To Myself

2011 is a new book. Let's take a look back.

You messed up plenty and got better because of it. You taught yourself things the hard way, like running blindly into each piece of a wall until you felt a door with your face. You learned things the easy way too, sometimes. You've stretched and grown. You have done some goods things. Don't forget that. Your efforts are not in vain, and they are appreciated.

I have to be blunt though, while you've done much, there is a huge difference in what you're accomplishing and what you're capable of. Don't waste potential. Don't waste time. Time is precious. Resting is important, but don't take breaks - earn them. School is tough, life is busy, but the wonderful thing is that those things don't prevent you from breathing praise and living for Jesus every second.

Do not let yourself forget the lessons of this weekend, and of 2010. Knowing leads to loving leads to obeying leads to abiding leads to abounding. Every step is important, you've tried to skip ahead long enough. Stop. You cannot profess what you do not possess.

Repenting is not (only) begging forgiveness. Wherever you got that silly idea, I do not know. To repent is to turn away. To change. To do a different, better, more beautiful thing instead. Let's be honest, sin is fun, but God is infinitely bigger and better. Sweating over sin only gives it a mental foothold. So don't. Live your best; God takes it from there.

You've always been a man of careful thoughts, plans, ideas. Now is the time to start really putting action behind them. Do hard things. Demand (of yourself) the mountain, and don't wheedle out of it when it turns out to be even harder than expected. In fact, rejoice when it does. Rise to the difficulty and then rise right above it.

Feeling warm fuzzies don't stop you from being lukewarm. Meaning well doesn't stop it either. You must choose it. Every day. Every hour. Every second. Every action. Every breath. Don't let up. Don't be held back by anything, least of all yourself. Fall down seven times, get up eight.

Each moment is a test that you get to take one time and only one time. Life's a song you can't rehearse. Life is a stage, play the best part you can. Life's a dance you learn as you go, so show 'em a new move.

Isn't it ironic that you need to take life less seriously? It's about the process at least as much as the end result. Concentrate. Be adaptable. Be ready. Expect God to surprise you; He certainly hasn't stopped yet. Accept your finite mind. Plan only as far ahead as you must. Leave room for faith.

Put your heart in it. The intellectual part of you doesn't know how that makes a difference, but you know it does. If it matters to you, it matters. So care about it. Get excited. Get angry. Get hyper. Get sad even.

Start things. Don't tell people that you're going to start something - that's a waste of time you should already be doing it! Make it a week without giving up or slowing down before telling a single person. Encouragement is too precious as it is - stop using it as fuel, as bait, as the goal.

Right now, your grad school applications are the giants you face. You've delayed, stalled, cowered. Get over it. If it wasn't hard, it wouldn't be worthwhile. Give your indecision up. Make a choice, walk forward in faith, repeat. Trust God to slam doors in your face when needed.

Alright, that was heavy. But important. We can wrap up more in character with something related but lighter. Take it away Brad Stine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iu4OrWiPWsM

Beyond The Rules

I think if I were writing a book about being a Christian, I would put all the commandments and rules on the first page. Maybe that's not practical, but the first chapter at least. Not because they're important though, and I'm not denying they are important, but to get them out of the way. Living a life for God is so much more than rules, but that's what we often focus on.

We had a good analogy at the Winter Conference. Imagine you're going down the highway, on your side, following the speed limit (or as close as you usually do), and suddenly a semi comes straight down the road at you, going 80 miles an hour. He's obviously doing the wrong thing, and you're following all the rules. You might think it's his responsibility to avoid you, and you'd probably be right. Dead right. The point being, following the rules isn't always enough, is it?

I don't know about you, but one think I always heard from my mom growing up is "I can't tell you everything you can't do. I have to teach you what you should do." Of course as a kid, that's not fair at all. If I don't know I'm not supposed to do something, how can I be in trouble for doing it? I believe that's what rules are about. Think about most of the Ten Commandments. All these "thou shalt not"s. We get some ground rules for living right, but are following all of those enough to be a 'good person'. No, not really. We should follow them, but there are plenty of ways to sin without breaking lying or stealing, aren't there?

