For the wedding coming up this Saturday, I opted to go with an older Victorian high-button vest. I bought the vest from Gentlemans Emporium Victorian Men's Clothing and Writing Goods. The site was nice, the vest looked good, and they shipped it here quickly. When it got here the button holes were a ragged. The thread around each button hole would get caught on each button which created a serious problem given my time frame.
I was a little concerned about calling them at first since I had just called a NY based company. New Yorkers are rather brusk people by nature. Fear of dealing with more bruskness under this added stress wasn't increasing my desire to call about getting the problem remedied.
Thankfully, the Lord had wonderfully nice people work at the Emporium. The lady that answered was understanding and concerned. She graciously listened to my story and then gave me a quick and easy solution.
Given that I needed the vest by this Saturday, she was kind enough to ship the replacement to Steph's parents house in CO. She then arranged for UPS to come and pick up the not-so-good vest. All of this (post-bruskness) was very unexpected. The Lord is always good though, and provides just the right people in just the right places to brighten ones day, lift one's spirits, and point our thankfulness to the Creator God who allows sinful people to be nice in the first place.
I highly recommend anyone interested in Victorian clothing or writing implements to do their business here. Nice people, good products, and a pretty slick web site. 8o)
Have you ever been trying so hard to live that all you can do is fail at it miserably?
That's the summary of the past ...umm... 5 or so months of my life.
I got this crazy idea, that I could figure life out. That all I needed to do was know what people (and God) really wanted. Once I knew that, I could do those things and all would be happy.
At first it seemed to be working. I could ask simple questions, get direct answers, and then act on them. But then, I found situations where I couldn't figure out the problem. Didn't know what questions to ask, didn't understand why what I was doing wasn't making the person (or Person) happy.
People pleasing has some serious short comings. For starters, if you do it long enough (successfully or otherwise) you become schizophrenic and begin thinking you see situations for "service" that aren't there or you become frustraited with the person you are trying to please because you just can't seem to get it right.
The schizophrenia only grows with every failed attempts. Successful attempts only lead to harder trying.
So that was the sin that caused 5 months of pain for more than just me. From all of this I've learned that you can't "try" at life, you just have to live it. Isn't that what "carpe diem corum Deo" is all about? Isn't that why Solomon wrote Ecclesiasties? Isn't that why Christ died? To redeem us from our sin, so that we would be new creatures. He not only made it possible for us to have eternal life, but His sacrifice also gives us the ability to live our lives like the Second Adam. His work of sanctification is a work of restoring the image of God that was intended to be in all mankind. It won't ever be flawless on this earth, but it does grow by God's grace through the work of the Spirit.
Forgive me for not Living.
Forgive me for not blogging.
Forgive me for not Loving.
Christ has redeemed me.
I am reconciled to Him by His blood.
What more can I give Him than my Life.
All of it.
In it's fullest.
With no inhibitions.
Naked and unashamed.
Praise God from whom all blessings flow.
My brain is full of blog ideas. Topics for words. Things that can't be truly expressed in any other form. They need to be written, but they're all crammed inside my head. Each wants the most attention. Each pleads to be written. Hard enough to just get an idea of what each topic is asking, let alone choose the one that gets attention first.
We are called
to Live.
If we know to do good
and we don't do it,
we're sinning.
Please forgive me.
In my often confused, finite brain I had been looking at grace all wrong.
Grace in my mind had been the thing that rescues me when I don't get it right. The thing I hadn't really thought of, was that I never get things right.
God's grace gives us the ability to do what's right. Without it, doing right is impossible. "All our righteousness is as filthy rags."
Without Him there is nothing.
In Him, there is Life and Peace.
This is the urgency: Live!
And have your blooming in the noise of the whirlwind.
--Gwendolyn Brooks
This morning I ran across some scum in the guestbook of one of the Mambo sites I frequent. Paulo, the owner, is a good template designer. I e-mailed him about the scum and he removed it promptly. In his reply, he sent me a free copy of one of the templates he normally sells (Peek Sys Blue).
Gratitude is a wonderful and very inspiring thing.
Thank you, Paulo.
For Your name's sake, O Lord,
pardon my guilt, for it is great.
Who is the man who fears the Lord?
Him will he instruct in the way
that he should choose.
His soul shall abide in well-being,
and his offspring shall inherit
the land.
The friendship of the Lord is for
those who fear Him,
and He makes known to them
His covenant.
My eyes are ever toward the
Lord,
for He will pluck my feet out of
the net.
Psalm 25:11-15
ABCNews.com has written a short article called "Gone Too Far?" about television content and they are asking for response.
ABCNEWS.com : Which TV Moments Went Too Far?
Please be advised that there is a list of "questionable" scenes that you will be asked to "review."
It seems three out of five web pages this morning have been in other languages. I'm not complaining mind you, just noticing my extreme lack of i18n* skills.
