March 2011
7 posts
2 tags
Big Cat Love: Apple OS X's 10th Birthday
Today, Apple should be cutting a big ol’ cake for their ten-year-old operating system. This is the beautifully designed, sturdy, safe, and easy-to-use OS that caused many of us to switch. Apple’s hardware is sleek and gorgeous, no doubt, but it’s the internal workings that really make Apple soar beyond the Windows-ridden PCs, despite the fact that you can usually spot traces or...
3 tags
Protestants love Latin-ish
In Protestantism, you only have to know six Latin words to be in the gang. Obviously, there’s “Sola” and then one of the biggies that follows it: “scriptura,” “fide,” “gratia,” “Christus” (technically, “Solus Christus”), or “gloria” (once again, technically, “Soli Deo gloria”). Well, it looks...
5 tags
Google's Mobile App (iOS): Better, Buggy, and...
Google just released a much welcomed update for their iOS app and a new moniker: Google Search for iPhone. It has a much crisper interface, and is a bit easier to use. I might actually use it now rather than searching within Safari.app. When you first open the app, you see a big Google, and underneath you see a break in the page with nothing below it. I thought this was unsightly and useless....
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Japan in View
At times it is fairly difficult to even moderately grasp what is going on across the world; for instance: the happenings in Japan right now. We know that an 8.9 earthquake struck and caused a tsunami that has devastated the country. Still, it is far away and if we personally haven’t experienced either it is even harder to imagine the devastation. The danger is that we can become indifferent...
5 tags
Conceivably Confused About AAPL
ConceivablyTech writer, Wolfgang Gruener, posted an article on March 11th entitled Why Did Apple Upgrade the iPad, Exactly?. In it he stated that he and his colleagues didn’t quite get (or conceive I suppose) why the iPad 2 is being bolstered by Apple as “even more magical than the first generation.” Rather, he considers this installment to be more of an iPad 1.5, as “it...
4 tags
Friends of Coal
Drive down any road in West Virginia and you’ll be hard pressed not to see a “Friends of Coal” sticker on a bumper or window. I usually see two to three per day. My personal favorite is the obnoxious full silhouette of a coal miner crawling which spans the whole length of the rear window and is normally found on trucks; at least in my experience. The question is, what does it...
10 tags
Give Him Hell For His Disbelief Of It!
Why is Josh Ritter tweeting about Rob Bell? He tweeted this yesterday: “Just read a nytimes article on @realrobbell. Want to get him Thin Blue Flame. Anyone know how?” The New York Times article entitled, “Pastor Stirs Wrath With His Views on Old Questions,” discusses the uproar that erupted over a promotional video of Bell’s upcoming book, Love Wins, set for release...
January 2011
1 post
December 2010
2 posts
3 tags
“Willst Du nicht, daß gewisse Menschen in ein Zimmer gehen, so hänge ein Schloß...”
– Ludwig Wittgenstein, Vermischte Bemerkungen
2 tags
November 2010
10 posts
Thankful 2010
2010. What a year. I thought 2008 had been tough. Then I experienced a reprieve the following year. 2009 turned out to be the most joyous year or stretch of time that I had ever lived: a small rustic town, the love of my life, an old eclectic apartment, a handful of odd-jobs, and an unbeatable landlord. Like in Einstein’s Dreams, I wish that time would have slowed down so drastically, or...
1 tag
“It is not scientific doubt, not atheism, not pantheism, not agnosticism, that in...”
– Frederic D. Huntington
4 tags
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This is frightening: μη αγαπατε τον κοσμον μηδε τα εν τω κοσμω εαν τις αγαπα τον κοσμον ουκ εστιν η αγαπη του πατρος εν αυτω
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Christians Know How to Waste Money "for the Glory...
I remember first hearing about the big $115 million dollar renovation that First Baptist of Dallas was to undertake. Did that even phase you? One hundred and fifteen MILLION. $115,000,000. So many zeros. Anyway, so today as I was reading through some news in Dallas, I was once again hit in the face with the possibility that there really isn’t a true church or even a Christian in America. One...
1 tag
Is Jesus a Joke?
Yesterday I had a conversation with a long-time friend about really taking our faith (as in, relationship with Jesus) seriously. We are quickly approaching 30, and when we look back on the past 10 years we wonder, “What on earth have we done with our lives for the Kingdom?” It was extremely difficult to actually think through. How do we do this now? Where do we get started? So, ok, we...
2 tags
Square Friends
Tonight I’m surrounded with friends,
all very small and weightless;
but loud nonetheless.
I owe this to you who loathes me now.
Do you still read this?
I owe this to you.
Their warm company I had not known,
till you, who hates me now.
They are squares
the opposite of boring.
Worn, not worn out
Used, not used up
Speaking easy, often hard to swallow.
Do you still have this...
2 tags
October 2010
2 posts
2 tags
“Sorrow found me when I was young
Sorrow waited, sorrow won
Sorrow they put me...”
– Sorrow, High Violet, The National
I’m still here.
