Funny Things You See On Facebook: Re-sharing To Receive God’s Favor

This appeared in my news feed the other day. Apparently, I am Facebook friends with either Joel Osteen or Job’s three pals.

P.S. In a real sense, this isn’t funny at all. The fact that anyone in a ‘Christian society’ could think this is the way God works shows how far off a lot of biblical teaching has gotten.

Funny Things You See On Facebook: Christian Counseling

The sidebar of my facebook page is always cluttered with advertisements which are supposed to be relevant to me in some way, but never actually are. They are, however, occasionally a source of great humor.

Today one of the ads was encouraging me to get my Christian Counseling degree (in as little as one year!). That’s not so strange I guess, but I was a little surprised by the choice of picture used to illustrate such a degree program—what appears to be the back of a leg tattooed with a picture of Jesus.

I haven’t taken any counseling classes yet as part of my degree program, so I confess to being ignorant here—is getting a Jesus calf tattoo part of the degree program, or is the tattoo something that the counselor suggests to his client as part of the counseling process?

Any assistance you could give me would be appreciated.

UPDATE: However the tattoos are used in the context of counseling, apparently it is also acceptable for them to be on the back of the neck.

The Dangers of Language Study

I have spent what seems like a significant portion of my life studying languages, and for the most part, I’m pretty good at it. Aside from English, which I’ve been speaking at least semi-fluently for almost a quarter century, I also spent several years studying Spanish (and even have a college degree in it), and for the past two semesters I have been studying Koine Greek (i.e., the Greek of the New Testament).

There’s a problem that comes with being “pretty good” at language study though: learning a language comes easy enough to me that I am not too intimidated to try it, but it is difficult enough that I never completely seem to “get it down.” Part of this stems from the fact that language study takes a great deal of constant practice, and I haven’t always been diligent about doing that. Another problem is that my brain seems to have a difficult time keeping the different languages separate, which results in me occasionally producing a weird hybrid of multiple languages. For example, consider the word in in the three languages I know:

• English: in
• Spanish: en
• Koine Greek: ἐν

These three words mean the same thing, are pronounced virtually the same, and are basically spelled the same (the Greek ε is similar to the Spanish e and the Greek ν is similar to the English or Spanish n). Is it really any wonder that I semi-routinely get these words mixed up and use them interchangeably?

Genesis 11 tells the story of the Tower of Babel, which occurred at a time when everyone spoke the same language. In an act of apparent hubris, a bunch of people decided to build a tower which would stretch up to heaven. This displeased God, so he confused their language (v.7) to disrupt their cooperation and prevent the completion of their project.

All of that to say this: despite my best efforts, I feel like my languages are significantly confused and babbled in my head. And here’s the problem with that: when you misspell the word in, people start to make assumptions about your intelligence (or lack thereof).

Maybe There’s A Good Explanation For This…

On the radio, I keep hearing advertisements encouraging me to donate any old cars I have to “Heritage for the Blind”. I don’t know anything about Heritage for the Blind, but assuming that their name is at all descriptive of what they actually do, I can’t help but wonder: do blind people really need used cars?

Be An Optimist Prime

As someone who grew up as a big Transformers fan and who is also occasionally inclined towards pessimism, this is completely awesome:

Losing Clothes

I do not, at all, enjoy shopping for clothes.

This fundamental fact about me leads to at least two other facts:

(1) I get lots of clothing for my birthday and Christmas. This is good, because it means I don’t have to shop for clothes as often.

(2) When I find clothes that I like, I tend to keep them for a long time and wear them often. For example, I still wear the button-up shirt that I wore in my 11th grade class picture (I am now 27), and I still have an Atlanta Braves t-shirt that I received in 1993.

The problem is, for as long as I can remember, I have also had a problem losing clothes, and without exception, I always lose things that I actually like. And while there are other negative characteristics of my childhood that I have happily discarded (like, say, being afraid of spiders), the tendency to lose clothes that I like has doggedly followed me to adulthood.

