanistan. He is the same Brandon from far away that you may have read about in my last entry. Soon he will be even further away because he is on his way to Boston. I won't go on and on about how I know him because you can read a bit about that in the notes that I wrote for the speech that I was privileged to deliver as Brandon's best man.

As I typed, I arrived on Wednesday, at about 11 in the morning. I got up early because I woke up early and had packed everything on the previous evening. After I arrived, Brandon and I went over to see Virgiliana who had been sleeping, but seemed to be happy to see us anyway and we argued about whether DVDs are really better than VHS videos (which I am sure that they are). We all went out shopping for a suit for me. I think that it was on Wednesday night that we watched the first two thirds of Fiddler on the Roof.

On Thursday morning, Brandon's bachelor party was held, which consisted of me and Randy and Brandon playing minigolf and frisbee and wandering around Spokane, although we did spend a few minutes talking about how Driscoll got kicked off of a particular radio show for failing to condemn oral sex as unchristian because he interprets Song of Solomon as encouraging it. We finished off that day with Virgiliana's family in the Mead area. I tasted my first wine there and then.

On Friday there was a little rehearsal and a big pizza dinner, none of which I should have eaten. Fortunately, the only thing that I did eat was one bread stick, so things could have been worse. After Brandon arrived at his house (which he had also opened to me), he felt somehow unhappy about all of the people who had arrived and decided that he needed to chill. Somehow or other he decided that we should have a devotional time instead of a beer drinking time, so that is what we had. It seemed to make him feel better, but that is probably because Jesus made him forget all about how miserable he was. Oh, Brandon would also want me to point out that his feet were quite warm the whole time.

On Saturday I felt sick, but I arose and used the internet to help me tie my own tie all by myself for the very first time. I haven't done it enough times to remember how to do it yet.

Brandon's other groomsman named Devin arrived and we all sort of headed off to church, which was half a block away. Two cute little girls from across the street kept coming over and asking if the wedding had started yet and I had to keep telling them that I hoped that it had not because I was not supposed to miss it.

I was somewhat distressed when I saw the color of the dress of the bride until the groom explained to me that it was a traditional Chinese wedding gown and that it had nothing to do with any lack of redemption, justification, sanctification, or expiation. On top of all that, it is very aesthetically pleasing and much more modest than the standard white American wedding gown.
I really liked the whole service, which Virgiliana planned, and the things that the minister said, and I had a good old time making everybody laugh during my toast which Brandon and Virgiliana seemed to be quite happy about. I downloaded all of the pictures from the father and sister of the groom so that I can share them with you. I left too quickly and now I don't know anything about the location of the digital camera that carried there with me. I left Spokanistan a bit after 7:30 pm and drove back to Sliverdale by 1:00 am or so on Sunday. Aside from losing my digital camera and my cellular telephone charger, I am very happy about the whole thing!

My first non-familial guests from far away

Brandon and Virgie visited me about two weeks ago. We had a nice time going to church and eating and wandering around the whaling days street festival and the beach and waiting for the ferry boat.

Actually, I didn't enjoy the eating part that much because there wasn't really any food that I could eat and Brandon paid good money for me to enter the Chinese Buffet. Oh well. We had a nice time talking about the differences between feasting and gluttony.

Notice my Bible Quizzing trophies in the picture there. I had been planning to throw them away in the dumpster (hard as that seems), but Brandon and Virgie decided to take them with them. I asked what they would do with them and was told, "we'll have them." I haven't the slightest idea what that means, but I don't really care because I got out of having to throw them away myself. If you are interested in this Bible Quizzing program, click here.

My Dear Sister's Wedding Picture

You may have noticed that my dear sister who got married commented on my previous blog posting regarding her wedding and informed me that I should go ahead and place a picture of her at her wedding up here. I visited her about a week ago and she mentioned that again, so here it is. I guess that she is a married woman and any relatives that don't like this picture here will just have to live with it.

