Know your world...

I recently found this on another friend's site and thought it was amazing. If there was ever a time to know about the Middle East it's definitely now. This is a test to see whether you know the geography of the area or not. It includes North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia. I've been there twice and I still had some trouble figuring it all out...see how you do. Here's the link: http://www.rethinkingschools.org/just_fun/games/mapgame.html

Slacklining

If you could map out all the people who slackline in the world and put me and my friends somewhere on the spectrum of talent we'd fall near the back. There's so many ridiculously amazing slackliners out there (backflips) but the mere fact that there's few people who do it makes us look good. Clark and I went out on Sunday to the park on Canyon St. and set up a long one. Pretty soon we had a nice little crowd around us. Whatever works. These two high schoolers came up, broke out their bong and soon we had a nice little convention around us fascinated with our every move. They asked us what we did for a living and I told them I worked with kids at the church down the street. One of them told me he was a quaker, but didn't know what communion stood for and wanted to. We shared some Jesus with them and they listened for awhile. I ended up giving them my number and telling them (plus all the others around) to stop on by and I'd buy them lunch. Hopefully they'll come. That's how it works sometimes.

Today...

Lately I've been thinking a lot about the word "today". It should be my life theme....who knows. As people, and especially as Americans the idea of the future is drilled into us constantly. Plan ahead, be smart, go to school, get a job, set goals, etc... While all this is good to a certain degree, we get obsessed by it. When we look at our character, we can easily apply this same principle to the formation of ourselves. The thought process goes something like this: "someday I'll be a person of character...I'm going to map out how to do that right now and act as if I already am because that's what any respectable person should do." The problem with this thinking is similar to saying that I want to build a skyscraper but I can't get past thinking how awesome it's going to be someday. That's all good and fine, but the reality is there is a lot of work to do between then and now. Each individual brick, support beam, window, bathroom, air duct, and light is going to need to be constructed before it looks remotely like a finished product. This process takes a long time. It takes having to wake up every morning and get up the motivation to work hard for that day. Take this back to ourselves and the formation of our character. The same thing applies. Every morning you wake up you can make the choice on how you want to live your life and who you're going to live it for. God and other people, or ourselves? Can we patiently let the Lord work out his plan through us?

With a million stones, hard labor, and time you can build the Great Pyramids.

Tozer

"The red bloodcells are like faith: they carry the life-giving oxygen to every part of the body. The white cells are like disbelief: it pounces on the dead and toxic matter and carries it out to the drain."
-A.W. Tozer, The Root of the Righteous

Misunderstood

I was sitting in Starbucks the other day reading and a group of 10 or so high school students walked in the door and sat down at a table near me. They were talking about whatever it is that high schoolers talk about and I couldn't help but sit there and listen. Earlier, I had been thinking about the fact that whether you believed in Jesus or not, he still remains one of the most misunderstood figures in all of historical account. No other name evokes the imagery or response that JESUS does. In America, you can't walk down the street and meet someone who hasn't every heard of Jesus in some form or fashion before.

I was going to give a talk later that night to hundreds of middle school students about Jesus, and I got to thinking that it would be a good idea to ask the high school students sitting near me some questions as I was formulating what I was going to say. I got up out of my chair, went over to where they were sitting, and said: "hey guys, can I ask you some questions? I'm giving a talk to a bunch of kids tonight about Jesus, and I want to know if you were one of them, what questions would you have for me about Jesus?" At first they thought I was selling them something, but when they realized that I just wanted to know their thoughts they started opening up like crazy. I got everything from: "how much does Jesus bench press?" to "was Jesus black?" to "what WOULD Jesus do?". They asked a lot of questions about what he said, will he come back, and was he God. It's funny because all of their questions are answered in the Bible (besides the bench press question). I feel like there are more opinions floating around out there about Jesus than any other person who ever lived, but at the same time there are 4 accounts that go deep into exactly what he did. I know that people contest the authority of the Bible, but I don't think that's the real problem as to why people don't know what Jesus was all about. I think it's because we don't bother to take the time to read about him. I hear people say all the time that they don't mind Jesus, they just don't like Christians. That's unfortunate and sadly true a lot of times, but that is weak excuse to not believe what Jesus said. If it was just you and the Gospels on a desert island, I think you'd think a little differently about what Jesus is actually about.

the reason...

for the season. How many times have you ever heard that phrase about Christmas? It's true that we totally forget (or are completely sick of hearing about) what Christmas is about. It's not that we don't care, believe it, or want to think about it, it's just that a lot of people get sick of Christmas 2 weeks into December. We've also heard about it so many times in our lives, its really hard to sit and be moved while remembering an event that took place over 2000 years ago. When we try and remember it, our thoughts are dominated by little Nativity scenes, Christmas carols, snow, Santa, and Christmas Trees...it all can be distracting. The month leading up to Christmas is called Advent, and I really doubt 98% of people really knows what that means. I didn't, so I did a little research. The word Advent comes from the latin word adventus which comes from the greek word parousia which refers to the Second Coming of Christ. That's confusing. Simply put, Advent is a time that not only is supposed to remind us of the historical event of Jesus' birth, but is also to remind us that he is living and will come back again. That was the original intent of the Christmas season. We don't just remember something that has come and gone in the distant past, get some sentimental feelings and open presents to feel happy...we remember that Jesus didn't leave us alone. He came to this earth, and he's coming back again. That changes the meaning a little bit...

Soccer Game

Maybe they should lower the stadium ticket prices......