That's what I'm starting to open up to in my faith right now. The rules are the very first step in living right, and they're a relatively small step in the whole journey. This morning at H2O, I got this message straight from Jesus in Luke. Chapter 10 if you want to take a look, I won't copy it down here. It's the parable of the good Samaritan, but we're taking a look at something that isn't pointed out as much. At least I'd never heard or thought about it before today. Go ahead and read it through, starting at verse 30. Done? I hope so. We get the picture of loving your neighbor, of helping people, and that's a great thing! But you don't need to hear that part from me.

The first two men that pass by, the priest and the Levite. As is, we might think these people were busy or didn't want to trouble themselves, but it's a little deeper than that. Priests and Levites were some of the highest and holiest people among the Jews in that day, and these people are just coming from Jerusalem, the holy city. They want to stay pure by God's law. You can find in Numbers 19 (the latter half specifically) that touching a dead person makes a person unclean. These men saw a collapsed body on the side of the road, and their teachings said they should go around it. Think about this!! If you are paying attention, this should be blowing your mind! I'm bouncing around in my own head still from this morning. The priest and the Levite were following the Bible, they were obedient to the very word of God...AND THEY WEREN'T DOING THE RIGHT THING. This example is straight from Jesus! What?!

This is the next step! The rules aren't everything! Rules don't define Christianity, no matter how much we try to make them sometimes. Following Jesus is about LOVE. If we love our God and we love everyone, the rules fall away in an instant. It's so simple, and it's just like Mom wanted. If you live right, you don't need to worry about the rules! If you love your neighbor, are you going to want to steal from him? Lie to him? Kill him? I daresay no, unless you have a vastly different sort of love than I know.

This isn't just my extrapolation here, take a look:

Matthew 22:37-39 - Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' "

and here's the real kicker:

verse 40 - "All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

So don't just take my word for it. Don't just take my word on anything, please. I'm just a guy, trying to do the best he can. Questions, comments, insults, anything, throw them my way. I want to hear from you all too. Grace and peace be with you all.

And then there was woman...

We’re looking at Genesis 2b, and I’ll go ahead and define that for you as verses 15 through 25. God just finished preparing the garden of Eden and puts Adam in it. (This is a more detailed account of the sixth day of creation, by the way. Adam has been created, but Eve has not yet.) For some reason, this makes me think of dragging Adam over like in the Sims or something. God figures Adam might be getting lonely. I’ve never heard this passage focused in on, so it’s understandable if you think this is right where Eve comes in. After all, “it is not good for man to be alone” is like the slogan verse for marriage, right? Well, not yet.

The first thing God does after saying that is create the animals and place them in Eden as well. God brings them before Adam so he can name them all. (What a job!) Look close at verse 20 here. Out of the NASB, “the man gave names to all the cattle, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him.” So God knows Adam needs companionship. The first thing He gives to Adam is all the animals, but that’s not the kind of company Adam needs. More creatures then you can probably imagine, and none of them filled Adam’s need. Then only after all of that is when God creates Eve. Adam calls her “bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh”.

So that’s cool, right? Adam’s got a wife so perfect, it’s as if they were made for each other. And yes, that’s exactly what they were. You may hear this brought up in the context of marriage, and that’s fine and good, but I see an image that goes beyond that. I see a snapshot of relationships in general and how God intended them. If Adam was supposed to be superior or the ‘master’, any animal would do. He could have got an old dog and sat on the proverbial porch. This isn’t what God created us for though. The only companion that will suffice was another human being, an equal. Another rational, intelligent person with a will of her own. Sadly, that’s not how men (or some women for that matter) treat their significant other, is it? Men and women are different, despite whatever modern political correctness might try to stuff down your throat, but even in our difference, we were created equal. Of course, God has a lot more to say on that subject, but I felt this was worth mentioning since it’s the first picture of relationships, right as the first two humans are made.

