2013 Resolutions

Discussed this with Cindy.

I really don't want to make zero resolutions.
And if I do 2,013 resolutions, most of them will have to be things I already do such as "Wear my retainers", which Cindy objected to as 'resolutions'. But I told her, who can possibly come up with that many new things to do in a year?
And she said, "Exactly."
So I thought it would be 44 resolutions...
But, she's brilliant:

She said just do 13. One per month, and then an extra one.

And I said YESSSSS. Except one per month, and then one BIG OVERARCHING YEARLONG ONE for the entire year.

So that's what I'm going to do.

Going to fill in this:

2013: The Year of Living ______________ly

January: ______________
February: _____________
March:________________
April: __________________
May: __________________
June: ____________________
July: ______________________
Aug: _______________________
Sept: _________________________
Oct: _________________________
Nov: _________________________
Dec: _____________________

YEARLONG:

School Lunch, Dream Facts, Crazy Endtime Talk, and Maybe a Little Bit of Spiritual Progress

THREE DISPARATE IDEAS that eventually relate ( maybe only in my mind) If this makes sense to your mind, too, and you get what I'm trying to say, I would love if you tell me that somehow. Or if you don't agree. Or any response, really. 


1. A local high school's month has been interrupted several times by bomb threats. The kids are herded to the stadium, entire classes are skipped, and nothing else happens. The police investigate, rumors abound, and no one is charged.

 At dinner last night, a few HS students were discussing another recent event: The HS is collecting biometrics of all students (hand prints) for the purpose of 'purchasing school lunch'. Whether you historically pack lunch or purchase lunch, it's mandatory. Non-participants must have a waiver signed by parents.


 Fascinating: The students understand perfectly. "They know that no one will remember to get that waiver signed by the deadline." And even, "Yeah, suddenly 'a better way to buy lunch' becomes top priority after all these bomb threats. Right."




 2. I read an "OMGFact" that excited me so much:

 There is now technology that can create visual representations of dreams. Supposedly, the majority of our dreams go unremembered. So now, with this device that translates unconscious thought into visible narrative, we'll have documentation.

It could have cool applications for stroke patients or others who have limitations of expression.

 But then I started thinking, "Hey! That's probably not why they want to develop this technology at all." These applications could be very, very cool...unless of course yours is the brain being plundered.



 3. I've joked that the iPhone (what's the i stand for? illuminati!! haha) is the mark of the beast (hold it in HAND, train eye (FOREHEAD) on it) because I've been in groups in which all are fixated on iPhones, and it's funny to me.

 But reality is: the microchip may be coming. It's even....likely, I think.

 They chip pets now. I think they've talked about putting medical info in chips. Why not financial information? Scan your hand instead of a card when checking out? Very convenient.

 I was talking to a person who suggested:

First generation -- Basic data, justification: security for kids, medical info for safety
Second generation chip -- Purchasing power
Third generation chip -- 'Read' thoughts
 Fourth generation chip -- 'Read-write' capability

 He also said something about the write code in some programming language having three 6's.


 What These Things Made me Think About 


 I remember a time when I was engaged in a spiritual battle of a kind.  I expressed frustration that, as a believer, I have to show so much restraint in the way I 'battle'. I can't return certain 'blows', and it's very, very frustrating.  My pastor said simply: "Well, we fight with different weapons."

 The 3 things above make me think about one of God's 'rules of engagement': How he does not usurp man's free will.

 This is maddening to me. He could, he has the power.
He could have killed Hitler in the womb, he could have made rapists impotent, he could have foiled the efforts of the atom bomb inventors, he could make the right 2 people fall in love with each other, he could make the right sperm penetrate the right ovum, and on and on and on.

 I am not really precisely why I have a problem with the above 3 scenarios, but it does elicit something yucky in me (like, a wary response). And I can see that it's a violation of freedom in each scenario.


 So for one little second, I can accept the way God doesn't always intervene in the ways that would so obviously 'fix' a situation.

Force/coercion/manipulation just aren't his style. And it makes sense, of course, because those things violate personal freedom, and setting people free is, after all, his M.O.

Ravi

Another old myspace blog entry circa 2007.

And the comment is from the same Shannon who comments on this blog. Her comments improve/help me better understand everything. Note: She does this IRL for me, too. I wonder how many miles we've walked (around Centennial Lake, around neighborhoods)  so that we could poke and prod and draw out and correct and affirm some idea or another.

Prediction: Shannon will actually try and figure this out using logic now, and give an estimate here. And that estimate would probably be within 10 mi. or so.

