Asian Wine Tasting

Josh had Nina and I over for dinner Sunday evening, Chinese style. The tradition is called "hot pot" and is totally legal. You cook your food (shrimp, scallops, sliced beef, mushrooms, spinach, noodles, egg, tofu, etc.) in boiling chicken broth, eating as you go. It's a group sort of thing. Josh enjoys this Asian liquor called Sake and I decided to try a taste for myself. Josh seemed to enjoy it a little too much. While the pictures we took look a incriminating, I could only stand taking a couple of sips. BTW, Josh was just trying to be funny (in the photo) ;)

Afterward we watched Japanese anime that had interesting insights on the Law!

In the marketplace for Truth? Try Veritas, it's minty fresh

Hey everyone! There is a new link posted in my "Links" section. It's not porn or some slanderous article about American evangelicals (slander? Try BBC's Justin Webb). It is, however, the website for the Veritas Forum (Veritas is Latin for "truth"). This is what Veritas is designed to do:

To explore truth and life
To engage all students and faculty in an exploration of life's hardest questions
To enlarge the university’s marketplace of ideas
To present Christ as a viable option to life’s hardest questions
To inspire students to connect their academic and vocational life to Christ
To unite the Christian communities on campus in meaningful and compelling ways

**Justin Webb's article is interesting. I was going to comment on it, but decided to just post a link to it and let form your own opinion. He is wrong in regard to a number of things: 1) Evangelicals are very complex and difficult to understand, a few statistics and general conclusions can't cover the range of beliefs (religious, political, social, etc.) that we hold. 2) His worldview restricts him from understanding what science is really about, I'll comment on that at another time. While I'm not all that offended at his writing, it just goes to show that the wisdom of God is folly to those in unbelief. It encourages me to be a better Christian, friend, student, and scientist.

There's no place like Kansas

A 1000 miles, tons of food and the smiles of Spirit filled saints made this last week one I desire not to forget. Here's the quickest recap I can give...

I listened to two lectures on the drive out - one about quantum physics and postmodern thought, the other was over the Biblical mandate to subdue the earth. I also rear ended a gal in Kansas. No harm, no ticket! Praise God!

I spent Monday and Tuesday visiting at my Dad's. I was able to spend time with Pops while he was working at home. I also spent the day time at the community college to prepare for a presentation this week.

Tuesday, Steve and I accompanied Justin to his sis' basketball game in KC, MO. They lost in the last 5 seconds. I didn't really care, I was there to talk with J and S. J and S are living and ministering among the lower working class in KC, KS. S recently returned from ministering in Kenya for 6 months.

Met up with my G-parents, mom and brother on Wednesday. That evening Cara G. and I talked highly of the grace of God and calling others to this wonderful dance. Our time together is always sweet and pleasing. God uses Cara in a very real way to help me see Christ more clearly. Thank you.

Turkey day was easy and good. I spent all day at my G-parent's. It was nice to spend time with all of my family - aunt, uncle, sister, brother-in-law, step dad, mom, grandparents, brother, cousins. Richard and I put up Grandma's Christmas tree. This always seems to be a *big* task. No matter how new the lights are, there are always a dozen or more burnt out lights that keep the whole string from lighting up. Nonetheless, Richard and I (mostly him) tackeled the suckers and got it all put together.

Friday - Michelle and I worked out at the YMCA. It just wasn't the same as CRCE at U of I (see last post). Later that morning I visited with the Griffos. It is wonderful to be around that family, their love for Christ is contagious and inspiring to see! I made it Christian Book and Gift that afternoon and spent quite a while visiting with Erin and Brenda. While I wasn't too interested in their selection of books, it was great to see my former co-workers.

Friday night - Kristen, Craig and I cooked Chilli for that evening's get-together. While Casie couldn't make it, a number of the elect gathered with us: Feaker, Stones, Jesse J., Michael and Sarah (hailing from IL), Joe F., Kris H, and the J. It was a riot! It was so wonderful to see and talk to everyone. I just wish that I could spend more one-on-one time with them, because it just wasn't personal enough. I really desire to hear how the knowledge of God has spilled into their lives at school, work and with friends and family. Or the other way around, how working out their salvation has helped the Scripture become interalized in their heart.

The drive today was long, especailly through MO. I'm back now and ready to face the next three weeks of challenges with the resurection in mind.

24 Hrs and counting

I've got something better then little red slippers. I have a 95 Ford Ranger with new front brakes and a tank full of gas! Look out Kansas, pb is paying you a visit!

To start our break off in the right fashion, the guys (Michael, Josh, Justin, Anthony) and I made it over to the aquatics center in Campus Recreation Center East. The facilities include a really nice aquatics area, complete with a big hot tub, water slide, fountain and much more. This is also the place where "Fellowship of the Huge" meets MWF at 7:45 am to lift weights. Check out the pics, they're high quality. Josh (23) and I (22) played two-on-two water basketball against Michael (23) and Justin (25). Age beat out beauty in this match - Josh and I schooled the old farts!

