We're in for it.
When Jesus was being crucified, and was walking down the road with Simon of Cyrene carrying his cross, a crowed was following him, along with women who were crying.
He said to them:
"Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep for yourselves and for your children. For the time will come when you will say, 'Blessed are the barren women, the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!' Then:
'They will say to the mountains, 'Fall on us!' and to the hills, 'Cover us!''
For if men do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?"
[Luke 23:28-31, quote from Hosea 10:8, NIV]
The women in Luke were crying because Jesus was about to be put to death.
They might have been followers of him, but then again they might not have been.
And notably, he was crucified by the religious leaders of the time; these were the people that the Jews revered. And here they are, the (puppet) government, killing our savior.
Jesus told them not to cry for him; rather to cry for themselves and their children.
Why?
Roman times were decent.
True, the romans took over every country they could dump a couple infantry units into. But the Romans knew [or maybe, had known] how to run a government.
With Roman times came roads, sanitation, cleanliness, order... more-or-less peace...
Times were pretty good.
And when the Roman empire fell, the Western world was thrown into darkness.
(cough, the dark ages, cough.)
Emphasis: the Western World. As in, Europe.
China? Japan? Baghdad?
All perfectly fine. Thriving, even.
While Europe was trying to remember how to wear shoes, the part of the world that wasn't ruled by the Roman Empire was just dandy.
Cut to: modern times.
We have: GPS, Fiber-Optics, cell phones, the internet, full government regulations on the electromagnetic spectrum...
Ask anyone and they'll tell you that "global economy" is a pretty big deal.
America's economy is fully and 100% dependent the likes of China, Japan, Taiwan, etc.
When a little chunk of Serbia breaks off and calls itself Kosovo, the news is instantaneous, and everyone's buzzing about it.
In Roman times, Japan wouldn't have had reason to care about that.
See, nothing can happen in today's world that wouldn't be world-wide.
If one super-power crumbles, the whole world will be set askew.
And all you have to do is take a peek at Revelation to realize what kind of skewing will be going on.
I'm sure that governments will be doing plenty of stuff that will cause people to weep. Incompetence galore. Craziness.
Just ask Luke- the women will be wishing that they never had children.
That time is coming soon... and we better be ready.
Friday, February 29, 2008
Thursday, February 28, 2008
On How It’s All About The Heart
Ch-ch-check it out.
Ezekiel 14:2+3
"Then the word of the Lord came to me: 'Son of man, these men have set up idols in their hearts and put wicked stumbling blocks before their faces. Should I let them inquire of me at all?'"
When Ezekiel wrote that, God was talking about the elders who worshiped idols, and then dared to go to Ezekiel, God's profit, for advice. Obviously, God was not okay with this, and went on to tell Ezekiel that he would turn those people into examples for others not to idolize.
However, reading that passage, the word that seems to poke its head out above the rest is "heart".
He said idols, in their hearts.
When i think of the word "idol", i usually think of some creepy Mayan figurine or something, or them little statues that the Romans used to keep in their houses.
Other people think of Brad Pitt or some hottie like Stephen Hawking.
But that's not necessarily what God meant when he was talking to Ezekiel.
He meant -anything- that we invest our heart in that isn't Him.
So, the usual: money, jobs, celebrities, and ourselves... all can become idols.
That's not good.
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, "You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, 'Do not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.' But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment."[Mtt. 5:21, NIV]
The anger there that Jesus equates to murder is something that you harbor in your heart.
So is the Lust that he talks about in Mtt. 5:27...
"You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.' But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart."
This is how religion turns into a bad thing:
People [take the religious leaders of Ezekiel's time, and Jesus' time, for example] follow religion because they have to, or because it's expected of them, or because they're all caught up in it. But as soon as it turns into empty motions (going to church every sunday, standing like a mummy for half an hour, falling asleep for another half hour, and then going home), you're better off not going to church at all.
This is one of the reasons that Martin Luther got himself excommunicated.
After reading the actual Bible, Luther decided that God doesn't care so much about your outward actions as he cares about your heart.
Granted, actions betray the heart (you can't go murder someone and then try to say it wasn't the will of your heart), but by the same token, you can't expect God to take a fake lifestyle as the real thing.
Learn from the religious leaders of Ezekiel's time. They screwed up 2,600 years ago so we don't have to.
Ezekiel 14:2+3
"Then the word of the Lord came to me: 'Son of man, these men have set up idols in their hearts and put wicked stumbling blocks before their faces. Should I let them inquire of me at all?'"
When Ezekiel wrote that, God was talking about the elders who worshiped idols, and then dared to go to Ezekiel, God's profit, for advice. Obviously, God was not okay with this, and went on to tell Ezekiel that he would turn those people into examples for others not to idolize.
However, reading that passage, the word that seems to poke its head out above the rest is "heart".
He said idols, in their hearts.
When i think of the word "idol", i usually think of some creepy Mayan figurine or something, or them little statues that the Romans used to keep in their houses.
Other people think of Brad Pitt or some hottie like Stephen Hawking.
But that's not necessarily what God meant when he was talking to Ezekiel.
He meant -anything- that we invest our heart in that isn't Him.
So, the usual: money, jobs, celebrities, and ourselves... all can become idols.