My little brother took this snap shot with a digital camera from the front row with no tripod and a built-in flash. It is just amazing how photography has become easier for people who know nothing about science (that isn't supposed to say anything about my little brother). But yeah, there you go. You can see the blog of my dear sister and her husband here.

Speaking of weddings, I am to be a part of the wedding party for the wedding of my friend Brandon in Spokanistan on Saturday. That should be exciting. I'll have to make some mention of how it goes.

Today I had Pat from Seaside Church over for lunch because I had purchased food for other guests without a confirmation from them and they were not able to come and everybody else seemed to be busy. He is a Francis A. Schaeffer fan, so we had a good time. 

Alcohol

I was at my neighbor's house last night because of a community event called Sliverdale Whaling Days (Silverdale Whaling Days). It is kind of a street festival just like Duvall Days and Sultan Shindig and Seattle Seafair. I didn't know that people invited their friends over for parties in honor of said events (or the fireworks that precede them), but there I was. I had already met the host at the Seaside Church in Bummertown (Bremerton), and he offered me a beer that didn't say light all over it, so I accepted. While I was consuming this alcohol, my buddy from Pullman called me and I realized that the last time I had consumed alcohol was when I was with him at a party. Sometime around then I decided to try to come up with a list of occasions upon which I have consumed alcohol.

1. In Monroe with my friend Brian. Brian has acted as my friend for some eleven years. I think that I was 22 years old. He insisted upon taking me out for this blend of coffee and alcohol. I said to myself, "this is probably the cheapest way to determine that I don't like coffee and that I don't like alcohol." I didn't like that drink at all. It may have had something to do with the fact that the drink was supposed to be hot, but I let it get cold.
2. In July of 2004 I went on a little evangelism outing with a man whom I met at a college group in the home of the Claussen's in Carnation. We handed out the Ray Comfort type tracks and talked to people. We (I) had a great time. Afterward, Samuel (said man) bought me some sort of alchoholic fruit drink from the QFC there.
   
3. Then there was the time in 2005 that Dave at the Embassy said that I was invited to Applebees in Moscow ID and I had $10 in my pocket, so I surprised everyone by accepting. I ordered something called a Black Buette and surprised everyone by finishing it even though I ordered a small glass and a large glass was delivered.
4. One day in April of 2006 I went to a place on the hill in Pullman (I can't remember the name of the place) and had something called a Jeagermister. The music was loud and the place was quite crowded.
5. Last night at my neighbor's house while waiting for fireworks and cracking corny jokes.
   

So there you go (just in case you cared). O yes, as Driscoll once said, "WWJD? What Would Jesus Drink?) That reminds me that I should get around to trying some wine someday.

The Wedding of my dear sister to that one man that she likes a lot

My dear sister was married to a man whom she met at Bible college in Wisconsin. I am not including pictures of either of them because if I were to do so, a particularly sensitive relative of mine would become upset about it. Instead, I have included a picture of myself (having my picture taken) getting ready to take a picture of my dear sister and her new husband (no, he wasn't born yesterday and no, he hasn't been living under a rock since then). I can't figure out why I was the only one there who thought of standing on top of that really nice rock there.

Oh well, it was a nice wedding on a nice day and I can't think of any disadvantage to the whole thing for my dear sister.

We did get my grandmother to come out (the whole ten miles or so), but she had to be returned to her home almost immediately after the ceremony. Much of the other side of the family attended also. 

What I did last night.

This posting is for my boss's wife because I was told yesterday that she thought that I wouldn't even chop up vegetables. I imagine that she thought so because I eat a raw but baked potato for lunch and I just smile and nod when people suggest that I take the trouble to take care of myself.

I was lying around yesterday after work because I was tired. It is probable that I was tired because I hadn't eaten enough. I started thinking about Proverbs 14:17 which says that

Where no oxen are, the manger is clean, But much revenue comes by the strength of the ox (NASB).

