jesus camp

Anybody seen this movie? I watched it last night, its 1:20 minutes, so its a quick dip. My thoughts are still very primitive in development about it but overall I was a little disturbed over it. I felt angry too at the adults who are defining their success and effectiveness over how the kids react to their challenges and sermonettes. I may be off-base but I sensed a TON of pride present in the leaders and parents and didn't at all think that they were walking humbly before God. I tended to side with the radio show host who was appalled by the entire topic, but had an interesting discussion with Denise after about how we would raise our kids. For example, I think I would try to tell them equal amounts of argument for either side of evolution and creation, but in the end definitely make sure they knew what I believed and why. In the movie, the parents would only explain how ridiculous evolution is and that "we believe the Bible, so creation is true." Now I agree with that statement but I believe also that we should explain out of humility and an anti-fundamentalistic attitude, the concrete reasons why the Bible is true and authoritative, and also why teleologically, ontologically, and fundamentally creation is easy to believe. www.dictionary.com

I think what I've learned from seminary also is how important it is to know what issues are worth contending for and what issues are worth being diplomatic about. The people in this movie more resembled Muslim extremists than Christians. I know that's harsh but watch the movie and tell me what you think. In your comments, send me a link to your blog.

And lastly, 6 year olds, speaking in tongues, is always a little freaky to watch, especially with Indie-film-esque music playing in the background. I'm not saying I don't think people should speak in tongues, I pray that I would, but that they should do so either privately, or do so for the edification of the body as found in I Corinthians 14:22-24, I Cor. 14:39-40. Well actually, I'll save you some time:

I Corinthians 14:22-24
23 So if the whole church comes together and everyone speaks in tongues, and some who do not understand or some unbelievers come in, will they not say that you are out of your mind? 24 But if an unbeliever or someone who does not understand comes in while everybody is prophesying, he will be convinced by all that he is a sinner and will be judged by all,


I Cor. 14:39-40
39 Therefore, my brothers, be eager to prophesy, and do not forbid speaking in tongues. 40 But everything should be done in a fitting and orderly way.

I have more to say, but Denise is schooling me with studying. So I'll possibly get to write more later.

Flan

what are you eating

so i came home the other day and caught mark eating this snack. i said, gross, what are you eating? he goes, bread and butter. like it's no big deal. except it was like fifteen slices of cold butter on a piece of bread. basically an entire stick.

i have a dream

it has long been a dream of mine to one night, when everyone is asleep, to go throughout the world and change all of the car make and model stickers on everyone's cars and just switch them all around so that when you wake up in the morning, your acura is now a honda and your infiniti is now a camry. i figure, it would be too much work to change them back and most people would forget what cars are which anyway. i think this would be a good socialist, leveling-of society type thing to do. as in, sorry lexus owner- your lexus is now a kia.

anyway, i literally think about doing this at least once a week, but i think i've found two people who have already done this! there are two guys that live at the top of our street and i drove past their cars this morning and was like, no way. both of their cars are ROYAL blue, which is not an appropriate color for a very expensive car. the "lexus" sedan looks an awful lot like a honda accord and the "mercedes" suv looks a lot like a ford escape. could this really be happening? could they have bought affordable cars and just switched the car make stickers? maybe i'll try to get a photo so someone else can help me decide.

a dream that my uncle patrick has is that the three named people (John Michael Montgomery, Sarah Jessica Parker, Sarah Michelle Geller, etc.) would fight the one named people (Cher, Bono, Madonna, etc.) in an all out brawl. maybe his dream will come true too.

stuff christians like

www.stuffchristianslike.net - this is hilarious. go ahead, peruse. included in his list are: side hugs, getting people to like us, kissing dating goodbye, donald miller, chic-fil-a and slowly turning against oprah. wuahahaha.

the wonderful analog world

So the other night Denise and I are simmering down afer a long day at work and we decide to give the ole' tv a shot. Presto. Channel 111 yielded an old episode of "The Office". Yes, we had found CBS. It was a little fuzzy so we pulled the tv out of its cave and lengthened the amazing antennas to 4 feet! We then sat back and watched FREE tv. Unreal this feeling is.


On another note, I witnessed while driving on Albemarle road a showdown. 10:00pm. One big man, two cops. Out of my peripheral, I see the cops jump the big guy, twice the size, easy, of either cop, tackle and wrestle him to the ground trying to get cuffs on. The big guy shrugs them both off like a leather jacket and proceeds to beat both cops in the face and ribs as I'm on the phone with Denise, speechless. Thankfully, one cop pulls a tazer and fires it into the large scary man and he starts jolting. I've never seen a tazer go off but its loud, and for a second I thought the cop had just shot the guy!!

Then, the unthinkable, the big man gets up with the tazer wires hanging from his back while the cop is pulling his electro-stunner trigger trying to subdue him. Big hoss starts hitting the cop again! This is totally going to be on a cops episode next year. I had to go after I saw this part of the standoff, to my chagrin but I didn't read or see any news about two beaten or dead cops today. So that's good. All in all let's just say that I felt a little burdened to pray for those two cops, knowing they both probably got kids at home. Unbelievable job?

Its one thing to watch two drunk white dudes fight but when there are cops involved, and weapons, it definitely effected me all day today. But hey, its not about me. Just thought it was interesting how I couldn't get the violence out of my mind when I'm surrounded by it in movies. What must it be like to experience that? Wow.

no socks

so i have to tell this story. for the last few weeks mark has been dropping not-so-subtle hints that he wanted me to buy him some dress socks. (since he wore carharts and tennis shoes every day at his last job, he has never needed dress socks and he probably owns like three pairs) so anyway, every night for like two weeks, we'd be getting ready for bed, and he'd go, man, i really need some dress socks. and i would say, why don't you buy some. basically he wanted me to do this errand for him. but i never did. so the other day he was getting ready for work and didn't have any clean socks, so he wore his boat shoes, without socks, thinking that this would be fine. he gets to work and basically all of the guys there let him have it. they're all in their 50s or 60s. they were like, mark, did someone tell you it was casual Friday or something? and, are you looking for the flooring department? (because apparently the guys don't dress as nice down there) then later they were in a sales meeting and at the end, the guy leading the meeting asked if anyone wanted to recognize anyone else- meaning for a job well done. and one of the guys goes, i'd like to recognize mark flanders, for not wearing any socks today. so basically mark left the office that day, drove to tj maxx and bought some dress socks. and he said the lady who was the cashier looked down at the socks and looked back at him and said, i have never in my life seen a man buy his own dress socks.

remember this?

this is for everyone who was at this party two summers ago. for those who weren't- a bunch of us were hanging out and all the sudden, (is it 'all the sudden' or 'all of a sudden' or 'all of the sudden'? who knows. it's a doggy dog world.) mark went into the pool and started splashing around like he couldn't swim. our friend mason stripped down to a speedo and ran, jumped in and "saved" him. the video's a little dark so it's kind of hard to tell what was going on. but it was hilarious.