That's not good.
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, "You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, 'Do not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.' But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment."[Mtt. 5:21, NIV]
The anger there that Jesus equates to murder is something that you harbor in your heart.
So is the Lust that he talks about in Mtt. 5:27...
"You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.' But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart."
This is how religion turns into a bad thing:
People [take the religious leaders of Ezekiel's time, and Jesus' time, for example] follow religion because they have to, or because it's expected of them, or because they're all caught up in it. But as soon as it turns into empty motions (going to church every sunday, standing like a mummy for half an hour, falling asleep for another half hour, and then going home), you're better off not going to church at all.
This is one of the reasons that Martin Luther got himself excommunicated.
After reading the actual Bible, Luther decided that God doesn't care so much about your outward actions as he cares about your heart.
Granted, actions betray the heart (you can't go murder someone and then try to say it wasn't the will of your heart), but by the same token, you can't expect God to take a fake lifestyle as the real thing.
Learn from the religious leaders of Ezekiel's time. They screwed up 2,600 years ago so we don't have to.
Sunday, February 24, 2008
On Hypocrisy, or, Conflict of Morals
I present you with a couple of pictures.
these are pictures from the LHC, or Large Hadron Collider.
The LHC has been the source of major buzz in the scientific community for the past few years.
What is it?
It's a particle accelerator.
In fact, it's the biggest and most powerful ever made.
What does it do?
It smashes itsy-bitsy pieces of matter together at ridiculous speeds.
As it begins operation in May, particle physicists hope that it will reveal the existence of the theoretical Higgs Boson particle, which is supposed to provide the identity of mass.
Think about that.
What is mass?
most people define it as a measurement of weight, which technically is incorrect; weight is a measure of gravity's pull on mass.
Mass is essentially how much stuff you have.
well, what is that stuff, and how come we can measure it?
exactly.
we have literally thousands of scientists working on these types of questions.
the LHC might also answer many a question about gravity... which is one of those things that most people don't even think about.
look at it another way:
Scientists know that Physics is wrong.
This May, they might actually find out what is wrong with it.
This is big news.
How big?
The LHC occupies a circular tunnel roughly 16 and a half miles long, in Geneva, straddling the border between France and Switzerland.
At regular intervals, there are massive detector units (that big red thing in the second picture) that see what's going on inside that blue pipe.
This gigantic machine has cost roughly 3 Billion dollars.
No where online could i find a number of how much energy it will consume.
However, i do know that it uses a multitude of superconducting magnets- requiring near-absolute zero temperatures.
And the energy required to keep just that is enormous.
Now, the LHC presents the scientific community with the ability to do things that were previously impossible.
As such, we really have no idea what will happen the moment it gets activated.
Among the possibilities for disaster include the creation of miniature black holes that could devour our planet, and the production of Strangelets that could consume our earth.
To break that down, we (yes, the US chipped in) paid 3 billion dollars for a machine that saps enormous swaths of energy, and could potentially destroy our existence.
What we stand to gain is an improved understanding of how the universe works.
AKA, nothing.
Seriously, this stuff makes me sick.
The scientific community is insanely giddy over this thing.
And after we figure out about the Higgs particle, it will be close to worthless.
And i guarantee you, we have nothing to gain from learning what mass is.
Like, there's nothing you can do with it.
"oh, we know that there's a particle that makes matter have mass."
And like, after our society goes the way of the Roman Empire, NO ONE WILL CARE.
BECAUSE THERE WILL BE NO ONE LEFT TO CARE.
people, there are serious, pressing matters in the world.
the ENERGY CRISIS.
GLOBAL WARMING.
THE GREAT COMMISSION.
The scientific community once again presents itself as hypocrites.
These people are the ones pushing the hardest about global warming, and responsible economics, and free trade, and they're the ones obliterating resources for useless gains.
You'd think they'd spend their money on pressing matters.
You'd think they wouldn't want to contribute to global warming and energy dependence.
But instead, they've chosen to ignore their own ethics and ideals in favor of this big particle accelerator.
Why do we still use 100-year-old light bulb technology?
Why aren't we all using Induction stoves?
And seriously, WHY ARE WE STILL BUYING OIL FROM OUR POLITICAL, SOCIAL, AND ECONOMIC ENEMIES?
Maybe if people spent as much money solving important problems, there wouldn't be as many problems left to solve.
it's insane.
it's like, everyone in Western Society drank the cool-aid.
Isaiah 65 states:
"The Lord says,
'I was ready to respond, but no one asked for help.
I was ready to be found, but no one was looking for me.
I said, 'Here I am, here I am!' to a nation that did not call on me name.
All day long i opened my arms to a rebellious people.
But they follow their own evil paths and their own crooked schemes.'" [NLT]
God wants everyone to run to him; to realize the dumbness of their routine lives, shape up, and start living for something.
As it stands, popular belief, especially in hard-left New England, is about as ready to do that as they are to admit that the LHC isn't worth its pricetag or one-and-counting fatality rate.
And that's why we need to show them what it's like to let go of all that and run to our savior.
these are pictures from the LHC, or Large Hadron Collider.
The LHC has been the source of major buzz in the scientific community for the past few years.
What is it?
It's a particle accelerator.
