A Random Burst Of Remembrance

One of my favorite verses in the bible is Luke 12:48. It goes something like: "But the one who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, will receive a light beating. Everyone to whom much was given, of him much more will be required, and from him to whom they entrust much, they will demand the more."

This verse very much reflects the saying of "ignorance is bliss." It's so true, isn't it? The terribleness of this world is directly proportional to the amount of knowledge we receive from Christ. Terribleness is a subjective term, so some people would see more of it than others. Regardless though, if we weren't knowledgable, the world probably wouldn't appear as bad. Think about the "good old days" when we were children. Life was so nice back then. Why? Because we knew nothing. Everything was handed down to us by our parents. All we had to do was eat and have fun. Paying the bills and working? Well, the adults worried about that.

I think this idea corresponds to the story of Adam and Eve. The world probably would have stayed pretty awesome if they did not eat from the tree of knowledge. The what? Knowledge? Yeah. Once they ate the fruit, everything started to suck. They felt embarrassed because they were naked and ran away from God.

Once a person gains knowledge, I feel there is a great dilemma. The feeling of knowing something is awesome, and sharing that knowledge is awesome as well. I had always thought it was great being able to share what I learn every day, but the thing is, that is making the world worse for others. Remember, knowledge and terribleness of the world. So what do I do? I could share something and make people become more knowledgable, or withhold knowledge from them, but that seems wrong. As of today, I will continue to share all that I learn, but nonetheless the dilemma lives on.

Been Thinking About Some Stuff, So I Wrote A Poem

Oblivion Eclipses A Man Celebrating Eureka


Tomorrow will rain
A thunderstorm of confetti.
I will drown in vain jubilation
Because I sank long ago.

Once, the world was a cliff.
I stood on the edge.
Gravity wanted me dead,
But Someone held my hand.

Today I live on a mountain.
I greased its slopes with sin.
Sisyphus gave me his stone.
Now I know how he feels
And more.

The Sweating Summer Sun Is The Depth Of Wrongdoing

One can easily tell from this graph that summer does not help Christian men in terms of temptation. As the weather gets nicer, let's try to remember what's important. Girls are good and having a nice beach body is good as well. But God tops all of it. He's the best and everything else that's nice is second. All second. If this post makes you feel uncomfortable or makes you think that I'm too "old-fashioned" then......good. Not everything about the Christian life is supposed to be comfortable. As siblings in Christ we are supposed to call each other out. Even when things are uncomfortable to talk about.

P.S.--My apologies to the girls that come across this post. As a guy, I do guy-things once in awhile.

The Bursted Bubble Leaves A Trail Of Hope

Couple of weeks ago I came to a realization of the situation I'm in. I go to college. I'm not living at home. I am completely immersed in the college-life/dorming-experience/whatever-you-call-it. At first thought, it really isn't a big deal, but it really is. College life is not life in the real world. In the real world people work at jobs, feed families, and deal with real world problems. In college students studies. That's really about it. At least it is what me, as a student, is SUPPOSED to do. Can't say I exactly perform to the best of my abilities when it comes to studying...

Anyways, that was just something I realized. I chewed on the principle for awhile, but was unable to digest it. I had one of those moments which I made a claim, but was unable to prove it. Not until this past weekend. I had the fortunate chance to hang out with my one friend who is a prospective auto mechanic. In order to graduate, he needs a certain amount of intern hours at a mechanic's shop. Unfortunately the economic state the country is in is not allowing that. He had gone from looking for a car shop to looking any job he can get. Going solo thru college is hard.

After hearing his story that night, my bubble popped. I was in a very good college, getting an education with all my tuition paid for. I was pretty much economy-proof. After hearing my friend's story though, I cannot help but to feel extremely broken. How can I be foolish enough to think the world is utopic when it's full of sin and sorrow? How long have I been taking this ignorant view on life? I felt so narrow-minded. A soldier from a defeated faction scolded for incompetence. At this point something funny happened. I recalled a phrase that I repeat to myself often:

God is good.