July 2010
5 posts
3 tags
Weight Loss: Ahead of Schedule
On June 13th I wrote a quick word about how I wanted to lose 17 lbs by the end of July, which would bring me down to 200 lbs. Well, I have reached that goal…much earlier than expected. Today, soaking wet, I weighed in at 202.5 lbs. Progress. So, I have decided to up the ante. My new goal is to be down to 180 lbs by the end of August…if I don’t die first. Wish me luck!
agingofanotsosuperhero: What's wrong with the... →
I went on vacation this past week to Camp-of-the-Woods (it’s in the Adirondacks). In my pea-brain mind I assumed that this camp was somehow related to the famous Word of Life Camps (just over the mountains). Any how, I was wrong. Apparently the camp (Camp-of-the-Woods) is run by “The Gospel…
“Die Welt wird nicht bedroht von den Menschen, die böse sind, sondern von denen,...”
– Albert Einstein (via germanheit)
2 tags
“Well it’s four in the morning,
things are getting heavy,
and we both...”
– Our Window, Noah and the Whale
2 tags
“It’s the first day of spring
And my life is starting over again
The...”
– The First Days of Spring, Noah and the Whale
June 2010
3 posts
4 tags
Fat
I did not come to the realization today that I was overweight. No, this is something I’ve known for quite some time. There were several times during this period of self/fat awareness that I attempted to correct an unhealthy eating style and very unhealthy abstinence from any type of physical exercise. I think one day I ate tuna, and then for three days I ran on an elliptical. Of course,...
3 tags
“Loneliness is the human condition. Cultivate it. The way it tunnels into you...”
– White Oleander (via kari-shma) (via whitnic)
4 tags
“The man who never reads will never be read. He who never quotes will never be...”
– Charles Spurgeon (via scottmgrace)
May 2010
19 posts
5 tags
Our Boring Bible
We have severely taken the mystery out of the Bible. It is a common thing; a boring thing. However, when we think of the Gnostic Gospels or Egyptian Hieroglyphs, we ooh and ahh over them. They are ancient and have a certain mystique about them. This makes me think that we have totally forgotten where our Scriptures came from. If God really did inspire humans to write the extant scriptures that we...
2 tags
“I want something
That’s purer than the water
Like we were
It’s...”
– Beginning To Get To Me, Snow Patrol
4 tags
LOST
Last night we witnessed the conclusion of the greatest show and story ever told. I won’t bother giving a summation or synopsis (if either can be truly given to such a masterfully complex story). I will however tell you of when my journey with LOST began. Unfortunately, I didn’t begin watching when the show first came on. Like many other naive and ignorant people, I thought this was...
4 tags
Foreknowledge
People hate Calvinism. Period. At least a whole bunch do. How could a loving God not give us a choice? How could a loving God condemn us from the start? How could a loving God…? What kind of God could…? The combinations are endless. The answers are not easy, and especially not easy to swallow. Without trying to settle 2,000 years of debating this issue, perhaps this is a good starting...
8 tags
On Being A Nonentity
I struggle with ADHD. My eyes and mind are everywhere all at once. I have a passion for reading, and this condition makes it very difficult. I have to be intentional (to say the least) about it. However, I am coming to a better understanding of how I’m wired. Yes, I think it’s fair to partially blame ADHD for being highly interested and motivated in something for two weeks, and then...
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“There is no blurring of the clear either/or: discipleship and the pursuit of...”
– R.T. France, The Gospel of Matthew (via scottmgrace)
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“It is quite possible - overwhelmingly probable, one might guess - that we will...”
– Noam Chomsky, Language and Problems of Knowledge (via scottmgrace)
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“Again I say, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for...”
– Matthew 19:24
Jesus was wrong. Americans are in the top 5% of the wealthiest people worldwide. There are 300 million or more of us. If Jesus was right only a small percentage should be Christians, but according to studies about 50% of those people say they are Christians. That means Jesus was a...
3 tags
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“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”
– African Proverb (via Jeff Wright)
“Stay home with me
Never look back
I won’t let you down
I won’t...”
– Thomas Dybdahl
passingelegance-deactivated2011 asked: do you ever feel uncomfortable (in relation to yourself) about your beliefs or do you ever feel unsure? (not in relation to a belief in God but in the specifics you hold)?
“For God is a God who bears. The Son of God bore our flesh, he bore the cross, he...”
– dietrichBONHOEFFER, the cost of discipleship (via jonwasson)
3 tags
“The very scary thing about religion, to me, is that people actually believe God...”
– Searching For God Knows What, by Donald Miller, p. 20-1
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“I realize a lot of people don’t like Jesus, or just ignore Him or have no...”
– Searching For God Knows What, by Donald Miller, p. 19
1 tag
“It seems when God had the Bible put together, He hid a lot of the ancient wisdom...”
– Searching For God Knows What, by Donald Miller, p. 9
April 2010
4 posts
5 tags
Blogging Possibilities
Wouldn’t you know it, as soon as I start really appreciating the ease and accessibility of Tumblr, I go into nerd mode and begin Googling who’s-got-the-bigger-stick discussions like, “Blogger or Tumblr,” “Wordpress or Blogger,” and “Import Blogger to Tumblr.” After pushing up my glasses and adjusting my pocket protector, I stumbled onto another...