In fact, it's the biggest and most powerful ever made.
What does it do?
It smashes itsy-bitsy pieces of matter together at ridiculous speeds.
As it begins operation in May, particle physicists hope that it will reveal the existence of the theoretical Higgs Boson particle, which is supposed to provide the identity of mass.
Think about that.
What is mass?
most people define it as a measurement of weight, which technically is incorrect; weight is a measure of gravity's pull on mass.
Mass is essentially how much stuff you have.
well, what is that stuff, and how come we can measure it?
exactly.
we have literally thousands of scientists working on these types of questions.
the LHC might also answer many a question about gravity... which is one of those things that most people don't even think about.
look at it another way:
Scientists know that Physics is wrong.
This May, they might actually find out what is wrong with it.
This is big news.
How big?
The LHC occupies a circular tunnel roughly 16 and a half miles long, in Geneva, straddling the border between France and Switzerland.
At regular intervals, there are massive detector units (that big red thing in the second picture) that see what's going on inside that blue pipe.
This gigantic machine has cost roughly 3 Billion dollars.
No where online could i find a number of how much energy it will consume.
However, i do know that it uses a multitude of superconducting magnets- requiring near-absolute zero temperatures.
And the energy required to keep just that is enormous.
Now, the LHC presents the scientific community with the ability to do things that were previously impossible.
As such, we really have no idea what will happen the moment it gets activated.
Among the possibilities for disaster include the creation of miniature black holes that could devour our planet, and the production of Strangelets that could consume our earth.
To break that down, we (yes, the US chipped in) paid 3 billion dollars for a machine that saps enormous swaths of energy, and could potentially destroy our existence.
What we stand to gain is an improved understanding of how the universe works.
AKA, nothing.
Seriously, this stuff makes me sick.
The scientific community is insanely giddy over this thing.
And after we figure out about the Higgs particle, it will be close to worthless.
And i guarantee you, we have nothing to gain from learning what mass is.
Like, there's nothing you can do with it.
"oh, we know that there's a particle that makes matter have mass."
And like, after our society goes the way of the Roman Empire, NO ONE WILL CARE.
BECAUSE THERE WILL BE NO ONE LEFT TO CARE.
people, there are serious, pressing matters in the world.
the ENERGY CRISIS.
GLOBAL WARMING.
THE GREAT COMMISSION.
The scientific community once again presents itself as hypocrites.
These people are the ones pushing the hardest about global warming, and responsible economics, and free trade, and they're the ones obliterating resources for useless gains.
You'd think they'd spend their money on pressing matters.
You'd think they wouldn't want to contribute to global warming and energy dependence.
But instead, they've chosen to ignore their own ethics and ideals in favor of this big particle accelerator.
Why do we still use 100-year-old light bulb technology?
Why aren't we all using Induction stoves?
And seriously, WHY ARE WE STILL BUYING OIL FROM OUR POLITICAL, SOCIAL, AND ECONOMIC ENEMIES?
Maybe if people spent as much money solving important problems, there wouldn't be as many problems left to solve.
it's insane.
it's like, everyone in Western Society drank the cool-aid.
Isaiah 65 states:
"The Lord says,
'I was ready to respond, but no one asked for help.
I was ready to be found, but no one was looking for me.
I said, 'Here I am, here I am!' to a nation that did not call on me name.
All day long i opened my arms to a rebellious people.
But they follow their own evil paths and their own crooked schemes.'" [NLT]
God wants everyone to run to him; to realize the dumbness of their routine lives, shape up, and start living for something.
As it stands, popular belief, especially in hard-left New England, is about as ready to do that as they are to admit that the LHC isn't worth its pricetag or one-and-counting fatality rate.
And that's why we need to show them what it's like to let go of all that and run to our savior.
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
On Poetry
In my english class we're reading a short story by Stephen Crane, called "Maggie, girl of the streets".
its pretty depressing, but well-written.
In class today we looked at a couple (as in two) poems by the same author.
they are both short.
The first is titled, "A Man Said To The Universe":
A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replioed the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
The second is titled, "I Saw a Man Pursuing the Horizon", and goes as such:
I saw a man pursuing the horizon;
Round and round they sped.
I was disturbed at this;
I accosted the man.
"It is futile," I said,
"You can never--"
"You lie," he cried,
And ran on.
I should need to, but i'll explain the poems.
The first is on Man's plea to the universe.
People cry out to the stars all the time.
they want to be recognized by the world.
They want acknowledgment of their existance.
But does the universe care?
how can it? it's just a collection of stars and planets and giant rocks hurtling around through emptiness.
Cold, dark, sterile.
The other poem is on ignorance, for the most part.
Liken it to a dog chasing its own tail.
Futile, yes. Obvious, perhaps.
But the man refuses to accept that he cannot reach the horizon, which is in fact, an imaginary line representing the curvature of the earth.
Since the earth is more or less spherical, that line moves away from you at the exact same speed that you move toward it.
Here's some more poetry.
Psalm 121:
I lift up my eyes to the hills-
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot slip-
he who watches over you will not slumber;
Indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.
The Lord watches over you-
the Lord is your shade at your right hand;
the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep you from all harm-
he will watch over your life;
the Lord will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore.
