I am experiencing long periods of time without any profound reflections.

I'm guessing it's just a function of having next to no leisure time. I still haven't had time to read "Leisure, the Basis of Culture" by Josef Pieper.

I was elbowed in the lip by Josiah during a ferocious bout of MMA roughhousing. I had his left arm bent behind his back and was leaned over within range of his right elbow. The way I see it I had it coming, it was a good move, and he apologized, so no hard feelings. It was a hard enough hit where I stopped to check for chipped teeth afterwards, and put ice on my lip. Brandy made fun of me for being concerned about having a fat lip at work, so that none of the little students would see me all deformed. It's true, I am vain. I pray often enough that the Lord won't punish me for vanity by allowing me to be disfigured or hit on the head enough to consign me to janitorial work, but rather that he would remind me of my vanity enough so I can take measures to keep repenting.

China hacked my email. Don't know if it has anything to do with the new Ipod Touch I got, but I wouldn't be surprised. They sent emails selling electronics (I think) to all my contacts. Alphabetically. I would think that someone smart enough to hack my email account would be smart enough to realize that nobody buys electronics based on spam email advertisements.

Reading through Revelation + commentaries to see if I can hammer out a more solid understanding of what I believe about the "Eschaton" (smarmy academic word for "end times/things, but they don't all think it has anything to do with time.)
Some things really irritate me about academia.

1.) I think the purpose of big words is so we can use fewer of them and be more specific. Academics use big words like magicians use smoke and flash powder - to stun and mystify, and to make clear things obscure.

2.) They are extremely nearsighted. The minutia that higher level academics occupy themselves with (especially in liberal arts) are incredibly dull and subjective.

3.) Trend-driven. They all jump on the same ships of opinion. Sometimes there will be two opinions which function like the US party system (They make a lot of noise and are both wrong). If a theory isn't "in", it is almost always dismissed or ignored, usually as "outdated" (if it's ever been held before - doesn't matter if it's ever been refuted). It's as bad as fashion. And I'm not just talking about creation/evolution. They do this with everything.

Well, I could list more but that's taking a lot of space.

Brandy & I (If the Lord wills) are going to Jammu in August for about a week. I'd hoped to be there longer, but very happy to have the opportunity, we've been talking about this for years.

And to sign off, here's a video from the Ipod of us at Discovery Park beach.

I feel like I'm being given a raw deal at work,
as if my failings are magnified and others' overlooked
but what can I do?
compare myself to other men?
and expect justice on the earth?
If I have wronged, however small,
let me bare my back for beating
as my earthly masters see fit
and God help me to know
from the blood in my bones
that even this
is not to my credit.

If there is injustice
in unequal measures
of bureaucratic wrath
then let it be
for my True Master
to search out.

Let your blows inside the blows of men
and purge my inmost heart
to serve you in all things
with a clean conscience
and a pure will.

God, I entrust myself to your judgement
and I trust fully in your mercy
if there is vindication
to be had
from the scars and twistings
received from little kings,
then let it be
for you to raise up
and cast down.
Until then,
I'll wait.

I never heard a wage-based insult until I started working at a private (Christian[?]) college. A co-worker of mine was insulted between swear-words the other day with "you make $8/hour!" (we make considerably more). The inebriated speaker apparently thinks that making 8/hr is a reason to hang one's head in shame, probably because his daddy's patched his every boo-boo with a big fat check. The poor kid somehow equates wage with intelligence, character, or ability.

I pity the fool who thinks that this (wage=worth) is the case. I'm making close to twice what I've made at most of my previous jobs here, yet I don't think of myself as any more or less worthy to walk the earth because of it. It's a job that I enjoy and that I'm grateful for, and that's it.

How do these people live? Even more puzzling, how do they remain in the upper classes of society? By pure snob power?

Part of me longs to fulfill the proverb "Strike a scoffer, and the simple will learn prudence". Unfortunately, most institutions of learning have abandoned this effective teaching technique.

And so, I am left to apply the message of my last blog. Even though it wasn't even me being insulted.

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On another note, the other day I had to go down the hall and confront the hispanic gangsta-guest-of-our-neighbors that's been ogling my wife when she does laundry. It's hard to warn people who don't speak English, but I think he got the idea.
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Well, I just got out of the night shift, and now need to write a paper on the difference between Romanesque and Gothic art for a class I have in two hours. Tuesdays are rough.

Unlike our pachydermous friends, we must forgive.
"bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive." - Col 3:13.

Now there are a host of things I constantly remember when I meet certain people, things ranging from minor perceived slights ("complaints") to large onslaughts of nastiness, which I must decide what to do with.
Most of the time I hear the demonic audience in the colosseum of my will chanting "kill!" (or something less dramatic but still ill-tempered) and giving the thumbs down as I face/remember people and choose how to think about them. And then the Holy Spirit chimes in with verses like this one.