And I also thought about how husbands are supposed to love their wives as their own bodies, and it occurred to me (as it has before) that no woman in her right mind is going to think that I will be diligent enough to love her and to take care of her while I am too lazy to take care of my own body. It reminds me of the assertion that Francis Schaeffer made in his dinky little book called The Mark of the Christian. It is about how Jesus gives the world the right to determine whether He was sent by His Father based on whether believers love each other.

So I got up and off of my bed and figured out what I wanted and wrote it down and walked down the road to the Red Apple store. I walked in and looked at the produce and held my list in front of me. This one guy there commented that he liked my list. I am pretty sure that he thought that I had been sent by my mother. I felt kind of bad about how many plastic bags I had to use to carry all the different vegetables seperately. When I got the front, the checkout lady called me hon. I think that she also thought that my mother had sent me to the store for her. It probably doesn't help that I appear to be about six years younger than I really am.

So I went home and built a stir fry and ate it and I have been living happily ever since. I guess it just goes to show that if you want something to get done, there are but three ways to make it happen (or so Tom Rief told me):

1. Do it yourself
2. Pay someone else to do it
3. Tell someone that it can't be done or that they can't do it

Since I was told that my boss's wife said that I wouldn't do something, I went out and did it. I should probably do it again soon.

Let me just tell you that you are unable or unwilling to leave comments and converse about my problems because you know that you have your own. Now maybe I'll get more feedback (uh-huh).

The least interesting post yet

I am standing outside of the apartment in which I reside because I want to be able to use the internet connection from the local union office which is north of the complex. Since moving here, I have decided that unions are good for something after all. I had been walking three blocks to the Silverdale Public Library, but I found out yesterday that I need only step outside and over to the left a few feet. This is kind of handy because the deck railing is wide and makes a decent platform for the cutting board that I place my computer on. I am quite happy about this cutting board because it allows me to place my computer on top of blankets and other things that would otherwise interfere with the ventalation system of my computer.

I went to see the cars movie last week and found myself grinning and laughing through most of it.

I am unhappy because I think that Jesus wants me to be talking to my neighbors, but I am not doing so.

One neighbor seems to like watching movies a lot. Another seems to like standing in front of the apartment in which he resides while smoking.

More about My Graduation

My little brother commented that I should post more about my college graduation, so here we go.

I guess I should begin by clarifying (just in case you haven't read my Parents posting) that the degree I received was Bachelor of Science of Civil Engineering from Washington State University. Oh, and the job that I have is a civil engineering job and the task at hand in my place of employment is the preparation of drainage reports for approval by Kitsap County.

People came to visit me on my graduation day. Pictured here with me are my good friend Brandon and his good friend Virgiliana who has agreed to marry him. Both of my parents and both of my brothers and both of my sisters also came along with my great grandmother and my great uncle Kerby who is a Civil Engineer in Lewiston Idaho.

My parents and my brothers and Brandon and Virgie and myself ate at Taco del Mar and Brandon and Vergie put up with my family and all of the moving and such that I had to do to move out of the Embassy where I lived for two years in Pullman. That was all quite gracious of them. My parents drove a great big van over to put my stuff in. My mother and my brothers and I left for Monroe on the day after graduation, but everyone else left on the day of graduation because of things that they needed to get done. Brandon and Virgie decided to stay with me until about nine that evening talking and listening to music and watching a TV show from the third season of Hogan's Heroes. 

My First Week of Work

I made it through working on Wednesday and Thursday and Friday. I have been staying with my grandparents twenty-six or so miles away from Poulsbo because it seems that there is no housing in Poulsbo. If anyone knows of any cheap housing in Poulsbo, please let me know.

Work on Wednesday morning was quite rough because of me not knowing what was going on because of my supervisors being absent and the disorganization of the computers. The computers seemed to be disorganized because of the incompetence of the engineer before me. Everyone seems to be pleased that he is gone. I have been doing some praying that I will not turn out like him.