Prediction 2: Shannon will cast doubt on my uncanny ability to predict things b/c I wrote it here, so it appears to be a challenge or that I gave her the idea. But if you're honest with yourself, Shannon, you will admit that you were thinking of a figure before you read the first Prediction. BE HONEST GEEZ. Now the blog.

RAVI

I love Ravi Zacharias. I love his ability to preach, I love his massive IQ, I love how he always talks about the movie " Chariots of Fire", Cissy and I  love how when a word ends with "s" he draws it out, for example, "Jesus Christ (dramatic pause) died for our sinssssssssssss."

I wanted to put an awesome quote here. But it's about 3 paragraphs long. And Cissy complains my blogs are too long to suffer. I want to summarize below: (C. is probably already clicked out of this by now hahaha)

It's this idea that Christians need to differentiate between our opinions and our convictions. Our opinions need not be foisted on anyone. And even our convictions--every conviction we hold should be undergirded by love.

He says that, without the undergirding of love, the possessor of any conviction becomes obnoxious, and the dogma believed becomes repulsive to the one who disagrees with it.

Jesus, of course, is the ultimate example. Instructing, convicting...loving.

12:10 AM

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  • 
    Shannon!
    

    In honor of Cissy, it is my aim to post a comment LONGER than your original post!  :)
    
    I see our own brand of post-modernism in this.  Just remembering that we will be wrong on something...I suppose we will probably be wrong in our convictions and our opinions. (hmm...how can one be wrong on a conviction?  Does that mean it doesn't come from God?  Do we call things convictions that in fact are opinions? But this is not where I was going.)
    
    And then of course I think of fundamentalism, defined as the idea that if you don't agree with me on what I say is important, I will hate you.  (This has the appearance of greater civility, since it used to be "If you don't agree with me, I will kill you."....but hate=murder)
    
    I struggle with fundamentalism...I'm working on praying more like the sinner and less like the Pharisee...
    Ooops...I think I'm stopping too soon...so sorry, Cissy!  :)
    

    ... Show more

    5 years ago

The Tebow Effect

((Background: I have always loved sports, and I was raised to be a Steelers fan.
I loved playing (one thing I miss the most about my life pre-RA), and now I love watching. I really believe the cliche that 'athletics reveal character.' ))

Of course, I'd heard his name all season. But I was keeping up with Pittsburgh (my team) and Baltimore (my son's team) and had not even watched a Denver game all season. I knew people loved Tebow (I have a facebook and a twitter account...).

My daughter's friend was talking about him, and the passion was what intrigued me:  He HATES Tebow. He was vehement: Tebow was grandstanding, arrogant...so I was thinking it was something like Kurt Warner or Tony Dungy and how they give glory to God after games.

A friend of my son's said the funniest thing -- that Tebow is going to turn out to have severed heads in his freezer or bodies buried under his house. Again, I still had not seen him play or speak or read any articles.

A different friend of my son's was fervent: "He's a winner. He wins." was the phrase I remember. I don't think of this particular young man as eloquent, and I was struck that he sounded poetic when he talked about Tebow.

Another friend of my son's, who is eloquent and who I think should be a sportswriter said, "I would like to have Tim Tebow's babies." (He's male, it was funny.)

SO -- I made it a point to watch the Chicago-Denver game. I made a facebook status and got interesting comments.

In the first half, I could see why people like him. He runs a lot, and he's brave - he puts his shoulder down and doesn't slide to the ground like most QBs.  He throws, too (I had heard he never passes) But his passes are wobbly, no spiral.

Then the fourth quarter happened. Everyone in the world knows what happened -- it was nothing short of amazing.

And the parts that confused me happened aftward -

He rightly gave credit to the kicker (whose name I know now - Prater -he had  59 (!!!!) and 51 yard field goals- he was a hero))) and his o-line and his defense.  When he says the 'believe' stuff, he's talking about his teammates belief in each other.

I only saw him "Tebow" once. ((My favorite player crosses himself in the Orthodox manner after EVERY SINGLE PLAY, so I don't understand the big deal about this QB kneeling a few times a game.  Christians/people of all faiths  pray when they're struggling/playing sports, big deal.))

So -- why do his haters think he's arrogant?

There are a million articles out there on this phenomenon. They are so interesting...I think the secular sports writers are saying the best things.

Here's where I may sound crazy, but reading all of those articles is having an effect on me personally.
((I'm a person who likes the dark side. I am familiar with struggle. Cynicism is comfortable to me. The glass isn't just half-empty...it may be full of something toxic. Villains in stories are always more interesting/attractive to me.))

Reading about Tebow is making me feel like experimenting with optimism.


((Also - I am as excited about the Denver-Boston game as I am about Pittsburgh-SF. ))