The other day I realized that I had lost a brown polo shirt, which was a major blow, because it had a prominent place in my weekly rotation. Add that to the blue polo which I am convinced I lost somewhere in Colorado, the long-sleeved white shirt that I wore as an undershirt in the fall/winter, and the “Salute a Veteran” t-shirt that I got for giving blood, and my wardrobe has really taken a hit over the last few years. And then there was that sweet red, white and blue windbreaker that I lost in elementary school and have never really recovered from.

I’m afraid I’m going to have to shop for clothes again.

Disclaimer: Implying that I am completely over my childhood fear of spiders might have been somewhat misleading. That being said, one of my husband-ly duties is to deal with every spider that makes the unfortunate decision to enter our house. So, it’s something I’ve been working on.

Calypso Conundrum

I generally try to avoid Wikipedia.

Not because I’m one of those people who talks about how inaccurate it is, but because I find it to be altogether too fascinating. I’ll go to Wikipedia to read an article on something I’m interested in only to discover links to other articles that I’m interested in, and before I know it, I have 12 tabs open in my browser of different articles and I’ve lost 40 minutes of my life.

I say all that to introduce the fact that the other day I found myself on Harry Belafonte’s page without knowing how I got there. In addition to discovering some interesting facts about his life, I also came across the record cover to Belafonte’s hit album Calypso:


This fascinating photo leads me to two very important questions: (1) Did Harry Belafonte really have 7 fingers on his left hand, and if he did, (2) Why isn’t this very important fact mentioned in his Wikipedia entry?

Facebook Theology

First person’s status:

“Drop kick me Jesus through the goal posts of life.”

Second person’s comment:

“Jesus doesn’t kick field goals bro. He goes for the touchdown on 4th down, he makes it, and then he goes for the freakin’ sweet 2 points afterwards.”

There’s actually something significant there, I think.

Junk Mail

Of all the different forms of “junk” correspondence that I encounter, I would submit that junk faxes are the most annoying.

The somewhat ironically-named “courtesy call” on the phone is annoying, but you can always just hang up when you realize that’s what it is. It’s pretty easy to sort junk mail from the other legitimate stuff that comes to your mailbox, and it’s easily thrown away as well. Junk e-mail really isn’t a problem as long as you have a decent filter in your email system.

Junk faxes are the most annoying though, because in addition to wasting your time (which all the above examples do as well), they also waste your resources. Every time we get a junk fax at the church office, a sheet of our pristine 8 1/2 x 11 Office Depot copy paper is wasted. That might not seem like a big deal, but since we seem to get a couple of junk faxes per week, when you multiply it out over the course of a year, that’s 100 or so sheets of paper. Which still isn’t a major expense, but it is certainly annoying.

Most of these junk faxes offer cheap insurance rates, or inform me that I’ve won free vacations, or tell me that I’ve been selected for some version of “Who’s Who.” But one time a while back, I got one that was a little more interesting:

Dear Personnel Manager,

If there is a piece missing from your organizational puzzle, I believe my background and qualifications will fit perfectly with your company’s needs.

I am a results-oriented, seasoned professional who regards principle, balance, and professionalism as strategic components of my business philosophy. I have a proven ability to reach targeted goals and have gained diverse experience in sales, management, and marketing. I believe I can be an asset to your firm.

I would welcome the opportunity to meet with you to explore how my experience could best meet your needs. Thank you for your consideration.

Best regards,

Some Random Guy Who Apparently Didn’t Realize That The Service He Subscribed To Would Also Send His Resume To Random Churches

Attached to this cover letter was a resume that contained the following highlights:

• Over 10 years experience specializing in Sales, Account Management and Business Development.
• While working at a parts store, was instrumental in the successful acquisition and assimilation of two competitors.
• Also while at the parts store, developed a culturally diverse marketing strategy for the location capturing 75% of the established Hispanic market and 95% of the established Asian market.