That’s all for today. As always, please comment if you have thoughts. Then again, if you don’t have thoughts, you might want to see help about that. Also, the take-home question for today is: A did Adam and Eve have belly buttons and B what difference could it possibly make to us today? Stay tuned for when I share a little of my takeaway from the retreat. (Not involving belly buttons.)

Well with my soul, not with my body

Well, I was too sick to attend church today, so I'm taking a little my and God time to get a little further in my projects. Relatedly, I believe it's high time for some coverage of Genesis 2. Also, I've added a subtitle to my blog that I think describes it fairly well. I'm just one guy wandering through the Bible. I've had no formal training outside of many years of sunday school, and I don't think I really need to. So these are my thoughts, and you can take them or leave them. Commenting on either the blog or the Facebook mirror is encouraged. I don't mind disagreement as long as you can do everyone the favor of remaining civil. But enough blather.

So Genesis 2. One theme you see a lot here is something I forgot to mention in Genesis 1. I stated that God talking means we listen. Or at least we should. We all know that doesn't always happen. But then in the Bible, you'll see repetition. In a perfect world, or at least with perfect people, that wouldn't be necessary, but God knows it is. It's like He is pointing out "you should be taking in all this stuff, but this part you really need to get". In chapter 1, you see it with "and God saw it was good" which I already addressed, not once but seven times by my count. That just reinforces how perfect He created everything.

The repetition in chapter 2 is less blunt. Read the first three verses slowly. (This will be in my verse of the weekish for a while.) See it? The trend continues through the chapter, but look at verse 3b real quick: "in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made". Does that sound redundant to you? It should. We just read that God made everything, so what's up with that? Just think about all the theories out there today from gap theory to theistic evolution. God isn't giving a whole lot of room for misinterpretation here. This is God's work that He created and made. Not this is some stuff that God found floating around and decided to look after. Not this is some stuff God set into motion with itty bitty bacteria and then sat back to see what would happen. This is God's work that HE created and made. He is responsible for every last atom of creation, and we should treat it as such.

The implications of that are enormous in scope, but we've got a whole Bible to go over how. I'm going to wrap up this post now, but I'm not even quite finished with Genesis 2. I want to give the second half a post of its own, so I will do that some time in the future.

JP out

Do Not Adjust Your Monitor, We Are In Control

If all goes smoothly, I have magically linked my blog into my Facebook notes. Did I mention I have a blog? Tis true, and now I can do double duty with it. There's a couple posts on it before this, so if you want to check it out, there's probably a link somewhere attached to the note, but I'll pop a URL right down here for your convenience:
http://daytodaycrisisoffaith.blogspot.com/

There's not a lot of interest, just ramblings of me that some may have already seen, in more or less the default appearance. If you're into the whole RSS scene, you'll be able to grab that there. If you don't know what an RSS is, don't worry about it. If you are reading this looking for another of my quiz notes, don't sweat it. Those will most likely return in the coming school year. They'll be regular notes since I don't really want them to leak into my blog. Because! I think I finally have a direction for my blogging. I have a couple projects which I would like to keep track of via this. Wrapped in secrecy, I'm only going to fully reveal it/them when I get far enough that I trust myself to follow through, but the part I am beginning on tonight is something I've wanted to do with the blog for a while. I'm a bit of a pack rat when in comes to church bulletins, and in looking through my collection, I've got the feeling that I have a few cents worth to share on a lot of them. So what I'll be doing periodically (not guaranteeing regularity though) is talk about the topics and incorporate my own thoughts. I think I may even put together my own thoughts about random Bible passages without old sermon inspiration. If this idea doesn't interest you, tough cookies. You've been warned, and if you don't want to read, by no means do so. But if you do, I welcome it and your (civil) comments.

Segue out of intro to my first of hopefully several if not many Bible Blurbs. (If you have a better name, I'm open to it. I don't want to call them sermons or lessons, so that's the best I could do.) The topic today is Genesis 1, please turn with me to it now. Generally speaking, I'm not going to copy down more than a verse or two. I encourage use of your own copy of the Bible. If you do not have one, I suggest A) getting one, B) using biblegateway.com, an excellent website (with a sorta clunky search engine) and/or C) talking to me. If you don't have the means, I will find a way to get a copy of the Bible into your hands if you have a need. But yes, Genesis 1.