[NIV]
The universe doesn't give a crap about you.
crying out to it doesn't do you a thing.
If anything, it makes you look stupid.
But God cares.
As the psalmist points out, he watches over us, both now and "forevermore".
Think about that.
The universe doesn't even care that we exist.
But God watches us intently- the way a child might watch an HO scale train run around and around its tracks, setting it straight when it gets derailed.
So crying out to Him might prove useful.
Even better, don't bother crying out to Him.
just trust that He's gonna guide you right on to where you need to be.
As for chasing after the horizon... don't be ignorant.
Don't try to reach goals that aren't possible to reach.
And don't find yourself believing in things that are obviously ridiculous.
Try to see reason.
Stephen Crane spent a lot of his life observing life in the slums of new york, and essentially surrounding himself with despair.
He died of tuberculosis when he was 28, in the year 1900.
What a bummer... i kinda liked the guy.
its pretty depressing, but well-written.
In class today we looked at a couple (as in two) poems by the same author.
they are both short.
The first is titled, "A Man Said To The Universe":
A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replioed the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
The second is titled, "I Saw a Man Pursuing the Horizon", and goes as such:
I saw a man pursuing the horizon;
Round and round they sped.
I was disturbed at this;
I accosted the man.
"It is futile," I said,
"You can never--"
"You lie," he cried,
And ran on.
I should need to, but i'll explain the poems.
The first is on Man's plea to the universe.
People cry out to the stars all the time.
they want to be recognized by the world.
They want acknowledgment of their existance.
But does the universe care?
how can it? it's just a collection of stars and planets and giant rocks hurtling around through emptiness.
Cold, dark, sterile.
The other poem is on ignorance, for the most part.
Liken it to a dog chasing its own tail.
Futile, yes. Obvious, perhaps.
But the man refuses to accept that he cannot reach the horizon, which is in fact, an imaginary line representing the curvature of the earth.
Since the earth is more or less spherical, that line moves away from you at the exact same speed that you move toward it.
Here's some more poetry.
Psalm 121:
I lift up my eyes to the hills-
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot slip-
he who watches over you will not slumber;
Indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.
The Lord watches over you-
the Lord is your shade at your right hand;
the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep you from all harm-
he will watch over your life;
the Lord will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore.
[NIV]
The universe doesn't give a crap about you.
crying out to it doesn't do you a thing.
If anything, it makes you look stupid.
But God cares.
As the psalmist points out, he watches over us, both now and "forevermore".
Think about that.
The universe doesn't even care that we exist.
But God watches us intently- the way a child might watch an HO scale train run around and around its tracks, setting it straight when it gets derailed.
So crying out to Him might prove useful.
Even better, don't bother crying out to Him.
just trust that He's gonna guide you right on to where you need to be.
As for chasing after the horizon... don't be ignorant.
Don't try to reach goals that aren't possible to reach.
And don't find yourself believing in things that are obviously ridiculous.
Try to see reason.
Stephen Crane spent a lot of his life observing life in the slums of new york, and essentially surrounding himself with despair.
He died of tuberculosis when he was 28, in the year 1900.
What a bummer... i kinda liked the guy.
Monday, February 18, 2008
On The Lunchroom Dilemma
Today we're going to be talking about a parable that confused me for a long time.
It's in Luke.
I'm quoting NIV.
Lk. 16:1-15
"Jesus told his disciples: "There was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. So he called him in and asked him, 'What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your management, because you cannot be manager any longer.'
"The manager said to himself, 'What shall I do now? My master is taking away my job. I'm not strong enough to dig, and I'm ashamed to bed- I know what I'll do so that, when i lose my job here, people will welcome me into their houses.'
"So he called in each one of his master's debtors. He asked the first, 'How much do you owe my master?'
"'Eight hundred gallons of olive oil,' he replied.
"The manager told him, 'Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it four hundred.'
"The he asked the second, 'And how much do you owe?'
"'A thousand bushels of wheat,' he replied.
"He told him, 'Take your bill and make it eight hundred.'
"The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light. I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.
"Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else's property, who will give you property of your own?
"No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money."
The pharisees, who lived money, heard all this and were sneering at Jesus. He said to them, "you are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of men, but God knows your hearts. What is highly valued among men is detestable in God's sight."
What i could never understand about this passage is why, after the manager acted even more dishonestly (remember, he's getting fired for wasting the guy's possessions in the first place), the master commends the guy.
Why would Jesus be telling his disciples to be dishonest with money?
The definition that the NIV translators must have had in mind for the word "shrewd" must have been "clever".
What throws me is the next paragraph, when he talks about being dishonest with what's been given to you.
Wasn't that guy dishonest with what was given to him?
Why is he then a good example of how to live?
Jesus isn't telling his disciples to be dishonest.
He's telling them to take advantage of what they can.
I guess the opening of the parable, the part about where he was dishonest, applies to us being trustworthy. But the part about us gaining friends with money applies to the second part.
This guy had the ability to give away a considerable amount of money, and he did to gain advantage, and to plan ahead for when he'd need the favors returned.
That's what Jesus wants us to do.
He wants us to plan ahead... but not for when we get fired.
He wants us to plan ahead for eternal life.
Even your social studies teaching will tell you that money is fleeting, and not to spend your time chasing after it.
