On Sin and Annoyances...

I can't stand gluttons. Now I can't say too much because I'm guilty of this too, but it really bugs me, especially when the results of someone else's gluttony affects me.

Probably the most stereotyped and oft-seen example is food. My family isn't incredibly rich. We have enough money to get what we need and pay the bills, and we're not afraid to try different things. Still, I hear dad complaining about how he gets paid and all the money just disappears. So when some individual in the family gets home from work, opens the fridge door, and starts stuffing everything they can get their hands on into their mouth...it disgusts me. That container of roast beef costs money. That fudge (which I want to last for a week) is gone in a day, just by one person.

Yes, that person may have paid for the food, but all of us need to eat it! And things like bottles of wine and beer REALLY irk me. (Let me say that I don't have anything against drinking wine or beer.) You don't need wine. It doesn't have any medicinal values. They cost from five to fifteen dollars. Fifteen dollars? That could buy the materials for like ten loaves of bread. It could buy three frozen pizzas, which would save on cleanup and time. I'm not about to "go green" but being careful where we put our money would really save us a lot.

And it wouldn't hurt us to be a little hungry sometimes, now would it?

On Organization...

Life is so short and busy. I've been noticing this more recently; school, work, church, and friends all take up a whole lot of my time. School? That's partially my problem, being that I don't apply myself as I should, and also its pretty pressured because of work. Work? Nothing I can do about that, and it gives me some income (even if very little) but it takes time and I'm beat much of the rest of the day. Church? I love church, and I don't want to do any less work or fellowship there. If anything, I want to get involved more somehow, but I simply can't handle that.

Friends...friends online and in person. The ones online want to talk to me every night, which I'm glad to do, but it really cuts back on things I could be doing. Also, its so impersonal. Just text bantered back and forth. You can't build solid relationships that way! Unfortunately, I don't have any other way to contact some of my friends. It seems to be a slow road to destruction. Unfortunately, the friends I meet in person get less of me than they could because of the online me. I don't know how to carry on a steady conversation, even after several tries. I just can't relate. Well not in person, that is.

On Being a Soundman...

I'm the most-time soundman at our church, and I've picked up some interesting little tidbits through my work. A huge part of it is that, as Sam said, "We are here to not so much provide, but to help the congregation worship. We aren't here to make all the musicians happy and give them a chance to perform." The hardest part of that is when people who can't sing very well get up on stage. I really don't want to just cut them out completely, but I have to view it from the viewpoint of trying to get rid of distractions. That means cutting the people out, but then I have to face them and they wonder why I cut them out of the mix.

Oh, and remember that you always want to drive the bass, drums, and vocals a lot. It gives the best results. *grins*

On Coffeeshops...or rather, not...

I had something really good and cool to talk about, but now I've forgotten. Its something I'm used to, because it seems to happen every time I sit down.

I've been impressed recently with the amount that people can remember. I talk to one person and they tell me everything that happened to them the past week, another person tells me what happened a month ago, etc. (I also found out that I've been spelling etc incorrectly. Pahaha.) I only seem to be able to remember a few hours or so back. Maybe I have prioritized what I do as so unimportant that my mind automatically just forgets it so it'll have more room for what other people said? I really wouldn't mind that, or the concept of that, but it can be quite a bother when I am expected to continue a conversation and I'm just like "Muhhh...I think that I ate food a minute or two ago." I'd be willing to bet that its a bit part of my problem with remembering...

On Introspection and Growing Life...

When we cease resisting Christ and let him into our lives to begin his work, we start changing on the inside. Fruits are a result of Christ's work, not visa-versa. If we take a step back and look at our or others' lives, then we can see how the person slowly changes; inside to outside.

Ephesians 3:16-17.5 says, "I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith."

See that? Inner being! Dwell in our hearts! Change starts on the inside, and moves to the outside.

John 15:5 says, “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing."

Once again, He remains in us. But right before that, you see, "If you remain in me" so this isn't a one-way relationship. Once we are a Christian, we are saved forever, and cannot lose our salvation. (Romans 8:35-39, John 10:27-30, Timothy 2:19) So it is up to us to keep up our relationship with Christ by submitting to his will and learning about him.

Submitting to his will? What do I mean by that? First, I want to say that free will is the mind choosing. The mind and the will are inseparable. Also, everything we do has a reason and purpose. Humans ("free moral agents" according to R.C. Sproul) always act according the strongest inclination they have at the time of decision. What gives us our inclination?

Well going back to what I said earlier, the mind and the will are inseparable. What is our will? When we are non-Christians, our will is our sin nature. When we are Christians, our will is Christ's will. So when our will is connected to our mind, then either our sin nature or Christ's will is connected to our mind. What our mind chooses is therefore based on either our sin nature or on Christ's will.

Someone remind me to write more on this. I'm not done.

On Death...

How many of your friends would you give your life for? I mean, of course we'd say, "All of them!" But seriously, is that true? Say its a split-second thing. Toss yourself in front of a bullet? Yeah, most people could do that. How about a bit longer term? Say (we'll ignore how improbable this is) a heart transplant. Would you be able to keep your composure for several days, knowing that you're gonna die just to keep someone else alive? All your life dreams, wasted? All the people you wanted to know better and closer, all gone? Think over it for a while. Don't just read it and go on with life.