I was looking through it the other day myself, and these are my thoughts. A lot of people know the first chunk or so, and even more know the gist. God makes things, calls 'em good, makes some more things and yay, we've got creation. It's an easy chapter to skim. After all, we know this part already, right? Well, I don't think so. Not only is all scripture useful for all manner of things (2nd Timothy 3:16), but think about it for a second. The Bible is God's word, and when God speaks, we ought to listen. Not listen to just the rules or the happy parts or the proverbs, listen to every single word of it. So that's what I did, and I hit something kinda neat.

You may be familiar with it: after every day, God sees that it (being the day's creation) was good. One the one hand, of course it's good. God just made everything, even still got that new creation smell, of course it's good. But think on "good" for a moment. These days, the word is pretty bland. We mean it the same way we mean "decent", "ok" and a lot of times "good enough". Is that what brand new creation was like? Good enough? Not likely. When God sees that it is good, He doesn't mean fine or ok. This is the God so holy that a single sin cannot enter His presence, the God so perfect that our earthly bodies would not survive the sight of Him. When God says it's good, you'd do well to believe it was good. Perfect, awesome, faultless, that kind of good. Not "I did a pretty good job on this paper, I should get a passing grade" good, not "we'll call it good" good, this is God good.

Doesn't stop there though. We'll go on to see what happens to this beautifully good creation, but I'm not going that far tonight. I will highlight that it's a grand set-up, planned by the Writer Himself. The two things I personally take out of these thoughts are firstly that, for God's part, the world would be pretty awesome if there wasn't all that sin out there mucking things up. The other is, if we can look at the stars and flowers, rainbows and sunsets and still see the beauty and wonder, how much better were things when He made them? It's a cool thought to imagine a fraction of the glory we'll have to look forward to in Heaven, isn't it? I certainly think so.

That conludes the re-inaugural post of this, my blog. Follow along with me if you dare. I'm going more public because I want to hear from all y'alls, so don't let me down. For now, this is JP over and out.

And So What We Have Learned...

applies to our lives today.
God has a lot to say,
in His book.
And so we know that God's word
is for everyone
now that the song is done
we'll take a look.


No particular reason for that besides my inherent insanity. It's kinda catchy if you hear it enough times...

So here's my first late post. Not that I guaranteed they happen every Sunday, but that's what I'm aiming for. It appears I have the option to change the time displayed for the post, but that would be downright dishonest. As far as excuses go, I've got a halfway decent one. Being the procrastinatory prodigy that I am, I managed to put off studying for my 8am Monday final until 10pm Sunday night. I had this three night plan all worked up and ended up just completely disregarding it. It was a math course, so there were a fair amount of things to study too. It ended up fine, I hope. The exam seemed to go well enough anyway.

As for the sermon yesterday morning, it was a fairly mellow deal. I was back in my hometown this weekend. I'm not saying it's better or worse, but the services there have a lower energy level than those I've been attending at college. In any case, I'll be getting back used to them as classes end this week.

The message I would rather talk about today was one I listened to in the evening. There was a youth get-together thing going on, and I tagged along for it. My verse for the week (Ecclesiastes 9:10 for late-comers) ties into what the speaker spoke on. He talked about being where you are. It sounds a little strange just like that, but it's a pretty serious topic. A lot of the time when we're at work or class or even just with friends, we aren't there mentally. We could be day dreaming, planning out the rest of the day, worrying about upcoming projects or any number of other things. The important part is that whatever they are, they're keeping us from being where we should be.

This topic strikes pretty close to home right here in college life. Way, way too often, I find myself distracted in class. With a laptop and more or less campus-wide wi-fi, it's pretty hard to stay grounded. Even though I have this absurd (and frankly annoying) tendency to score well despite the numerous reasons I don't deserve to, it's starting to catch up. Classes are fast placed and info packed, and a habit like that could prove to be my academic undoing. Heaven knows it should already have by now, but it hasn't yet. This summer, I'm going to try to steer away from the laptop a little more often. Even if it means playing more video games (oh the agony) or something, my hope is that it will help wean me off.