The IFL dinner was amazing! Many students helped set up and beautifully decorate 20 tables. The feast, and I mean massive amounts of food, was candle lit and provided an intimate place to talk and fellowship with our international friends. Both Zahra and Chongong and his wife were my guests. I participated in a short play about Squanto, which helped communicate the Thanksgiving message. The vice-president of the electrical and computer engineering department gave a short message on being thankful, reminding us that everything we have has been given to us. He made a good point that Thanksgiving, unlike most other major holidays, has by and large been left unadulterated since is inception. This is one of the reasons it's my favorite holiday. Everyone seemed to really enjoy the evening. IFL's website will have pictures up soon!

This morning Josh Goh, Nina, Dwayne and I had homemade, whole wheat, almond pancakes! Amazing! Josh and Nina and I tried to get the hood of Josh's Honda open. The thing is stuck shut and the release handle is broken. It stayed shut, too. Tonight we're heading back to Nina's house to fill up Christmas shoeboxes with toys and hygeine products. We will be sending the boxes to an organization that will mobilizing our "boxes of love" overseas to little children.

goin' Home Alone

4 Days ago it was 60 degrees, today, 15! We've also accumulated a little bit of snow as a result of morning precipitation. And, the wind makes it dang cold! IFL Thanksgiving dinner for Int'l students is tommorrow evening. I've invited a few people from the office. I'm thinkin' Ivan will make it, too. All together we should have between 80 and 100 people in attendance. I even get to make a fool of myself in a skit! Whoo-hooo! Praise the Lord (!), I'll get another free meal Saturday evening at the church Thanksgiving potluck! Rock On.

This morning the guys and I were sharing prayer requests. I shared with the guys about an Iranian friend a few years ago who had become a Family member. My story ended with some gospel singin': "And he got ... saved... saved... saved... by the blood of the Lamb!" Blake followed suit by eckoing "saved! saved! saved!". This went on for a while and involved some foot stompin' and hand clapin'. It brought alot of joy to our spirits! Good times.


Sarah, along with her b/f Michael, and I were going to carpool to Topeka on Wednesday, but plans have changed. I've decided to drive out to KC this Sunday and spend a few days at my Dad's house. I intend to make Topeka on Tuesday evening. Staying KC will allow me to hang with my Dad and Step-Mom more and work on my project over at the local community college. I'm getting my brakes worked on tommorrow, so pray that the drive goes well and that my attitude is joyful!

Real Science???

Here's a link to a friend of mine's recent editorial to our school newspaper entitled Bad Science. I thought it might be of some interest to all of you in Topeka.

Forget Nat'l... Local evangelist gets cocky!

I guess I've created a little bit of a stir by citing that BBC article last Friday. Through events that happened today and over the weekend, I decided to delete the post. Here's why:

1) It didn't show the preciousness of God, nor encourage you in your salvation. Eph 4:29

2) When I judged the 700 club guy, I cast the same judgement on myself. I sure don't spend enough time caring and showing concern for other people. Rom 2:1-4.

3) My initial reaction to members of the religious right and their evolution/creationism stance is a negative one. This was expressed in my negative and condemning attitude in the post.

4) Evolution/ID is a testy subject and if I write about it, I need to completely explain myself.

Most importantly, my attitude lately has been one of arrogance, individualism, pride, legalism and unthankfulness. Today I took shots at the body of Christ that were unwarranted. It seems like I've put aside the grace of God for a lie and worhsiped MYSELF over the Creator. I try as hard as possible to hide this sin and paint a self-righteous picture. Sound bad? Does it sound like that Manson/Webb blog-post from a while back? I don't write these things to be hard on myself, but rather to boast in the redeeming work of Christ! I am a redeemed sinner!

"There is none righteous, no, not one;
There is none who understands;
There is none who seeks after God."

"... And [Jesus] was crucified."

"In him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace."

"it is God who commanded light to shine
out of darkness, who has shone in our
hearts to give the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Christ."

"Even when we were dead in trespasses,
[God] made us alive together with Christ,
it is by grace you have been saved."

"But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed intot the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord."

**So here's the thing, did you follow me into the same sins and disregard God's grace? I pray not, oh please be more wise then myself! Rely upon the grace of God, study the Scriptures and encourage and correct me. Watch and pray, lest you follow my sinful ways and enter into temptation. The Spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak (Mark 14:36).

Goats with brains

Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.
Eph 4:29-32

At church we were exhorted not to give over to the habit toward hardness, neglecting to acknowledge God.
We did not learn Christ that way. Rather, we learned Christ by putting aside our childish ways - we learn the ways of God mostly clearly by practice, not solely book knowledge.

In worship, we sang of our dependency upon our Savior alone (Rock of Ages):

+Rock of Ages, cleft for me,Let me hide myself in Thee;Let the water and the blood,From Thy wounded side which flowed,Be of sin the double cure;Save from wrath and make me pure.

+Not the labor of my handsCan fulfill Thy law’s demands;Could my zeal no respite know,Could my tears forever flow,All for sin could not atone;Thou must save, and Thou alone.