Bill Gates is an example of a shrewd person.
He never chased after money... it just kind of fell into his lap.
In giant, uncountable sums.
And for the most part, he's used it pretty wisely.
Sure, his house is ridiculously extravagant, but he's not a greedy person, he's fighting aids, and hasn't bought any countries yet.
But if i were Bill Gates, i'd spend it all.
Not on stupid things.
On things that will matter in the long run.
We're supposed to use our resources for God's work, not our own idiot whims.
After all, whims are pretty fleeting.
The next thing i want to focus on is the very last line i quoted:
"What is highly valued among men is detestable in God's sight."
Jesus is talking here to the religious leaders, about money.
But the line applies to more than just money.
When i went to Somersworth freshman year, the most intimidating thing for me for the first 3 months or so, was the Cafetorium.
AKA, the lunchroom.
I didn't know anyone, so i went out of my way to get to lunch early and get a table all by myself.
And not eat anything.
Eventually, people started to try to get me to be social.
They'd sit with me, let me drink their chocolate milk, and ask awkward questions.
I kept to myself pretty much the whole time.
Now, when i went back to berwick the next year, i knew some people.
But the crew that was the most outgoing was kids from exeter that i didn't know very well.
They got to know me a little bit, and they were pretty cool.
One of the most notable thing about them is that they never dont have a good time.
Anything turns into a joke.
Lunch is a lot more natural when you're around people you know, who are outgoing, who laugh at stuff you do.
I don't sit there this year.
I don't really sit with anyone anymore.
Sometimes i sit with sophomores, sometimes i sit with random people, and sometimes i just dont go to lunch.
This is partly because the other table is too crowded.
But its also for another reason.
When you spend 7 hours a day with people, you get to know their personality.
You might not get to know what their dog's name is, or how often they get their hair cut, but you get a good feeling for what they value and what they hold as important.
So the question then becomes, what do your friends value?
Because like it or not, it doesn't take long for you and your friends to value the same things.
If you went around a lunchroom at most highschools, and listened in on conversations, you probably wouldn't hear a lot of what God values. You'd get more of the "detestable in his sight" stuff.
Get your values on track.
Get your friends to do the same thing... or, get different friends.
Be shrewed in what you have at your disposal.
It's in Luke.
I'm quoting NIV.
Lk. 16:1-15
"Jesus told his disciples: "There was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. So he called him in and asked him, 'What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your management, because you cannot be manager any longer.'
"The manager said to himself, 'What shall I do now? My master is taking away my job. I'm not strong enough to dig, and I'm ashamed to bed- I know what I'll do so that, when i lose my job here, people will welcome me into their houses.'
"So he called in each one of his master's debtors. He asked the first, 'How much do you owe my master?'
"'Eight hundred gallons of olive oil,' he replied.
"The manager told him, 'Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it four hundred.'
"The he asked the second, 'And how much do you owe?'
"'A thousand bushels of wheat,' he replied.
"He told him, 'Take your bill and make it eight hundred.'
"The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light. I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.
"Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else's property, who will give you property of your own?
"No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money."
The pharisees, who lived money, heard all this and were sneering at Jesus. He said to them, "you are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of men, but God knows your hearts. What is highly valued among men is detestable in God's sight."
What i could never understand about this passage is why, after the manager acted even more dishonestly (remember, he's getting fired for wasting the guy's possessions in the first place), the master commends the guy.
Why would Jesus be telling his disciples to be dishonest with money?
The definition that the NIV translators must have had in mind for the word "shrewd" must have been "clever".
What throws me is the next paragraph, when he talks about being dishonest with what's been given to you.
Wasn't that guy dishonest with what was given to him?
Why is he then a good example of how to live?
Jesus isn't telling his disciples to be dishonest.
He's telling them to take advantage of what they can.
I guess the opening of the parable, the part about where he was dishonest, applies to us being trustworthy. But the part about us gaining friends with money applies to the second part.
This guy had the ability to give away a considerable amount of money, and he did to gain advantage, and to plan ahead for when he'd need the favors returned.
That's what Jesus wants us to do.
He wants us to plan ahead... but not for when we get fired.
He wants us to plan ahead for eternal life.
Even your social studies teaching will tell you that money is fleeting, and not to spend your time chasing after it.
Bill Gates is an example of a shrewd person.
He never chased after money... it just kind of fell into his lap.
In giant, uncountable sums.
And for the most part, he's used it pretty wisely.
Sure, his house is ridiculously extravagant, but he's not a greedy person, he's fighting aids, and hasn't bought any countries yet.
But if i were Bill Gates, i'd spend it all.
Not on stupid things.
On things that will matter in the long run.
We're supposed to use our resources for God's work, not our own idiot whims.
After all, whims are pretty fleeting.
The next thing i want to focus on is the very last line i quoted:
"What is highly valued among men is detestable in God's sight."
Jesus is talking here to the religious leaders, about money.
But the line applies to more than just money.
When i went to Somersworth freshman year, the most intimidating thing for me for the first 3 months or so, was the Cafetorium.
AKA, the lunchroom.
I didn't know anyone, so i went out of my way to get to lunch early and get a table all by myself.
And not eat anything.
Eventually, people started to try to get me to be social.