So after originally lampooning the idea of us receiving this guy’s resume, maybe I need to give him a call.

If hiring him would help us with the successful acquisition and assimilation of our “competitors” and also help us to capture the local established Hispanic and Asian markets, he’d be worth anything we could pay him!

Church Signs

Of my many work-related responsibilities, one of my least favorite ones is being in charge of changing the message on the church sign we have out front. People who go to church where I do could probably guess that this is something I don’t like doing much, because it gets changed very irregularly.

It’s somewhat of a pain to drag the ladder outside, pull down the old letters, come up with something new to put up, make sure we have enough letters for the new message, pick out and arrange the new letters and put them back up on the sign (which is partially broken and therefore makes the process somewhat more difficult).

Really, though, it’s not that hard to do, and I would probably change it on a (more) regular basis if I was convicted at all that it was important—if changing the sign out front actually did any good or was worthwhile.

Instead, I tend to think that church signs do more harm than good—someone driving by is more likely to be turned off by a hokey saying than they are encouraged by a thoughtful one.

For example, one local church that I drive by regularly recently proclaimed the following message on their marquee:

PRAYING IS BETTER THAN TEXTING

While I agree with this message, I’m not really sure that I would include it in the thoughtful category.

On the other hand, maybe the person who put it up was having trouble coming up with new ideas and decided to embark on an ongoing series. If that’s the case, they may have discovered a gold mine. Just consider the possibilities:

PRAYING IS BETTER THAN FACEBOOK

PRAYING IS BETTER THAN BLOGGING

PRAYING IS BETTER THAN MYSPACE

PRAYING IS BETTER THAN TWEETING

You don’t even have to stay mired in the world of technology, because this is a very versatile theme:

PRAYING IS BETTER THAN VEGETABLES

PRAYING IS BETTER THAN TELEVISION

PRAYING IS BETTER THAN MCDONALD’S

PRAYING IS BETTER THAN READING CHURCH SIGNS

Well, you probably get the idea, and I’ve spent too much time on this anyway. There’s other stuff I need to be doing—like changing our church sign.

A Most Unpleasant Way To Start The Day

I am a morning showerer. I have to start off each morning with a shower, or I just don’t feel like I’ve really woken up.

But on rare occasions, I shower at night, and when that happens, I’ll sometimes skip my morning shower so I can sleep in a little bit longer. However, if I don’t shower in the morning, my hair is out of control, so I’ll still go wash my hair in the bathtub (which takes much less time than a shower) to make it more manageable.

Last night, I showered after playing ultimate, which means that this morning, I slept in a little bit and then went to the guest bathroom to wash my hair. I was bending over the bathtub, with my head under the faucet and the water running,when it happened.

A snake came out of the drain, about six inches from my face.

After realizing that I wasn’t hallucinating (I had just woken up after all), I jumped up, shocked and speechless. Unfortunately, I had no snake-killing device in hand, and since I’m not Bear Grylls, I wasn’t about to grab it with my bare hands.

After a few seconds, the snake went back down the drain, and I haven’t seen him since.

We called a plumber, who basically said that it wasn’t all that uncommon, that there was nothing they could do, and that we should keep the drains closed and toilet lids down and eventually the snake would leave.

This seems like a less than ideal solution to the problem—anyone have any better ideas?

I guess the good thing is that I discovered the snake rather than Caroline—if that had happened, I’m pretty sure that we’d be moving.

Little Things

I’ve always taken great joy from the “little things” in life and also from watching other people.

These two elements combined the other day while Caroline and I were eating at a Mexican restaurant.

Two young men, probably in their early 20s, were eating in a booth adjacent to ours, and when one got up to use the restroom, I noticed a mischievous grin appear on the face of the other. Once his friend was out of sight, he reached for the salt shaker, started cracking up, and poured a generous amount of salt into his companion’s drink.

