Quote of the Day

Odd, the way the less the Bible is read the more it is translated.
C.S. Lewis

Charlie Ward turned Anti-Semitic?

I found a comical/unbelievable comment while "researching" (wikipedia style) tonight. Thumbing through College Football happenings in history, I came across an entry for Charlie Ward - the only Heisman Award winner to play in the NBA - I say "why not play football", but whatever. Reading through the article I was surprised at his great integrity and clean record until I came to the heading of...

Controversy

In 2001, while a player for the New York Knicks, it was discovered that Charlie Ward had made some disparaging comments about Jews during a Bible-study session, comments that were eventually leaked to the press. Among the comments made: "Jews are stubborn... tell me, why did they persecute Jesus unless he knew something they didn’t want to accept... They had his blood on their hands."^[1]

There was an expected amount of outrage directed at Ward from Jewish groups, as well as the Knicks organization and the public at large. Ward defended himself by indicating that "I didn't mean to offend any one group because that's not what I'm about. I have friends that are Jewish. Actually, my friend is a Jewish guy, and his name is Jesus Christ."^[2] He also noted that the quotes were taken out of context, as he had stated that "Jews are stubborn" in speaking to what he perceived to be their disinclination to convert to Christianity.^[3]

"Lord Willing"

I have always been taught to say "the Lord Willing" when I spoke of future plans in my life. This was not necessary a "lesson" that was drilled into me, but shown by example. I would always hear it, and have grown to respect and repeat it. It is one of those phrases that hits me just about every time I hear it (along with "I'm Sorry", "thank you for this day", and references to God (especially overstated in our prayers = using the name of the Lord in vain?? think about that one for a while). Thoughts of "what does that really mean" or "do I really mean that" invade my thoughts.
Just today I was given a simple reminder of the true emphasis of this statement. When after saying "Lord willing" the person I was talking to responded "He is willing to accomplish, are you willing to put forth the effort?" The thought really sunk in. Am I giving the effort necessary to accomplish my God-given goals? Reading through the passage that this phrase come from, I am reminded of what our life is all about - bringing glory to God.

James 4:13-16

Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit." 14 Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. 15 Instead, you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that." 16 But as it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil.

John Piper shares application to this pledge of "Lord Willing" with these remarks in Education for Exulation - Beginning and Ending with God

1. Education for Exultation means educating our children to have a true view of life as a vapor and a true view of God as governing how long we live and what we accomplish. Our aim is that they not be arrogant, but that they exult in the sovereign love of God, through Jesus Christ, who died for them and rose again. These pledges that we are about to make are not mainly about a building; they are mainly about a vision of God. God is sovereign. God governs our lives - their length and their achievement. He does it with a good and wise hand. He does it with a view to exalting Jesus Christ whom he sent into the world to save sinners like us. We want to teach this to the next generation and to the neighborhood and to the nations. To that I pledge my life and my money.

2. Corporately, as we make our pledges - which are simply prayerful financial plans, as James says, "to do this or that" - let us say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that." If the Lord wills, we will be alive to give our pledge. If the Lord wills, we will have the resources we have pledged to give. If the Lord wills, my heart will have these purposes of generosity (1 Chronicles 29:18, "O LORD, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, our fathers, preserve this forever in the intentions of the heart of Your people, and direct their heart to You"). Let us honor the truth of God in the way we think about our pledges and the way we talk about this ministry of giving.

3. Let us remember how wonderfully secure we are in the confidence that it is God who finally governs our lives - God and not chance, God and not our enemies, God and not disease, God and not the devil. I, for one, am very glad that my life is in the hands of an all-loving, all-wise, all-powerful Father. I pray that in the Gethsemane evening of my life I will be able to say with Jesus, "Not my will but yours be done," and then, "Into your hands I commit my spirit." Rejoice in this. You are immortal until God's work for you is done.

4. Finally, since your life and your accomplishments are ultimately in the hands of God, then he is able, in ways you never dreamed, to help you fulfill your pledge and provide every need besides. Philippians 4:19: "My God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus." 2 Corinthians 9:8: "God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed."