They'd sit with me, let me drink their chocolate milk, and ask awkward questions.
I kept to myself pretty much the whole time.
Now, when i went back to berwick the next year, i knew some people.
But the crew that was the most outgoing was kids from exeter that i didn't know very well.
They got to know me a little bit, and they were pretty cool.
One of the most notable thing about them is that they never dont have a good time.
Anything turns into a joke.
Lunch is a lot more natural when you're around people you know, who are outgoing, who laugh at stuff you do.
I don't sit there this year.
I don't really sit with anyone anymore.
Sometimes i sit with sophomores, sometimes i sit with random people, and sometimes i just dont go to lunch.
This is partly because the other table is too crowded.
But its also for another reason.
When you spend 7 hours a day with people, you get to know their personality.
You might not get to know what their dog's name is, or how often they get their hair cut, but you get a good feeling for what they value and what they hold as important.
So the question then becomes, what do your friends value?
Because like it or not, it doesn't take long for you and your friends to value the same things.
If you went around a lunchroom at most highschools, and listened in on conversations, you probably wouldn't hear a lot of what God values. You'd get more of the "detestable in his sight" stuff.
Get your values on track.
Get your friends to do the same thing... or, get different friends.
Be shrewed in what you have at your disposal.
Friday, February 15, 2008
On The Matrix
This blog's been distilling since a few weeks ago, when i talked to a kid at my school.
I said, "hey, whats up?"
and he said, "Wit, i haven't talked to you in a while... i hear you've become religious... that's cool."
That hit me hard.
In a bad way.
It was a wake-up call.
I've gone to a pentecostal church for my entire life.
How come people at my school don't know i'm a christian?
So i was going to write a blog about that.
until a few days ago.
I turned on AMC.
It was the Matrix.
I love the matrix; it's one of my favorite movies of all time.
So naturally i watched it all... and something struck me as incredible.
The Wachowski brothers, the guys that wrote the film, made one of the most influential "cyber-punk" dystopia films of all time.
But they certainly weren't trying to make an excellent inspirational film for christians.
For those of you who don't know the Matrix too well, haven't seen it, or were utterly confused by it, here's a rundown:
A computer programmer nicknamed Neo is active in the hacker underground.
His entire life, he's had this weird sensation: he knew that there was something wrong.
There was something more to the world than what he knew.
In the hacker subculture, there's word running around of a so-called "matrix".
It's only a buzzword, and in fact, no one actually knows what it is, except for the elusive Morpheus, who is one of the greatest hacker guys of all time.
Neo finds a way to meet this guy.
And what happens is mind blowing.
Neo wakes up bald and naked on a ship hovering in an underground sewer system.
The year is 2200.
Morpheus explains to Neo that, along with the rest of the population, he had been living inside a computer simulation; in reality, they were inside a farm.
A human farm, that used people for energy to power the Machine society.
The Matrix was a false reality that was designed to hide what was actually going on.
There was something much, much bigger than what Neo knew; there was the whole world.
Morpheus took the wool out from over his eyes.
Now, coincidentally, Neo is the only person that can save the world.
Him and the rest of the rebellion members can insert themselves back into the matrix, so that they can interact with it and try to get more people to join their cause.
except Neo is different.
When Neo is inside the Matrix, he isn't bound to its rules.
He can bend them, and even break them.
He can fly, dodge bullets, stop time, and walk through walls.
But before he figured out how he could do all that, he had to realize that the Matrix wasn't real; none of it existed. By focusing on that fact, he could do anything.
The only thing that could stop him was Agent Smith.
Agent Smith is a program on the matrix that is omnipotent.
He can do anything he wants.
He has infinite power, and can make a whole army of himself on a whim.
He has a weakness, though.
Where Neo can break the rules of the system, Agent Smith must follow them.
And while Agent Smith is bound to the Matrix, Neo can leave and go back to reality, with Morpheus and the rest of the rebel movement.
Now i'll bet you that out of all the people that have seen that movie, 85% of them have said, "I wish i was Neo."
After all, Neo is like the ultimate hero.
But the best part?
WE ARE NEO.
don't you get it?
The Matrix is real.
We're in it.
This world?
Sure, if i cut off my arm, i don't have an arm anymore.
But there's so much more to life than this measly, smelly planet.
There's a whole planet full of people sitting in tanks, being mulched for energy to feed the Devil.
That's Agent Smith.
He has full reign over the earth.
Except he's also bound to it.
And guess what?
We aren't.
Not only that, but we can break the rules of the earth.
In Matthew 21:21-22, After Jesus totally owned a fig tree, he said, "I tell you the truth, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, 'Go, throw yourself into the sea,' and it will be done. If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer." [NIV]
Paul Meaney said it a different way: "With a word we can drown a mountain"
See??
We're Neo.
With Faith, we aren't confined to the boundaries set on the Earth, because God can do anything.
I think that theres no reason Christianity shouldn't appeal to people who play games like D&D, or spend their lives with their noses in sci-fi books.
You don't need to pretend to be part of a rebel cause that's trying to uproot a force that's destroying humanity.
We already are.
We're a band of rebels, huddled in a ship with fingers trembling over an EMP-blast trigger, because the Machines are attacking us.