My last night

This may very well be my last night at home. I am supposed to show up at work in Poulsbo on Wednesday which is the day after tomorrow. I don't have my own place to live yet. I called four apartment places today and have been unable to talk to anyone connected with them. I am allowed to sleep at my mother's parent's house. My mother's parents live only 26 miles away from the location of my work. I guess that I will type about how all of this goes after some of it has already happened.

I had to take my computer apart and resoldier the power jack because I busted it in my car on the ferry boat last Tuesday. I remembered to connect my on board mouse this time, so the computer is easier to use in unconventional locations.

I graduated today

My little brother took this picture for me. It is an image of me as well as an image of an image of me.

I should also mention that I got a job in Poulsbo Washington which I accepted on Friday after visiting the company on Monday.

I had only applied for the job a week before Monday through a portable document file in an electronic message. I received a call before 8 am on the following day. I was asked some questions and all but offered the job. I received a written job offer on the following friday.

This is unusual because I seem to have spent about the first month of each of the last two summers trying to find a summer job. This time I was all but handed a job. I remember that last summer I noted that I had given God every opportunity to give me an engineering job, but he had not. There were a number of jobs that I should have had, but I just didn't get them. Jesus must have given me this job just so that I will know that He can give me whatever He wants to whenever He wants to do so. We should all take note that God can do whatever He wants to do because He is the King! 

Children's Church

When I grew up I was very rarely allowed to attend children's church because my parents determined that my time would be better spent by practicing for adulthood in adult church. I now agree with them.

My church recently lost two pastors, one to church planting, another to a church in a neighboring city, so my church was left with leadership needs. Because of these needs, the children's ministry at my church has been opened to not only the skilled, but also to the plain old willing. I am a part of the plain old willing. That is to say that I am not skilled in dealing with children.

This picture is a picture of two people having their pictures taken. The person whose head is nearest the top of the picture is Josh who helps me. He comments on my blog sometimes and it was his idea for me to type about children's church in my weblog. That person in front of him is a student.

I am told that these kids behave worse than people do in public school. 

My birthday or the twenty-fourth anniversary thereof

My birthday was yesterday. Please note that I am telling you this after the fact and not before the fact so that you will not feel the need to go out and buy me something. I am just going to tell you about it because I need something to type in this blog about because I have been neglecting it. When I can't think of anything to write about, it makes me feel like I haven't been doing anything worth doing, which is probably almost true.

Yesterday was not really my birthday because my real birthday was twenty-four years ago. Each of us can have just one physical birthday and the annual celebrations of birthdays that people hold are really just anniversarys of birthdays. So the next time you hear someone talk about her fiftieth birthday party, she is probably talking about reincarnation.

I was quite tired on the morning of the twenty-fourth anniversary of my birthday because I had been awake a long time the day before taking the Engineer In Training test and visiting with my friend in Spokane, but I made it to church and taught children's church anyway. My Mother and my Father and my sisters called my cellular telephone and greeted me. Aside from the really nice vegetable stir fry that my friend bought me in Spokane on Saturday, that was about the best part of the whole thing.

I wonder if I'll be able to come up with anything interesting to type before graduation.

Attempting to glorify the worm

These are pictures of pastor Dale. He ministered to my grandparents someplace and then to my parents years ago at 15th Avenue Bible Church (which no longer exists) before I was born.
He ministered to me at Sky Valley Bible Church in Monroe from 2001-2004.

Come to think of it, I must have been born for some of that 15th Ave Bible Church stuff because I know that loves to tell a story about me praying for snow at a time when snow was unlikely and getting it and then going four-wheeling in his orange pickup truck.