History of Religion in 90 Seconds

Simply a must see. See the history of religion in 90 seconds from mapsofwar.com. Krishna, Abraham, Buddha, Christ, and Mohammed. I was just thinking about how an Eastern would view our so-called American Christianity that is "confined" to our continent. Very interesting.

Overhead Cam Falls Onto Field in Seattle

I just had to laugh when I saw this article. I've always wondered what players thought of this "thing" floating above their heads.

An overhead NBC television camera mounted on wires collapsed onto the turf during a timeout in Sunday night's game between the New Orleans Saints and Seattle Seahawks, causing a 10-minute delay. The Saints had just called timeout with 11:24 remaining in the first quarter when the camera slumped and then fell a few yards from where the Seahawks were huddling. After the camera was righted somewhat off the ground, it fell again—and nearly hit Bobby Engram as the Seattle receiver was walking to the sideline. Referees then cleared both teams from the middle of the field while the network got the camera back up to normal height. As the camera moved up and down the field for testing, Seahawks coach
Mike Holmgren looked up at its every move with his mouth agape. When the camera moved to the sideline, Seattle's players all cleared out from beneath it. After a 10-minute delay, the game resumed with the camera parked above the Seahawks bench area—with players and coaches making sure they did not stand under it. Just before the game resumed, referee Jeff Triplette announced: "If any live ball were to touch the wires overhead, there will be a replay of the down, by rule."

Yet another thought for the day

You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing that we call 'failure' is not the falling down, but the staying down. ~ Mary Pickford

Thought for the Day

[God] is not proud...He will have us even though we have shown that we prefer everything else to Him. C.S. Lewis

This stuff happens?

While it seems like our American heritage would scream for this recent action of the House of Representatives, how often do malicious attacks on our leaders get 'washed over'? I feel like saying to the House, "Thank you for being American"


House overwhelmingly condemns MoveOn ad

The House passed by a wide margin on Wednesday
a resolution that condemns an ad from liberal advocacy group MoveOn.org
that referred to Gen. David Petraeus as “General Betray Us.”

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In Remembrace of Friday

Take a look at this summary of the average Joe.

Working closely with many non-Christians on a daily basis, I have been able to observe closely an interesting religion to which my co-workers adhere. I speak, of course, of their complete and unending devotion to the god Friday. The day of worship for the barbarians is, as one would expect, the fifth day of the week, which I presume to be named after this god. The entire week of labor is done to the glory of
Friday...

read more "Observations on a growing and influential cult" @ Immoderate

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A Kid's Life: Watertown

Today, my bro's and I just went out for a cruise around Watertown. It was like a flashback to the good ol' days we had as kids when we thought Watertown had EVERYTHING. After stopping by the bank (and asking for candy suckers) we had to make our regular trip to Vinnie's (St. Vincent De Paul Thrift Store for the less fortunate who haven't discovered it yet). Upon entering we were pleased to find that all clothes were 50% off - woohoo!? and so were all computer products - anyone need an extra copy of Encarta '97 or possibly a black/white 11" monitor? I could swing you a deal for something like . . . 50 cents. We grabbed our free loaf of bread and chatted with Mrs. McCarnan. After taking a quick glance at the board games we browsed the bargain room - ya, they have a discount room at a thrift store = go figure! We actually walked by the shoes and clothes, but didn't find anything (recent findings were a pair of Florsheim's for $2 and Nike sandals $1.25 - now that's a deal). All-in-all today we spent $0.53 for two LP Records. If you know anything about Watertown or Wisconsin, you know we love our cheese. Kraemer's is right next to Vinnie's so we stopped on in to grab some cheese spread. After driving through our old neighborhood we recounted the memories of our paper route - dogs, slips, tips, freezing cold, etc - we could still remember every house and whether they did/didn't get the paper. Our last stop was to Tom's United Foods. After walking through a few aisles we realized that the monster-of-a-store that we traversed as kids had somehow shrunk to a mini grocery store??? Passing by the deli we all noticed the Lunchable shrine and remembered the good old days when you were automatically inducted into the "upper class society of 2nd grade" on the day that your parents bought you a Lunchable to take to school - these days usually came on field trips for me.
Ah yes, life as a kid. Wasn't it wonderful?