After reading it, I decided that God's being really generous here. It says "Forgive, as the Lord has forgiven you". However, I don't think I can. Not that I don't think I can forgive someone, I don't believe that God asks us to do things He doesn't give us the power to do. However, when Jesus forgave me, I was 100% in the wrong, and He was faultless of all transgression, against me or anyone else. I will never face that situation. No matter what trivial thing anyone's done against me (and honestly, I can't think of anyone that has done me a terrible wrong. People have done terrible wrong to my friends and family yes, but people seem to pretty much leave me alone in the "terrible wrong" department) I will never be 100% innocent when faced with the decision (and command) to forgive.

"Who has ever given to God, that He should repay him?" - Good question. I am perpetually in His debt, but he asks me to follow in his example of forgiveness, even though he forgave from the moral high ground, and the only people I'll ever have to forgive are transgressors like me.

Watched Avatar a couple weeks ago.
I came out of it feeling like I haven't felt for a decade or so, that old feeling I used to get after reading a really good sci-fi or fantasy book. It's a mix of excitement and low-grade melancholy produced by the fact that the world we live in is much more boring than the one I'd just been immersed in. The melancholy wasn't near as bad as it used to be though, since I was thinking about the New Earth, and how likely there would be comparable landscapes in my future.

Heard some christians complaining about the "occult" or "new agey" themes in the film. I used to do the same thing (quickly criticize movie philosophies that I didn't think were "christian"). But I've found it slightly annoying this time around, partly because I think it's silly to expect pagans to make a "christian" movie, but mostly because I didn't see what was un-scriptural about most of the movie's themes. I think concern for creation should be a christian trait, and it's irritating when I see and hear christians ridiculing compassion for animals or conservationist actions that really are just good stewardship. I don't think it's christian at all to kill animals for fun, or to slash and burn, mine, or otherwise ruin swathes of earth for convenience's sake. I think a big theme in "Avatar" was a critique of destructive greed - covetousness. Scripture says covetousness is Idolatry.
If it wasn't for covetousness, there would be almost no abortions, since abortion rates are driven by a covetous desire for "reproductive freedom" and a unfettered lifestyle full of things and opportunities that a child would get in the way of, as well as the covetous desire of the abortion industry for the cash kickbacks of their dirty business. Covetousness is the root of most other sins, the Lord Jesus even said "be on your guard against all kinds of greed, a man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions". I think this is one of the biggest things christians need to hear today in wealthy countries like America. I know I need to keep hearing it. I have about 20 shirts, and more books than a third-world library. I have a computer that costs more than many people make in a year. It's too easy to buy stuff online that I don't need, it's too easy to feel like my life consists in the abundance of my new purchases.

I also think it's good for people to have their imaginations expanded, to see beautiful things. It's too easy to let the grind convince you that it's all there is, and to get too wrapped up in the trivialities of the here and now. So a sub-theme of biological pantheism doesn't really scare me. Especially when the pantheism functions more like theism, and the "god's" name is an phonetic anagram for Yahweh. It scared me to hear christians laughing about torturing animals, or talking about deforestation and strip mining like it's a scriptural mandate.

All that to say, I really liked the movie. It's the best story I've watched onscreen in a really long time, it ended just like I wanted it to, and it made me happy to live in the great state of Washington where we have a rainforest just a couple hours away!

It has been the fifth conversation with a ministry leader who's asked you to lead a home fellowship and said they would call the people who would come - and they don't. After that happens three times, you ask if you can call them. By this time the list you're given has shrunk to 3, one of whom is the HF coordinator. Your name is finally on the HF list, but your wife's name's misspelled as a man's name. You talk to the families, and they say there must've been a mistake because 1. they were told they were in another HF, and 2. Your HF isn't on a day they signed up for. This is all very embarrassing. You ask the Ministry leader what's going on, they say they'll take care of it and call you. 2 weeks later, they ask you how the home fellowship's coming along (they never called). You say it's not. They ask if you will come to theirs. You say yes, with relief that it's over and with restrained annoyance that it's taken so long to come to this.

"You" is me. I am trying not to be annoyed. The only thing of comfort that came to mind is Joseph to his brothers: “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good"

So if Joseph can say that to his brothers, who sold him & meant it for evil, then I how can I be angry @ a brother who didn't mean his unreliability and cluelessness for evil at all?

May God help me have an attitude like Joseph.

Regarding my last Blog.

It seems like when I come up against an apparent problem like the last one, or like a couple years ago with my questions about the apparent irreconcileability of the Gospel resurrection narratives, I have a problem. I tend to friek out a bit, and in my frieking out I transgress in a way that Job did not. I come very close to accusing God. I talked to Brandy about this, concerned because it doesn't seem right, and yet my upset-ness is the thing that drives me on for answers. And seeking and finding answers I am convinced is a good thing that pleases God.

Brandy said that the only thing that came to her mind was "Work out your Salvation in Fear and Trembling"; a passage from Philippians that I assumed I was familiar with. So I typed in "Fear Trembling" into the Biblegateway search engine, and the NT verses that came up all have to do with approaching God in one way or another (in one case approaching a servant of God). The Phil. verse in particular follows up this phrase with "Do everything without complaining or arguing"

So this, I believe, is my problem. I need to find a way to approach these things with fear and trembling, since in approaching them I approach God. Somehow I must maintain a strong desire for answers, but to avoid my flippant flirting with annoyance towards the LORD God almighty - who could squish me very righteously and easily, but has not yet.