I have taken several of the sermons that he preached during his time at Sky Valley Bible Church from audio cassette tapes and placed them on the Sky Valley Bible Church web site because I find myself referring back to my recollections of his teachings over and over again. These include preaching on:

• eternal security
• the exclusive priesthood of Jesus
• the meaning of propitiation (1 John 4:10)
• the meaning of repentance (probably not what you think)
  
• the fact that Jesus lives in each of His children
• the need for believers to restrain themselves to keep themselves from pontificating and making people feel guilty over things that don't matter
• the need for believers to deal with bad behavior in the church
• the fact that Jesus is the King
• the need for believers to walk with Jesus all the way through the end of their lives
  

Pastor Dale has his own ministry which he calls Reaching Men Ministries which takes men (not too many at a time) away from normal life (often to some sort of wilderness) and talks to them about regular old things and things of eternal significance because many to most of the deep conversations that Jesus had with his disciples took place during such excursions.

I learned something new about the Pollyanna movie

Today my mother requested that I drive my little brothers to the library and that I wait there with one of them for an hour. I pulled out my computer and decided to read a sermon called "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" which was written by Jonathon Edwards because Mark Driscoll stated explicitly in his blog that Jonathon Edwards is the "greatest theologian that America ever produced" because of the aforementioned sermon which Mark Driscoll described as "America's most famous sermon." I.e. I decided to read America's most famous sermon because I had never read it before.

I read the first twelve or so pages (of eighteen in the format that I found first) before I had to drive my brother to another location. When I returned I decided to find the first sermon scene in the pollyanna movie because I was reminded of it by my earlier reading. As I watched it, I decided that sermon therin had obviously been taken from "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." I got on the internet and found it to be so.

So I just realized that the first sermon in the Pollyanna movie is really not as bad as the movie tries to make it out to be. It is just incomplete, i.e. just about all of the content of the Pollyanna sermon is contained in the first 12 pages of the "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" sermon and it ends with "Yes, death comes unexpectantly! Amen." and says absolutely nothing about Jesus or anything that he did or does. So it is a good 90% of a sermon, but makes people uselessly miserable. At the end of the movie, all of the sermons are preached exclusively from the happy texts and are even more useless than those previous. If you are at all interested in knowing why both of these components are required in these proportions, I recommend reading or listening to Hell's Best Kept Secret.

I guess I do find it interesting that Disney made money off of making fun of America's most famous sermon way back in the sixties when it was supposed to be so clean and moral.

Spring Break

I get to type about spring break! Of course I can't make you read about it, but that is just the downside. Again, the upside is that you can't stop me from typing about it.

My car was full during the trip from Pullman to Seattle. That means that I got paid so that the trip to Seattle didn't really cost me anything. I left on Friday the 10th. I found out that my car traveled 27.5+ miles every time it consumed a gallon. I didn't even get my car in a wreck! Wow.

I helped my grandmother move to assisted living on Saturday. I went to church and visited with friends on Sunday. I scheduled an interview on Monday and went shooting. Yesterday I had my hairs cut by my sister and ate dinner with her and watched the Cosby show. Today I had a different interview and went on a run with my brother. Me, me, me, I, I, I. When I left Pullman I was hoping for two interviews, neither of which were confirmed. Now I have finished one, confirmed another and am hoping for yet another. I should be praying to Jesus about these.

Re: So what do you do for sex?

You may have noticed that my little brother replied to my VIP posting. Being a young teenage male, he wanted to know how I responded when I was asked, "So what do you do for sex?"

If I remember correctly, this response went something like this: "Nothing." Of course this man couldn't believe that and proceeded to question me further regarding masturbating and a particular homosexual act, both of which he praised because of the pleasure he said that they brought him. The visit ended directly after he asked me to remove his pants from his body.

I told the activities director that I would only put up with so much of that kind of preaching before I began some preaching of my own and we agreed that I would cease visiting that individual. I think it is interesting that some of the men there are glad that I am in Jesus, some are just glad to talk to someone, but some want to have sex with me.