We're Neo, going head-on with the Agents, and with a little bit of belief, we can take down anything.
We're Morpheus and Trinity, recruiting new members to the cause, showing people that the wool has been over their eyes their entire life.
And one day, Jesus is coming back.
The enemy will be defeated.
Everyone will realize that they had no idea what reality really is.
Go watch the Matrix.
Monday, February 11, 2008
On Childness
I live on a dirt road.
As someone from Somersworth once said, "It's depressing".
It isn't really depressing, but when it rained, and i got off the bus and had to walk 700 feet to get home, it was rather dreary. (Mind the Gap.)
Anyway, since i've lived here since i was 3, i've grown up with potholes in my daily life.
Probably the most annoying thing about living on a dirt road is when you come home from long road trips, and you have to pee really really bad, its like, "yay, i can pee... oh crap, we have to go over the road first."
Then for 45 seconds you get this horrendous jarring sensation that comes with driving over potholes.
Then you can finally go pee.
It's more strenuous than it sounds, trust me.
There's something else about potholes in a dirt road, though.
When it rains, you get these great mud puddles.
Their not really mud puddles, per se, but they're puddles filled with muddy water.
As a kid, i can remember wanting to go outside when it rained an jump around in those mud puddles.
My mom would generally say "no."
[flash forward]
Sometimes, at the end of the day, when i curl up in my bed to go to sleep, i feel like a little kid who just spent the day playing in mud puddles.
Like i went outside when it was raining and got all dirty and nasty, after my mom told me not to, and now i need a bath.
Sometimes, i feel like i need a bath.
Not a tangible bath to wash off mud; an intangible bath to clean off intangible mud.
Stupid stuff that i do throughout the day.
Idiot things like not doing my homework and having to stay up until 4 to get it done... i should be able to do my homework every night and get 8 hours of sleep.
I end up at the end of the day with this feeling of having like mud caked on to me that i need to get rid of.
I feel like i need to wash all of that off, and be clean and fresh and bubbly.
And not smelly.
Or grubby.
kthx.
As someone from Somersworth once said, "It's depressing".
It isn't really depressing, but when it rained, and i got off the bus and had to walk 700 feet to get home, it was rather dreary. (Mind the Gap.)
Anyway, since i've lived here since i was 3, i've grown up with potholes in my daily life.
Probably the most annoying thing about living on a dirt road is when you come home from long road trips, and you have to pee really really bad, its like, "yay, i can pee... oh crap, we have to go over the road first."
Then for 45 seconds you get this horrendous jarring sensation that comes with driving over potholes.
Then you can finally go pee.
It's more strenuous than it sounds, trust me.
There's something else about potholes in a dirt road, though.
When it rains, you get these great mud puddles.
Their not really mud puddles, per se, but they're puddles filled with muddy water.
As a kid, i can remember wanting to go outside when it rained an jump around in those mud puddles.
My mom would generally say "no."
[flash forward]
Sometimes, at the end of the day, when i curl up in my bed to go to sleep, i feel like a little kid who just spent the day playing in mud puddles.
Like i went outside when it was raining and got all dirty and nasty, after my mom told me not to, and now i need a bath.
Sometimes, i feel like i need a bath.
Not a tangible bath to wash off mud; an intangible bath to clean off intangible mud.
Stupid stuff that i do throughout the day.
Idiot things like not doing my homework and having to stay up until 4 to get it done... i should be able to do my homework every night and get 8 hours of sleep.
I end up at the end of the day with this feeling of having like mud caked on to me that i need to get rid of.
I feel like i need to wash all of that off, and be clean and fresh and bubbly.
And not smelly.
Or grubby.
kthx.
Monday, February 4, 2008
On the Obvious
I jotted this down in study hall today.
King Solomon was supposedly the greatest kind that ever lived. When he had first started his rule, God came to him in a dream and said that he would give Solomon whatever he asked for. [1 Kings 3:4-15]. When Solomon merely asked for the ability to be a good ruler, God gave him wisdom beyond what anyone else had ever, or will ever, have.
Solomon was a wise man.
Now then, in Ecclesiastes 1:6, Solomon states, "The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course." [NIV]
Solomon is of course talking about the futility of trying to do anything on the earth-everything you do will eventually be washed away just like Incan history.
But there's something really cool here.
Solomon specifically uses the words, "...to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes..."
Does anyone else notice something about his wording?
why yes.
you there, in the back.
THE EARTH IS ROUND.
So if Solomon knows that the Earth is round, how come it took western Europe all the way until Christopher Columbus before they realized it wasn't flat?
how does that make sense?
Easy.
People are completely irrational.
Seriously, in the 1300s, people honestly thought that if you sailed far enough, you'd fall off the face of the earth- like in Pirates of the Caribbean.
Now adays (and in Solomon's days), we know this to be ridiculous. But 700 years ago, it was perfectly accepted.
It's really easy to sit here and make fun of Humanity's past blunders.
Slavery, Woman's Rights (what a blunder that turned out to be...), Lobotomies, putting radon in water and calling it healthy, eating phosphorous, pleather pants, and huffing paint are all excellent examples of things that are blatantly dumb, yet many people thought nothing of.
Example: Education.