So, I repent in dust and ashes and ask my God and Father to forgive me, and I ask for you, dear reader not to emulate my bad attitude of the past, and I ask finally for a more reverent heart to seek answers to future questions.

The Horrors of Customer Service

And the Wonders of Forgiveness.



I don't Know what else our apartment management and Fedex could have in common, but their customer service is one at least.

For the past three weeks ago people have been helping themselves to our parking spot, and we've (for the most part) not been able to catch the people going in or out of their vehicles. So it's been a tossup whether or not we're parking in the "visitor" spot every time we pull in. Half the time it happens when I'm away @ work, and the interlopers stick around until morning. We decided that most of the traffic came from the drug dealers a couple apartments over.

And Fedex was supposed to have delivered Brandy's new Macbook two days ago, but the pkg tracking has for the past two days read "Delivery attempted, residents not home or business closed" which is bogus since we've been doing little else but sitting home looking out the window for the FedEx truck, which never came. So after about five or six calls to their cust. svc line, with five or six different stories and excuses (none of which agreed with each other or made any sense) And three calls to Apple, I discovered that the contract Apple has with Fedex for deliveries dictates they're not allowed to talk to each other (what the heck?!?). So they can't help us. After another couple of calls to Apple I got a guy who gave us a 50.00 credit - nice of him- saying that I could go down to the FedEx hub and pick the pkg up, (which by the way, FedEx was adamant that we couldn't do) So I drove down there anyway in desperation to find a real live person to talk to. I did, a woman @ the actual FedEx office across the st. from the FedEx "home delivery" office (apparently they're private local contractors who work for FedEx but aren't really Fedex employees) who told me to call them again and have them hold the pkg tomorrow and she would go with me down to their office to straighten it out. Then I stopped a Fedex home deliver courier I saw parked in a lot and asked her if she had my computer, (she didn't) and she gave me some useful info that cleared up some of the babble we got over the phone. I've concluded that to people on the phone, the voice on the other end is just that - a voice, some kind of annoying noise that you've got to get off the phone as quick as possible by whatever means necessary. Talking to people in person is so much nicer. And so are the people.
So tomorrow I'm supposed to go down there and pick it up.
Also, I've nearly given myself an ulcer getting angry and frustrated over all this, even after Brandy & I had a talk about forgiveness and when someone has you carry something for them one mile going the extra, how Jesus told us to deal with ppl who step on our "rights", but I forgot in just a day, and went back to working on my ulcer, but today I was reading through James 4 which I was assigned to teach out of for Youth ministry, and the first part about why we get angry - because we want something and don't get it... Yeah. So I got better and prayed with Brandy, who I'd influenced over the past couple days to the point where she was upset and ulcery too, and we read through our Psalms & Proverbs for the day until it all got washed away in the great Antacid of Faith in a faithful God.

So.
I spent the better half of yesterday "fixing" our deck.
For the past month, dog feces, dog urine, cigarette butts, ashes, and a mysterious white slime have been dripping on our deck from the people upstairs. After I asked, they scraped the actual piles of crap off their deck, but enough fecal matter and urine were still crusted in the cracks for swarms of flies to want to make OUR deck their home. We've not been able to go out on our deck for the past month because of this, and I've talked to the management 3 times about it. The first time they sent someone out to power wash it, the second time they said they were going to power wash the upstairs neighbor's deck as well but didn't, and we were still left with a stank-nasty unuseable deck. Brandy convinced me to buy a kiddie pool to put out there after she said she cleaned it off and it hadn't rained for a couple days. The kids played in it, came in smelling like dog piss, and in the morning there were ashes floating in the pool. So for the third time I went to the management and asked them to provide a permanent solution, or let me put up some sort of barrier and reimburse me. They said OK to option #2, so I went to Lowe's and went to town. A very kind brother in the lord let me borrow his truck for the day while I worked on the project, and when the day was done, we had a very decent looking second roof made of corrugated polycarbonate sheeting. All for the low low price of 250.00. I wrapped the receipt up in a letter detailing what I expected them to reimburse me and options for reimbursement. Brandy delivered it this morning (she said the woman at the desk didn't look very happy at the figure, apparently she thought I was just going to drape a tarp over our deck to loosely funnel the excess piss towards the edge of the deck. I have a missed call from her on my cell, but aside from the cordless drill that I bought to finish the project, I'm committed to making them pay for it all. They agreed to it beforehand, they haven't done anything effective despite my repeated requests, since they haven't done anything, my kids have been exposed to animal waste, and the deck smells like it, so does the area of the carpet directly in front of the deck door, and really, I could have charged them for labor! It took me half a day to finish! That's not my favorite way of spending my day off.
So, if you could spend five minutes and pray that they would see reason and reimburse me for the whole thing without any trouble, that would be great.