After stirring it in, he apparently decided he hadn’t added enough, and then added a second helping. He then sat there, eagerly watching the restroom for his friend to return.

When he finally did return, the look on his face after drinking his salty beverage and his friend’s reaction to that look were absolutely priceless.

The whole episode made my day.

1984

After planning to do so for a long time, I finally got around to reading George Orwell’s 1984. I must say, I was disappointed.

I realize it was written in the late 1940s and that this was a scary time, but Orwell seems more than a little bit pessimistic.

On second thought, considering the clothing trends, popular music and hairstyles of choice of the 1980s, maybe Orwell’s prediction was somewhat rosy by comparison.

The Worst Church Song Ever

A very long time ago, I started a series called Best and Worst, in which I examine the best or worst of all time in a given category.

Except, technically it isn’t a “series” until now, because I forgot all about it until I became acquainted with The Worst Church Song Ever a couple of weeks ago.

For those of you who have spent a significant portion of your life singing church songs, if you’re like me, you probably have your share of favorites (Abide With Me, Come Thou Fount Of Every Blessing, Let The Lower Lights Be Burning), as well as your share of songs that you would rather never sing again (Follow Me, Ivory Palaces).

This post isn’t about any of those songs though. It’s about We’re A Rainbow, a song that I discovered in our homemade youth song book a couple of weeks ago.

Unfortunately, there’s no music to the words, and since I don’t know anyone who knows the song, I have no idea how to sing it, but you can read the lyrics for yourself:

“We’re a rainbow made of Christians,
We’re an army for the Lord.
We’ve no weapons that can harm you,
Christian love is much too strong.”

I don’t really even know where to begin, but I’ll try.

First of all, the song is really, really short. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but if you’re going to only have four lines, they need to be very good lines, and these aren’t.

Secondly, there’s no real attempt made at following any discernable rhyme scheme. I guess that’s small potatoes compared to the rest of the song’s problems, but it just helps to make the words of the song seem even more randomly chosen.

Third, a good song should convey a clear message. The message of We’re A Rainbow seems to be that Christians are a loving rainbow army, and I’m not really even sure what that means. Maybe I’d have a better sense of the message if the song itself was longer than 25 words.

Fourth, the different lines of the songs are all…wait, let’s just stop right there. I’m sorry, but I just can’t continue to pretend to seriously analyze a song that starts off with “We’re a rainbow made of Christians…”

My humble nomination for the title of The Worst Church Song Ever.

UPDATE: I recently received an email informing me that I only had the chorus to this song, and that the full lyrics are as below:

“We’re a rainbow made of Christians,
We’re an army for the Lord.
We’ve no weapons that can harm you,
Christian love is much too strong.”

So we sing in Unity,
‘Live and Love Eternally,’
so become a Child of God,
and enjoy a life of peace.

When you’re feeling sad and lonely,
and you cross is hard to bear,
come to Jesus, he will teach you,
to obtain sweet peace through prayer.”

While I still think the chorus is somewhat hard to stomach, the verses are certainly a big improvement.

My apologies for the inadvertent mistake.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy

I’d heard countless references to Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy during my lifetime, and I knew it had something of a cult following, but I really didn’t know anything about it until I read it a few weeks ago.

Now having read it, the only thing I can really say is:

It stinks. I think it might be the most mind-numbingly stupid, plotless book I have ever read.

It did succeed in getting me to laugh a couple of times, but since it tried to get me to laugh dozens and dozens of times, this doesn’t seem like much of a success either.

I know it’s a popular book, but really, I don’t get its popularity at all. If you’re a Hitchhiker fan, I hope I haven’t offended you, but maybe you can explain to me why it shouldn’t be considered a strong contender for The Worst Book Ever Written?

New House: When A Garage Can Be A Bad Thing

I haven’t written about this much, but back in January, Caroline and I moved from the apartment where we had lived for the past two years to a 3-bedroom house that we are renting.