One Shining Moment

Highlights from the 1999 Tournament. UConn beat Duke in one of the best college basketball games of all time.

Clutch

Spring Break

This Spring Break - I'm chillin' with Marc and Luke, working and having a fun time. This pic is Marc playing guitar this summer. I own a guitar too, but don't play it that much. I just found some guitar tab sheets from some of my favorite songs so I might get back into playing.

March Madness - already my brackets getting messed up - where's all the upset's. This is like March Mediocreness

Daily Reading and Dramatic Reading of Hebrews 9 and 10

http://www.gnpcb.org/esv/share/ical/

I know its the middle of February, but in case you're like me and have already lost your place in your reading plan, here's a cool link. If you check you Gmail daily like me, this integrates a daily reading into the google calendar


also, check out this video - really amazing - the powerful Word of God - AMEN

Ryan Ferguson recites Hebrews chapters 9 and 10

It really made me think about the temple worship and how Christ has become our High Priest. How AMAZING is His love!

Heb. 10:19 "Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near."

Bible Map

http://www.biblemap.org/

I just came across this website that integrates the Bible (ESV or KJV) with Google Maps to show locations. This is a really neat tool. Check it out.

Here's the about section:
"BibleMap.org is developed by the duo at He Lives Ministries (HeLives.com). The motivation for developing the site was simple. Create a free Bible atlas which harnesses Google maps. We hope this site will be a blessing to you and possibly help make the living book of the Bible more alive in your life."

How Great is our God!

Yesterday was a wonderful day to worship God. Matt and I went to Cottage Grove Baptist Church and thoroughly enjoy attending. Here's something crazy - I'm teaching Greek to the people - now that's scary! I really should know something, but its good review for me too. For the Greek lesson I reviewed the Alphabet. Some of the people are really getting into it. Next week I will take a big jump and talk about sentence structure.

For Sunday School, Pastor has been going through the book of Romans. We are currently on vv. 17-18 about our inheritance in Christ. It has been a great series and I like the questions (or study guides) that he passes out the previous week. He gives me 10-15 minutes after the lesson to teach Greek. BTW –we had one new visitor, an elderly lady from the area. She just got saved a few years ago, but is very knowledgeable. She had visited a church in Madison and Pastor Mayhak (another church planter in Madison) let Pastor Brill know about her desire to be in church. Jordon, Daniel and Pastor were able to make a ramp to wheel her into their van – what a blessing!

Sunday morning Pastor reviewed the entire book of I Samuel. It was so neat to go through the book again. He had been going through chapter by chapter and I loved the review and seeing the big picture.

The afternoon meal was a great meal of chicken and all the rest. It was so good! Matthew spoke on wisdom in James and we started calling people for the “Phones for You” program. We have almost 125 contacts that we can send information to. We have 10,000 contacts in the Cottage Grove area that we are calling to ask if we can send information. It’s a fun adventure and great practice for future ministry (Lw).

When we got home from church I really felt like going to Calvary for the evening service. I got on the church website and is said the message was about the “(2^nd) Most Important Decision of Your Life” from Gen. 2, Marriage. I loved going. It was true worship. A group sang “Amazing Love” that was sweet. It was also cool to get to see people that wee haven’t talked to for a while.

All in all – One sweet day.

Strange Sight

I was driving down Main St. last night and I saw the entire downtown blacked out - wierd. I felt like I was in a movie and someone was about to rob a bank. It was pretty cool. I have to admit, it was the perfect setup, only five blocks were without power (no street lights or stop lights, businesses including the the Police station were without power), a semi was idling two blocks away to steal all the money and there was not a cop in sight. Sorry, I've watched too many movies, but it was cool for the moment.

Back to the blog

Yeah . . . so its been a while since I've posted anything. My roommate has been writing almost everyday on his blog so I thought I would revisit mine and actually start posting. I never really understood the point of a blog, but I better understand it now that I've read a couple, I guess I like the idea. So, I'm back in the game.