Perhaps some later posting will include my reasoning for believing that masturbating is wrong. I guess I will just say that the power that God continually provides for me so that I can avoid masturbating is a great assurance that I really am in Jesus and that He is taking care of me and that He will continue to do so even if I die. I think that since I am living a (nearly) superhuman lifestyle, Jesus must be living in me. I tried to stop without His help multiple times. Each was unsuccessful.

So yeah, if anyone cares to know more about my experiences with masturbating and Jesus changing me, I will share with him (or her as the case may be).

Families

I had a most unexpected pleasure yesterday. Let me tell you all about it.

I was going over to the home of my friend who is married and has one child. He and I and perhaps the rest of his family were about to go shooting because I have not practiced in a very long time.

As it turned out, no shooting was done. His family piled into a small SUV with me and met another family and drove up into a recreational area at a relatively high elecation and played in the snow.

After the playing in the snow was done, we all returned the the home of the second family and rode unreliable trail bikes around the lawn. I had never driven a motorized cycle before and I tipped mine over and now I have a bruise on my right shin. I really didn't know what I was doing. It was good that I stayed off the road.

I was invited to dinner at the same home. It was during dinner that I realized that all three of the children that lived there were exceptionally well behaved, but also fun to watch (most people would say "cute").

If I understand right, their father is an elder in the church and is quite concerned about making sure that he is above reproach. He is quite conservative and goes further than I would, but I wasn't about to disagree with him unless I was asked, since I was enjoying his hospitality.

It has just been so long since I have seen members of a family pay so much attention to each other. It was kind of interesting to look at it and think that I could have a family just like that soon (like in five years or so).

The Nuart

This is kind of fun. I just arrived at the Nuart Theatre in Moscow Idaho where I talked to that one kid about Jesus two weeks ago. I can hear one man sharing his testimony with a lady at the next table. I arrived with my computer, but without my power supply and without my mouse. My onboard touchpad mouse has not worked since I had to take my computer apart so that I could replace my power jack, so I am relying upon my keyboarding skills entierly. I guess it is good that I don't plan to be here for longer than the two hours that my battery is supposed to be able to last.

The Nuart is great for a whole load of reasons:

1. You don't have to buy anything
2. There is free internet
3. There are lots of Christian books that you can pick up and read or buy
4. On Tuesday nights the owner plays his guitar and his harmonica and he is quite good. Some of the songs are about Jesus, but some of them are not.
5. There are free movies to watch on Friday nights.

Again, the Nuart used to be a theatre, but it is set up as a book store, a coffee shop, a theatre, a concert venue, and a church.

Missions

I went to a Career Expo at the University of Idaho on Wednesday. I had to go three times: I went the first time and realized that I had forgotten my resumes. I went the second time and eploited the career fair. I went the third time on Thursday for an interview. I mailed the thank you note yesterday.

As I walked around the Expo on Wednesday, I was quite suprised to see the Operation Mobilization booth. I have been on the Operation Mobilization boats and heard about their missions work previously. I talked to the recruiter about a trip this summer.

In church on Sunday I got to listen to Dr. Fred VanGorkom who graduated from Washington State University (which I am now attending) and heard all about what God has done for people in Eithiopia.

These two instances have got me to thinking that I should ask God to give me a job for the fall and to let me go on a mission trip to someplace this summer. I have never been on a mission trip except to Canada with my dad. I didn't really see anything new and different as far as people or God there.

VIPs

All that typing about girlfriends in my last post reminded me that I have some things to say about girlfriends:

One day I was visiting a nursing home here in Pullman and I was visiting this one guy who asked me if I had a girlfriend. I answered him directly, "No." His response was, "Then what do you do for sex?" I thought to myself that if I ever have a girlfriend, I should probably not go around saying, "So and so is my girlfriend," because if I do so, people will think to themselves, "Joshua has been having sex with So and so." You know, going around and saying the equivalent of, "So and so has been having sex with me," just wouldn't be very nice for dear sweet So and so.