For the past decade, teaching curricula[curriculums] have made breakthroughs in how they teach teenagers. We realize that you can't force a teenager to learn when he doesn't want to... so naturally the strategy is in making highschoolers want to learn.
Any teenager could tell you that. But before post-modern times, there was this thing that we now call "traditional" education. You know, you expect the kids to listen to teachers and learn and get good grades.
How about oil?
No one ever cared about foreign oil until it got expensive, and now its too late- our economy is 100% dependent on the Middle East. Scary? yes.
Preventable?
not anymore.
We should have been smarter than to base our whole transportation network on the presumption that oil would always be available.
How about pollution?
Global Warming was a joke until Al Gore got some graphs... and then it was hilarious.
Then the ice caps started melting and people realized that there's no more glaciers in Glacier National Park.
Now people are going nuts about it; carbon credits are traded publicly between companies, and hundreds of billions of dollars are frantically being spent trying to remedy the problem.
Maybe next time, we can think before we release trillions of pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Enron, the Great Depression, the titanic sinking, coal mines collapsing and cities burning from coal slag, the Love Canal, the Bell Telephone trustbusters... these are all things that happened because people didn't bother to be rational about them.
Dumping toxic waste next to a residential community will cause members of that community to die from toxic waste.
Crashing headlong into an iceberg will sink your ship.
Stealing countless amounts of money from stockholders will get you in jail.
These are simple concepts.
The earth is round.
But as a society, isn't it naive to think that there aren't modern incarnations of these things?
When asked, most people would say that they're glad they live in today- look at how much we know! and look at how many mistakes humanity has made. But what about the mistakes that we are currently making?
Drugs, abortion, and gay marriage are all hot topics in today's political world.
Plenty of people are in favor of legalizing pot, having abortions, and gay marriage.
What they don't realize is that these things are just as irrational and wrong as believing that the earth is flat.
We should try to be more like Solomon... wise.
King Solomon was supposedly the greatest kind that ever lived. When he had first started his rule, God came to him in a dream and said that he would give Solomon whatever he asked for. [1 Kings 3:4-15]. When Solomon merely asked for the ability to be a good ruler, God gave him wisdom beyond what anyone else had ever, or will ever, have.
Solomon was a wise man.
Now then, in Ecclesiastes 1:6, Solomon states, "The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course." [NIV]
Solomon is of course talking about the futility of trying to do anything on the earth-everything you do will eventually be washed away just like Incan history.
But there's something really cool here.
Solomon specifically uses the words, "...to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes..."
Does anyone else notice something about his wording?
why yes.
you there, in the back.
THE EARTH IS ROUND.
So if Solomon knows that the Earth is round, how come it took western Europe all the way until Christopher Columbus before they realized it wasn't flat?
how does that make sense?
Easy.
People are completely irrational.
Seriously, in the 1300s, people honestly thought that if you sailed far enough, you'd fall off the face of the earth- like in Pirates of the Caribbean.
Now adays (and in Solomon's days), we know this to be ridiculous. But 700 years ago, it was perfectly accepted.
It's really easy to sit here and make fun of Humanity's past blunders.
Slavery, Woman's Rights (what a blunder that turned out to be...), Lobotomies, putting radon in water and calling it healthy, eating phosphorous, pleather pants, and huffing paint are all excellent examples of things that are blatantly dumb, yet many people thought nothing of.
Example: Education.
For the past decade, teaching curricula[curriculums] have made breakthroughs in how they teach teenagers. We realize that you can't force a teenager to learn when he doesn't want to... so naturally the strategy is in making highschoolers want to learn.
Any teenager could tell you that. But before post-modern times, there was this thing that we now call "traditional" education. You know, you expect the kids to listen to teachers and learn and get good grades.
How about oil?
No one ever cared about foreign oil until it got expensive, and now its too late- our economy is 100% dependent on the Middle East. Scary? yes.
Preventable?
not anymore.
We should have been smarter than to base our whole transportation network on the presumption that oil would always be available.
How about pollution?
Global Warming was a joke until Al Gore got some graphs... and then it was hilarious.
Then the ice caps started melting and people realized that there's no more glaciers in Glacier National Park.
Now people are going nuts about it; carbon credits are traded publicly between companies, and hundreds of billions of dollars are frantically being spent trying to remedy the problem.
Maybe next time, we can think before we release trillions of pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Enron, the Great Depression, the titanic sinking, coal mines collapsing and cities burning from coal slag, the Love Canal, the Bell Telephone trustbusters... these are all things that happened because people didn't bother to be rational about them.
Dumping toxic waste next to a residential community will cause members of that community to die from toxic waste.
Crashing headlong into an iceberg will sink your ship.
Stealing countless amounts of money from stockholders will get you in jail.
These are simple concepts.
The earth is round.
But as a society, isn't it naive to think that there aren't modern incarnations of these things?
When asked, most people would say that they're glad they live in today- look at how much we know! and look at how many mistakes humanity has made. But what about the mistakes that we are currently making?
Drugs, abortion, and gay marriage are all hot topics in today's political world.
Plenty of people are in favor of legalizing pot, having abortions, and gay marriage.
What they don't realize is that these things are just as irrational and wrong as believing that the earth is flat.
We should try to be more like Solomon... wise.
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