Out for now. I'll probably send the link to here out soon, hopefully with next chapter of my infamous story. ;)

Woah, woah, woah. I almost forgot my interesting thing for the week (not that this will probably end up being a trend). I saw a couple of old dudes at my campus this week. I saw them twice on the same day. The first time, they were walking down a sidewalk with a couple shopping carts filled with medium-sized boxes. At this point, anything I (or likely you at this point) thought was terribly flattering or anything close to the truth. As I passed them, I saw a stamp on one of the boxes that read "Gideons International". Quite a different situation all of a sudden. The next time I saw them, they were outside the library (where I work) and would ask passing students "can I give you a copy of the Bible?" When I went past, I smiled and told them thanks, but I had my own back in my dorm room. It was really nice to see them out there.

Zero Post

Well, here goes a lot of nothing. I don't really know what I'm going to use this for yet, but I figure I've got a good idea to start out at least. Maybe I'll make a habit of it, it's been known to happen.

Brief intro here: I'm JP (and I'd like to keep that way if you're commenting, try not to laugh too much), a fairly antisocial Christian college freshman. This year has had a lot of ups and downs. To be honest, it's been heavy on the downs, but that's another matter. My current goals in life are to graduate with a double major in Computer Science and Mathematics, learn to play the piano to at least some mediocre level, restart a certain story and find a decent summer job (if it's Wal-Mart again, so be it, but please no Dairy coolers in mid-summer). I'm toying around with having a mustache, but as a little secret between me and whoever bothers to read this, it's more out of me being too lazy to shave on a regular basis than anything else. I have an inflamed liver for some obscure reason that will hopefully be cured soon as it gives me a good deal of pain on random days (lets just say I have a deeper understanding of what the term 'gut-wrenching' means than I ever wanted to).

Anyway, on to the real post. I've decided to start out on a good Christian note and reflect on church today. I waited until tonight about equally out of procrastination and with the intention of making me think harder about it.

H2O Cafe: This is the college level class at my church. It's a cafe because we get free breakfast with the deal. If that's not awesome, I don't know what is. Today, our leader talked about some pretty happy topics. We hit original sin and the curse, on through to the crucifiction and isolation of Jesus. I am hereby resolving to take notes on future days because I'm sad to say that's really all I have.

Main Service: We sang one of my favorite songs today prior to the service: It Is Well With My Soul.

When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.

It fit right in with the message today too, at least in my mind. The pastor is doing a sort of theme on self-conduct, and today was devoted to the workplace. He tied this in further with 1 Corinthians 10:31 and Colossians 3:22-23. I'll give you the first verse here, but you can look the second up either in my verse of the week, or if you're too late for that, you might just have to grab a Bible of your own. :)

1 Corinthians 10:31: So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.

Ok, so the reason it ties into the song for me is that it directly relates to the concept of joy. Christians have the joy of salvation within us, and in gratitude for that, we should give Him our all in whatever we do. This means doing your job and all that is required of you, but it doesn't stop there. We are to go above and beyond. Not only doing our job, but helping and talking and doing what we can even beyond our job description. Not just when we're being watched to suck up to the boss types, but even with God as our only witness, and isn't that more than enough? I think I'll wrap up be relaying the story the pastor closed with today.

A new doctor in a hospital was going over his last appointment with a senior doctor, for criticisms and advice. After going over that much, the senior doctor says to the younger "One last thing. Did you notice the man who came to clean after you were finished?"
The younger replies "No, I was busy with the files and seeing the patient out."
The senior nods and goes on "His name is Carlos. He's worked here for three years now. He's a wonderful man and can get an examination room back in order in no time at all. His wife's name is Maria. They immigrated here from Mexico 5 years ago. They had a little trouble adjusting, but once Carlos got the job here, it really helped things fall into place. Carlos and Maria have 4 children." The doctor goes on to list the names and ages of all the children. "Now, when I come back to speak with you next week, I want you to tell me something about Carlos that I don't know yet."