So I decided that I needed to come up with another term for the significant other that Jesus may or may not give me later. Of course I realize that if such a term catches on it will doubtlessly become corrupted like all sorts of other terms have, e.g. girlfriend didn't always mean "female meeting sexual needs," but I guess that all I care about is that it doesn't become corrupted until after I am through with it, i.e. until after I become married.

So I did come up with a term and you have already read it in the heading: Very Important Person. Whenever I introduced my "girlfriend" to someone I can say, this is So and so my VIP and explain why I don't want to call her my girlfriend.

The End of an Era (and other pictures)

I think that this first picture sort of represents what I have been and what I will be as far as image goes. In the past there have been a number of things--like shaving and cleaning my face and wearing clothes that look somewhat acceptable instead of clothes that just work and not wearing a crash helmet in unorthadox places--that I thought I would change someday when I needed too, like after I had a girlfriend who cared about how I looked. Now I am thinking that I will have to change all of those things before I get a girlfriend so that I can get a job as a professional and keep it from one day to the next. So yeah, that is what the black helmet represents. The car in behind me in the picture represents the relatively normal image that I will probably wind up with.

These other pictures are images of me and my roommate fighting with foam broadswords. His skill is superior to mine.

The Author of (our) Salvation

This posting includes a lot of rambling. If you want to read the part about the author of salvation immediately, skip down to the third to the last paragraph.

Last night (night of 02/22/06) I went to a place called the Nuart Theatre in Moscow Idaho with my roommate who is named Warren. A man named Eric Engerbretson owns the place and plays his guitar and sings and plays his harmonica in the lobby on Tuesday nights from 9 pm to 11 pm. The lobby is used for selling Christian books and coffee and soda. The auditorium is used for concerts and free movies and church services. Last night was an unusual night from my perspective.

I didn't want to work on homework, but I wanted to access the internet while I was there so I packed all my computer things into my backpack. Warren and I traveled the eight miles between Pullman and Moscow in my car which I call the Illuminate 2. I imagine that I will post an entry about the name of my car later. I parked the Illuminate 2 and noticed that I had left my backpack at the house that I live in which is called The Embassy. I don't really know how The Embassy got its name. I thought to myself, "I guess I can just sit and listen to music and read a book." I got started with a book called Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis and read through the whole first entry (Screwtape Letters is a fictional compilation of instructional letters written from one fictional demon to another regarding the deception and capture of members of the race of men), but while I was reading, Warren made contact with the people playing chess at the table next to me. He got me set up to play a man named Reed. I beat him easily because he made three mistakes and two of them were made consecutively. We played a queen's pawn opening. I fienchetoed my queen's bishop and I had one diagonal and one file clogged up by my queen's pawn. I gave him a half hearted excuse to get it out of the way and he fell for it (probably thinking that he had some really clever plan). Then he fell into a fork between his rook and his king. He moved his king to the wrong spot and I made it a fork between his king and his queen, the latter of which he lost. I went on to win the game.

Warren decided to play with him next (since I wanted to quit while I was ahead and it was Reed's board). I began to talk with the man that Reed had been playing with while I was reading the Screwtape Letters book. This man's name is Nate. I asked Nate about his house and found out that he used to live in a fraternity but that he moved out because the people there drank too much. I asked him how much drinking was too much. After a bit of discussion, someone mentioned the Bible and the reference in Ephesians about not becoming drunk came up. I went on to ask him about whether or not he belonged to Jesus. He told me that he considered himself to be saved. I asked him why and told me that he considered himself to be saved because he had quit a lot of his sinning since he began college. I kept asking him questions about sin and how it should be dealt with and how God should deal with it because I was trying to get him to tell me that the work of Jesus is the basis upon which Jesus can justify a sinner, but he never mentioned Jesus. I had to set him straight and I pointed out Acts 4:12. He invited me to his Bible study and I'll probably go at least once because there may be other people like him attending.