One of the more pleasant benefits of our new house is that it has a 2-car garage. Being able to enter the house basically via remote control is nice, and not having to scrape ice of your windshield in the winter is completely awesome.

However, having never lived anywhere with a garage before, there are some things about having one which I’m learning as I go.

For example, back when we had the big ice storm in January, we lost power at our house, the garage door no longer worked automatically, and I didn’t know how to get the door up so we could leave. I figured it out eventually though.

Yesterday, upon returning home from work, I had another lesson in Garage Ownership 101. On the way home, I had been listening to some talk radio, and as I pulled into the garage, I was interested in what one particular caller had to say. Without thinking, I closed the garage door and sat there for several minutes with the car running, listening to the radio.

Of course, I’ve seen enough movies to know that leaving the car running in the garage with the door down is a popular suicide method, but that didn’t occur to me until I finally got out of the car and was assaulted by a garage full of my own exhaust fumes. I began to cough and even after entering the house, felt light-headed for a while.

So here’s the lesson: apparently filling up your garage with carbon monoxide fumes really is a bad idea. I don’t recommend it. If the radio’s really that interesting, turn off the engine and sap some battery power.

Hope Vs. Fear

“We have chosen hope over fear.”
—Barack Obama, January 21, 2009

“A failure to act, and act now, will turn crisis into a catastrophe.”
—Barack Obama, February 4, 2009

So much for hope. It was fun while it lasted.

In These Times Of Economic Turbulence…

…I am reminded of a story of Babe Ruth, the greatest player in baseball history.

During the Great Depression (in 1931, I believe) Ruth signed a 2-year, $160,000 contract—more money than any baseball player had ever made before.

It was also more money than President Herbert Hoover made, and when a newspaper reporter asked Ruth if he thought that was right, the Babe shrugged: “Why not? I had a better year than he did.”

Redundancy Defined

Darren McFadden on his rookie season in Oakland:

“I felt like overall it was a good year without the injuries,” McFadden said. “Other than the injuries I thought it was a good year for me overall.”

This makes D-Mac sound pretty foolish, but I blame the sportswriter for not editing the quote.

Whom To Vote For?

So, I don’t know if you’ve heard or not, but there’s a pretty big election coming up in the next month or so.

I’ve talked before about how I’m not a Barack Obama fan. I disagree strongly with his views on abortion, which is a deal-breaker for me, but I have other problems with him as well.

Unfortunately, as a person, I think he’s probably a better guy than John McCain. I come closer to agreeing with McCain on a lot of issues, and, as I’ve written before, in some ways, McCain is a very admirable guy.

But on the whole, he seems to be a big jerk. He’s infamous for his terrible temper, he slept around all over the place on his first wife, and it’s really hard for me to respect a guy who would say things like this to his current wife (and in public!).

So it looks like I’m in need of a different candidate*, and it’s for that purpose that I’m writing this blog post—to accept nominations for a write-in candidate.

The first nomination I received a while back from my brother, and it’s a pretty good one: Optimus Prime.

I think Optimus has a lot of characteristics that would make him an ideal President. Consider:

• He would bring an entire new meaning to “Commander-in-Chief.” I’m not even sure we’d need an army anymore.
  
• International Negotiations: This goes along with the first point I guess, but seriously, can you imagine Ahmadinejad or Hugo Chavez doing anything other than treating Prime with the utmost respect?
• Over and over he has staunchly supported and affirmed the value of all human life.
• He’s the wisest and most noble of all Autobots.
  

But on the flip side:

• As someone who transforms into an 18-wheeler, Optimus is an inherent and fundamental part of our oil crisis in a way that no other candidate could be.
  
• And the big one: he’s not a native born citizen of the United States. Not at all.

So I guess the nominations are still open…

*I actually hope that McCain wins the election, but I’m just not sure that I could bring myself to vote for him. I’m pretty sure that in my state, it won’t matter though, which is why I’m taking such a light-hearted approach to this.