Some people tend to eat up whatever their church teaches them and tend to regurgitate it later on, without asking why. This bleeds over to political affiliations also, i.e. if their fundamentalist pastor is conservative politically, then they will be conservative also. I hate it when churches turn their sermons into a political movement, especially when in many circumstances there is no moral or Biblical reason for voting one way or another.
Many times I find myself asking “why?” whenever a church leader tells me how I should view the world. I can remember being told in Sunday school class about backmasking…how supposedly recording artists would put subtle backwards messages in their songs. Specifically I remember Queen’s “Another One Bites The Dust” having a coded message on it saying “start to smoke marijuana.” All of this backmasking consipiracy is just spawned from the “us vs. them” paranoia mentality. Why would a band make it a point to record backwards messages to put on their album? Why would someone bother to play a record backwards and try to interpret whatever the gibberish supposedly meant? The whole thing stinks like a bad urban legend.
Staying Busy
I continue to stay busy even though I am out of work. I’ve got a couple of websites in development….one volunteer work…one paid. And I’m also putting together a youth pictorial directory for church. So I’m not just sitting around all day doing nothing. I’d go crazy if I didn’t do anything.
Nothing worth writing about….
Terrorists Attacking Disney World?
A lady at church said she wouldn’t be surprised if the terrorists tried to attack Disney World next. From experience, Disney World has little security in actually getting into the park. There are no x-ray machines and bags aren’t searched. However there is security inside of the park (including plain clothes security personnel). It could be easy to target Disney World. Let’s hope it doesn’t happen. There are more than just Americans at Disney World. Many times the park is filled with foreigners. An attack on the happiest place on earth would outrage the world. It would cement the world’s resolve to elminate terrorism.
Throughtout this whole September 11th affair, I’ve come to realize that there are some very evil people out there. Why do they hate us so badly? Is it jealousy? Is it our support for Israel? These people have shown that they do not fear God. They don’t adhere to the basic concepts of their religion…that all human life is precious.
Harry Potters Children’s Home
Potters Children’s Home still has the same webpage they’ve had since I was in college. I went to school with the guy who originally did it. During that time, I remember having a discussion with a friend about whether or not small businesses and organizations really need their own domain. Keep in mind this was 1996 when not everybody and their brother have their own domains. Now the organization has their own domain (pottersministries.org) which they plan on using on their webpage which isn’t setup yet.
Comfort Zones
Doug Perry’s message at the teen devotional tonight was on the topic of actually trying to convert others to Christ. It’s time to start asking myself am I really doing enough for the cause of Christ. It’s more than youth retreats, summer camps, teaching Bible class. It’s life. I don’t do half of what I should be doing. I can do good works all day long….contribute photos to the church bulletin….tape sermons….display songs on the screen at church. But is that a direct case for trying to convert others? Nope. It is time to get out of my comfort zone and start putting my knowledge to work. I guess that’s where grace comes in. I could never preach enough sermons to convert enough people to Christ. Grace covers that. But I still need to try my best. I am trying to encourage others to continue to follow Christ. On the other side of things, I am not good with meeting new people…studying with them…etc….
I have thought about going to El Salvador on a mission trip. I really don’t know if I will be employeed in April (when the trip is scheduled). I guess it is something I need to pray about. That’s something I don’t do enough of: Praying. I am the selfish type person that only prays when I need something. I need to develop a better prayer life.
Anyways back to El Salvador. I really need to think about it. I need to be going for the right reasons. Not for a vacation, for it will be hard work. Not to be able to brag others about going to another country. But because people need help there, both physically and spiritually. Am I up for it? I don’t know. Something to think about….
There. I’m not sure why I wrote all that down. Maybe it’s good therapy for myself.
Teacher Webpages
I found Pat Hackney’s webpage. It is suspiciously similar to Nick Nance’s webpage. I think these webpages hosted on TeacherWeb are just template pages which users just fill in forms with specific data. It’s a shame many teachers can’t seem to get creative with their webpages.
Man spends $30,000 on gaudy auto accessories on his 1995 Honda Civic. Here’s a tip. Why not spend the $30K on a better car? It’s happened around here too. I’ve seen a lowered Geo Metro before. Metros are the next step up from Yugos. Plenty of times I’ve seen gaudy decals put on Honda just to make them look cool. Unfortunately it makes them look stupid. Like some oversized Hot Wheels car.
Fill-In Preachers
David Shannon shouldn’t have to preach tomorrow due to his uncle passing away. He already has to do the funeral at 2PM in Centerville. That along with the AM and PM services will make for a long day tomorrow. There should be someone in the congregation available…whether it is Phil, John Kennedy, Mitch Poskevich…. to preach at last minute notice like this.