How can this be so? My friend is going thru such hard time and I've been living like a fool. God is always good, but it's been hard to figure out how he fits into this situation. Maybe He's breaking us down so we can take the next step towards Him. There's always a light at the end of the tunnel. Just because I don't see it now doesn't mean it's not there, right?

To Get A Step Closer

There's an ancient phrase that goes, "know thyself". I think it originated from some Greek philosophers. This saying is still prevalent today. Some people even consider "knowing themselves" the philosophy to life. Coming from a Christian point of view this saying may be borderline blasphemy, but I think it has some value to it.

The phrase's original purpose was to, an attempt, reach the "ultimate truth". The phrase is somewhat related to humanism dare I say? People are trying find the answer to life by looking into themselves, looking at their human nature. In the Christian world this would be...not correct, because God's Word is the ultimate truth.

But what if I say that, by knowing oneself better and better, he or she would be drawing closer to God? Think of it this way: by nature, us humans are sinful and corrupted. That's why we need Christ. We can easily say we understand that fact, but do we truly, profoundly, understand that? I don't think so. At least I know I don't. I go around saying I'm a sinner, but my words doesn't always have a lot of weight to it. That's because I don't always remember what it truly means to be a sinner, and neither do non-Christians...most of the time. So, let's say that "know thyself" is accurate in the sense that: the ultimate truth is found when we understand more and more about our corrupted human nature. The more corrupted we are, the more we need God's hand, His healing. Christ. God pours His love unto the lowest of the lows. God pours His love unto us. How low are we?

Something Sweet I Found

I was listening to Mark Driscoll the other day, and he made a mention of this:

http://worldwide-classroom.com/

It's a website from Covenant Seminary. It has over twenty courses directly from the Seminary. You can listen to the lecture online, read the lecture notes(posted on the website as well), or even do some studying by going through the study guides they provided for you. If you've been thinking about going to a seminary but are not sure, this is definitely a good place to check out. The lectures are DIRECTLY from the school! It's like going to a seminary for free and there's no pressure of failing. I'm pretty sure it doesn't get anymore wonderful than that.

Valentine's Day Reflection

I was talking to a friend about Valentine's Day yesterday. She told me, and I quote, "Valentine's Day is STUPID!" At first, what she wrote seemed like something rather immature, you know, it's like an answer that a middle-schooler would give. It's almost a non-answer because there's almost no good reasoning behind it. This made me question her as to why she thought Valentine's Day was stupid. My conversation with her brought me to two conclusions.

I.
Valentine's Day's true meaning has nothing to do with mushy love or whatever the world has brought it to be. Being a Catholic, she told me how there are, like, I think six St. Valentines, and none of them has anything to do with love. She also argued that corporations use whatever saint they want to make money. For example, using Valentine's Day to increase sales of chocolate and St. Patrick's Day to increase sales of beer. I liked her argument. It made sense to me, but in my mind it begs to question: have I been skewing things that God has shown to me? A first thing I thought of was Christmas. It's suppose to be the day of Christmas. Often times I become the sinner that puts worldly presents that I'll get on Christmas Day before the Godly gift of Christ. I also thought of going to church. Every Sunday it's suppose to be an obligation to go worship our glorious Creator. It's cliche to say, but church can definitely become a social club instead of the house of God.

What are some things that God has shown to you through His grace?

Are you taking some of them in the wrong way?

II.
When I first started talking to my friend I made a bad assumption. I asked her, "think of it this way. You're saying Valentine's Day is stupid now, but what if in a year you're going out with someone and you're really looking forward to spend that special day with him? Would you still think it's stupid then?" Something very humbling came from this question.

I was figuratively slapped in the face because she, in fact, does have a boyfriend as of yesterday. Fortunately she was really cool about it. Which made me feel even worse. Assumptions are not about looking at a person as who they are. We are blessed to have God see us and know us as individuals. Who are we to look at His other creations and have terrible thoughts? I'm ashamed of myself.