+Nothing in my hand I bring,Simply to the cross I cling;Naked, come to Thee for dress;Helpless look to Thee for grace;Foul, I to the fountain fly;Wash me, Savior, or I die.

+While I draw this fleeting breath,When mine eyes shall close in death, When I soar to worlds unknown,See Thee on Thy judgment throne,Rock of Ages, cleft for me,Let me hide myself in Thee.

http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/r/o/rockages.htm

**When I saw the title of this hymn in our bulletin, I was like darn, I really dislike that song, thinking it was the contemporary Rock of Ages (Rock of ages; Jesus your the rock; rock of ages...). Wow, when ever I hear that song or bring it to mind I can't help but think of the worship pastor from Fairlawn Nazarene up on stage singing her heart out, but basically convulsing as she shouted the words. Really weird, but hillarious! Praise God we sang the rich, desperate version of this tune on Sunday!

I went with IFL and the international students to the apple orchard in the afternoon. Ivan accompanied and together we watched goats traverse across a bridge, took pictures with pumpkins and had coffee with donuts and apple butter.

Dwayne and I joined one of our church's small groups in the evening for worship. Together we broke bread as a welcome, sang songs from the morning worship time, reviewed Pastor Jason's sermon on Ephesians and spent a time in sweet prayer. The members of the group are earnestly seeking to work out their salvation with fear and trembling. We came to a concensus over wanting to trust completely in God's character over imagining or worrying what our future or current circumstances should look like.

Prayer:
Dwayne and I are considering going with a group from the church to Mississippi for a long weekend. He and I are thinking about meeting one-on-one to build each other up in the faith.

Ivan is studying for the GRE and TOEFL. The application process for him to become a perminant student here is tedius and he hasn't been too encouraged through interacting with admissions.

Our Numbers Bible study is going to do some outreach in the city. We're deciding when and what to do.

Many projects are on the horizon and their deadlines are quickly approaching. After this week there are three full weeks of classes and then finals.

burnin' down das haus

Wie gehts du???

It's getting dark out way too fast! At 4:30 the sun was setting on the great state of Cham-bana and it felt like way too early. What's up with that?

Some highlights from the week:

Thursday's hydrology test rocked, as some would say. I took it in the morning, compared to the afternoon, because of a fellowship recognition ceremony I was required to attend. My hydrology prof used me as a guinea pig for the test. I took the full version (10 questions) which was a little longer then what he gave to the others. I prepared well, so no worries. The ceremony that afternoon was boring, but I heard some good things about my performace vis-a-vis this semester. All good things, so that was nice!

I picked up my truck Friday morning from the transmission shop. It was driving pretty well yesterday, but today it seems like the same thing is starting to occur again - it's difficult to push the shifter into gear with the clutch in. This was the main problem, so I'm gonna need to take it back to the shop for warranty work. The bright side is that the owner of the shop is a real honest guy and will work with me. Yesterday evening a few of us saw the new Zorro movie. I must admit that I was surprised at it's quality entertainment value. Of course it helps when you go into a flick with no prior expectations. I had no idea a new Zorro movie was out! Afterward we went to Steak and Shake for a "little lunch" (at about 12:30 am). Dwayne was crackin' us up, he comes up with great questions like this: "Did your guy's power go off last night? Because mine went off just like that (he snaps his fingers)." Nope, power didn't go off. Funny thing is, though, when the power goes off, it usually goes off just like that (i just snapped my fingers).

I had a good nights sleep and started some work this morning. It wasn't too preductive of a day, mostly because I wasn't sure what to I should be doing. I read a couple of articles and did most of my stats homework. A friend and I met for coffee to get to know each other better. I say coffee, but neither of us ordered anything. Dang coffee at the coffee shop is way too expensive as it is. That's about it.

In devotion tonight I was struck with the efficiency of Christ's death. Mark says "And he was crucified". The whole nation, Jews and Gentiles, mocked; the disciples fled; God lovingly withheld his hand from staying His son's suffering; and, in this moment God came near.

Anything good at all and all I've attained to in this life was purchased by the grace of God.

Jesus paid it all; all to him I owe; sin had left a crimson stain; he washed me white as snow.

Noyes in Illinois

I'm working in the Noyes Lab on campus today, running a bunch of analyses on my sediment samples. I've taken a short break to write some emails and prepare for the next sample. I stopped to read a little out of JP's sermon "A generation passionate for God's holiness", and there is a paragraph I would like to quote:

"Therefore what is the love of God? It is the preservation and the exaltation of his own holiness for your enjoyment forever. And what is it then to be loved by this God? It is not to be made much of, but to be given the ability, by the death and resurrection of Jesus, to enjoy making much of him forever. God loves me when he helps me be satisfied in God and not in me. God loves me when he helps me forget about me and be thrilled with Christ. God loves me when he dies in my place that I might know him and be satisfied with all that he is for me in Jesus. God loves me when he makes me passionate for his holiness. God's love for me is holy love. Therefore it exalts the infinite worth of God. It is radically God-centered."