David is a workaholic. He does so much. I am afraid that he might burn himself out and get tired of church work. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen.
I redesigned this site. Took me much of the night last night and a little bit this morning. I think it turned out ok. Basically I took out the blue and left all dark green. Let me know what you think of the new colors. If you see anything that needs to be changed, let me know.
Wal-Mart takes on New England
Abandoned Webpages
Theoretically, the people who do the Friday Five could setup the post to run every Friday from here to eternity. Then they could have the hands off treatment and not have to worry about it, unless some special event happened to where they would need to change the questions. They’ve just chosen not to do one this week. Why should I worry? It’s not like it take some genius to come up with 5 questions for meaningless bloggers to answer.
Also having the hands off treatment is the Mt. Juliet High School Alumni website (mjalumni.com). Seemingly the person who created it has pretty much left it alone, not bothering to delete the duplicate entries and obvious fake entries. For example, “Joe Dirt” is listed as an alumnus of 2004. The last year you can search for is 2004. Makes me wonder what will happen after 2004 when the class of 2005 will want to add their entries.
Kids Reading Stephen King Books
Here is a list of books for the accelerated reader list at West Wilson Middle School (local middle school). It’s got everything on there from picture books about dirt bikes to “Gone with the Wind”. What was sorta surprising is that they’ve got some books on there like Stephen King’s “The Stand.” I’ve read a few Stephen King books before and there is some bad language in them. Doesn’t it seem odd that a school would almost officially endorse a book with alot of bad language in it while at the same time giving kids write-offs for saying bad language? Yeah, some kids could handle the language in these books. But it is sending mixed messages to kids. “Don’t watch the R rated movie, but you can read the screenplay.”
There will be no Friday Five tomorrow. The person who makes up the questions is on vacation. Maybe I should make up my own.
Christmas Cards
Time to ask myself is it effeminate to send out Christmas cards? Might as well do it again this year. Just going through my Christmas card list. I think last year I sent out alot more since I had something interesting to show – a picture from my trip to China. Now there’s not much to talk about. I’ve taken out people who I barely know or haven’t heard from in a while. There will always be people who I still get cards from. Such as those people I know from going to Washington, DC, in 1992. I’m forever on their Christmas card list, even though we haven’t had real coorespondence in about a decade. Then there’s other people whom I lost their addresses and I’m not sure where they are.
This is what was on the front page of Western Kentucky University’s homepage. Hmmmm….. Makes me wonder what part of the university are they trying to push?
Contemporary Christian Music
I have a friend who is just getting started in the contemporary Christian music. He’s got an album out. I guess I’ve always had a problem with it since I have scriptual discrepancies with instrumental music and performances which others consider worship. Anytime someone is performing in front of a church, then I feel it is entertainment. So it’s sorta hard for me to support something which one person considers a ministry…which he feels should be supported through “love offerings” and other charitable contributions. This may have caused friction in our friendship. I think he knows of my difference in opinion. I guess I would feel more comfortable supporting a missionary or minister who preaches the gospel rather than a musical performance which I consider entertainment. Just a personal preference; not meant to be a personal attack on anyone.
The Short Mountain webpage is coming along great thankyouverymuch. Big plans are being made to receive camp applications via the internet. The only problem is that I suspect the camp staff is not exactly a bunch of computer gurus. The design needs to be as simple and easy as possible. No one wants to make several trips up to Short Mountain just to tweak the camp computer.
I’m only saying this because this past summer a friend and I spent the greater part of a day trying to fix the camp computer while we were up there for summer camp. We ended up reinstalling the OS just to get rid of a virus problem. After that, we had to get a new modem since we couldn’t find the drivers for the old modem. Things tend to break easily.
Computers can operate in remote locations. The best example I know of is a missionary which my church supports. I think he uses a solar power laptop to receive email in the middle of Africa. The village he is in only has electricity for a few hours each day. He’s cool because he has one of those old school Compuserve address with a bunch of numbers and periods instead of AOL style usernames/email address. It’s a geek thing. Most of you people might not know what I’m talking about.
I’ve been seeing a bunch of commericals for 98 WSIX featuring Gerry House and the House Foundation. Man, Gerry is looking pretty old these days. Has a face for radio. I remember his co-host, Mike Bohan. Mike was the weatherman for Channel 4 for a while before switching to radio. Mike now has gray hair. Alot of the television commericals for this show aren’t all that funny. Mostly it’s just Gerry saying something stupid in a funny voice and Mike laughing about it. That’s all morning radio is. Morning DJs talking to laugh at themselves.
It’s been a year since John Thomas, a friend from church, had a massive head injury due to a tree falling on him. His progress is phenomenal. There was a time which we really didn’t know if he was going to make it. But he is back to normal. Amazing.