If I'm going to keep up with the web, life on this planet, and any kind of international ministry I'm going to have to learn at least one more.
My "to learn" languages list is exceeding long. The ones that I've found are most often used in my industry are (in order of most regular occurances): English (got that one), French, German, and Japanese.
Someday soon my friends.
a, ka, sa, ta, na...
* i18n stands for internationalization. It's my favorite child of the accronym boom of the late 90's. It has a younger sibling that's nice too: L10N - localization.
The state of my soul in seventeen syllables:
an enormous life looms
behind small, mundane tasks.
moutains through the grass.
Joy recently asked for "other thoughts" concerning Christians and imagination.
Here are mine.
Our minds are full of God given potential. Christians should know this better than anyone else. Why is it then that the rest of the world seems to display more creativity than Christians? It's often more developed. We see it more often. Displayed in more ways.
Perhaps this is something that others (the Schaeffers) have already addressed, but what is it that keeps Christians back? Fear?
It seems we have two choices. We can either encourage our creativity and train our minds, or we can let them take a sin-natural downward spiral.
The two seem to be related. We can either foster righteous, creative thinking or let our minds fester on the sin of this world.
In the Psalms, David talks about his consistent meditation on God's law and testimonies (Psalm 119:97).
"Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer." -- Psalm 19:14
If our minds were filled with meditation on Christ, they would not be able to fester. Filling our minds with Christ will leave no room for meditation on sin.
To be truly Creative, our minds must be filled with the Truth given to us by the Creator: His Love for mankind and our redemption through His Son's death. Because we are redeemed we can Live in the Truth of His Love. Because we our redeemed our minds can be filled with His Love. Because we are redeemed our Creativity will show His Love.
Psalm 19 consists of meditation of God's Creativity and the Truth in it. It ends with a prayer that David's meditation be acceptable in His sight for God was His Rock and Redeemer.
Like Joy (karagraphy: never a dull moment), the last few days of my life have been full of interesting circumstances.
The first one was my connection to the Net was down for almost two days (puts a damper on things when your a professional web designer).
The second a site that I've been working on for months that is very near completion is now in accessible due to some unexplained problem that was recently fixed for all the domains except the one I need.
The strange thing is that I'm not discouraged, frustraited, nor even afraid (though I was tempted to be this morning).
It's very strange, and wonderful, that we truly can have a peace that passes understanding based in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Knowing that His steadfast Love endures forever changes everything.
It's occured to me today that I have a responsibility to manage my life, my finances, my actions, my thoughts, my words, and anything else I do.
It's been very easy for me to sit back and "relax" while I wandered my way through life, working on my spiritual walk as a hobby, my finances as a game, and my business as an adventure.
Perhaps I'm being to honest.
I'm confessing this sin here and now.
Please forgive me.
Please help me.
There is no time to play.
But the urgency is not pain,
but pleasure.
We can thrive in this 24x7x52x70 existence.
Christ has equipped us
for every battle
each moment
all thoughts.
All breathingeatinglovingwalkingtrippingjumpingsmeelingtasteingseeing are His.
Why should we fear?
Why should we hold back?
Why can't we LIVE.
Fullness of life comes not from care-free-chaos.
It comes from ordered creativity.
From soul searching repentance.
From deep, earthy joy that makes your chin quiver.
Be unashamedly Christ's.
Right here.
Right now.
Always.
Somebody, somewhere (probably a credit agency) has given out my information to a number of credit card companies who have all taken it upon themselves to "help" me boost my credit.
MY CREDIT IS FINE!!!
Is there somewhere I can write that, so all these annoying phone calls will cease?
Just wondering. 8o)
This blog entry is in response to Jbo's comment on the SunCom entry.
After a wave of big dreams washed over me last week,
I've found myself sitting stairing at the dust in the corner.
Thinking small thoughts.
Producing nothing.
This morning, the Lord brought me to the point of realizing that my current state of mind was sinful. My thoughts have been selfish. Not in that I'm greedy, but in that I'm not giving.
Kammer said it best, "Creativity is one of the most powerful ways to exhibit unselfishness."
I've been sitting here,
not producing,
not acting,
not cleaning,
not improving,
slidding,
slipping,
drifting.
It's not a pleasant place to be.
Like drinking muddy water out of a broken cistern,
I'm thirsty and disatisfied.
All that,
changes now.
Today.
This moment.
My hat is over the fence (again). If any of you ever catch me not dreaming, rebuke me. If I'm not producing anything, rebuke me twice. I need your help brothers. Please help Christ purify me by not allowing me to just sit.
No matter what my head wants to think or how disallusioned and frustratied I may feel during the course of today, I'm am going to make my mantra: "By Him all things. Carpe diem corum Deo (seize the day before the face of God)."
How may I help you?