I just don't very well understand how people can think that they are saved and explain their salvation without mentioning Jesus who is the only savior.

If you don't have any idea what I am talking about, then please take some time to learn Hell's Best Kept Secret. I didn't think it would change my thinking before I heard it, but I was wrong and I was glad to find out.

Romance

I plan to start with a list of things that I think are romantic. I don't mean the romance like that involved when a husband gives his wife a gift or even makes sure that she never has to visit the gas station or park her car in the driveway in front of a garage full of shop tools. What I mean is the romance defined as

A mysterious or fascinating quality or appeal, as of something adventurous, heroic, or strangely beautiful--dictionary.com

1. Static on analogue radio or television, expecially on the AM commercial or amateur band on the signal of a DX station (I probably picked this up from my amateur radio experiences)
2. Walking along the shoulder of a highway
3. Wrecking a car and walking away knowing that I did all the right things to avoid the wreck (this probably comes from Star Trek III)
4. Broadswords (I think that the reason that swords seem so romantic may be that God invented them. Genesis 3:24)
5. Driving at night because it kind of emphasizes the difference between walking and driving.

I guess I'll camp on this one because I can't seem to think of very many more. When a person walks from point A to point B, he sees just about everything between those two points. When a person drives between the same two points, she never has to think about most of the things between them; it is like she has jumped into hyperspace or has climbed into a discontinuity machine and doesn't really know what happened. Sometimes a person will ask me how I got from one place to another and when I tell them, "I walked" or, "I ran," that person will look at me as though the origin and destination were light years apart. A person driving at night sees even less than a person driving during the day, perhaps as little as white dots in pairs, white lines, and yellow lines.

Parents

As I was typing my last post (the one about influences) I thought to myself, "I should honor my parents by expanding my mention of their positive influence on my life."

So here I go:

I guess I will begin generally. I have never been arrested, I have never caused anyone to become pregnant, I am not addicted to smoking, drugs, excessige food or alchohol, pornography, masturbating, or anything else that I can think of, nor am I in great financial debt (i.e. I owe them some). So for starters, let me just say that my parents have not caused me to fall into many of the foolish habits that many parents introduce to their children.

I will continue discussing the negative side: As the movie Polyanna points out so explicitly, a person's bad points are easy to find. In a way I have often been unhappy with my homeschool pre-college education. When I become unhappy about this I remind myself that even though I had never had a day of formal high school instruction, I tested into college classes as a result of all three my community college's pre college tests: reading, writing, and mathematics. This is more than half the people taking the same tests can do. This was a direct result of my parents teaching.

It is quite possible that my dad had a strong influence on my decision to become an engineer. He became a mechanical engineer after attending a community college and the University of Washington. I am about to become a civil engineer after attending Everett Community College and Washington State University.

I just realized that my memorization of hundreds of Bible verses in the Christian and Missionary Alliance Bible Quizzing program was a result of my mother's influence. When I was entering the eighth grade my mother told me that I should begin Bible Quizzing. I did not want to begin Bible Quizzing and my dad said that I was learning enough Bible from Awana, but it was decided that I had to try it for a year. After attending my first quiz meet, I determined to continue Bible Quizzing until I had to stop at the end of high school.

It is because of my father's instruction that I received real teaching from real teachers at a community college before spending loads of money at a four year university. My father received the same instruction from his step dad and I have seen second hand the discouraging consequences of attending a four year university engineering department straight out of high school.

Come to think of it, my mother's father is indirectly responsible for my memorization of hundreds of Bible verses because he led my mother in Bible Quizzing when they were both younger than they are now.

I don't really know how to end this. Perhaps by saying that instruction has saved me a lot of trouble.

Proverbs 4:13
Hold on to instruction, do not let it go; guard it well, for it is your life.

NIV