Endurance And Victory

Seeds

2010-11-07T21:13:00.000-05:00

I've been thinking a lot about the Parable of the Sower, I'm sure most if not all of you know the parable, I thought I'd post it anyways,
Matthew 13:1-9
1 That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. 2 Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. 3 Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. 4 As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. 5 Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6 But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. 7 Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. 8 Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. 9 Whoever has ears, let them hear.

There are a lot of different ways you can think about this, what got me started thinking about it was hearing someone say the parable was about the seeds, not the sower. Well, personally I don't really agree, I think the story is actually about the ground, to try to explain this a little, I'll give you what I think the different things represent.
We (the Christians) are the plants, which actually aren't mentioned in the story, we are where the seed comes from.
The seeds are our testimonies or witnessing's depending on what you want to call it
The Sower is Jesus, or the Holy Spirit
The Ground represents groups of people. And finally,
The plants represent individual people.

Okay, now you know what I think stuff represents, I guess you could say that there isn't actually one important part, every part is important, but the point is to show what happens when we evangelize. Some seeds fall on the path, these do not grow at all, I think this might represent people who refuse to listen. The seeds that fell on the rocky ground grew quickly but were scorched by the sun (which may represent the world), I think this represents people who believe, but as soon as something goes wrong, they lose interest.
The seeds which fell among the thorns, I think are people who believe, but then other people come and persuade them away.
The seeds that fell on the good soil are the people who believe, and grow in their faith, and eventually bear fruit.

Thankfully you don't have to take my meanings, Jesus Himself explained what He meant:
Matthew 13:18-23
“Therefore hear the parable of the sower: 19 When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside. 20 But he who received the seed on stony places, this is he who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; 21 yet he has no root in himself, but endures only for a while. For when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles. 22 Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful. 23 But he who received seed on the good ground is he who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and produces: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.”

Now, I didn't really read the section from 18-23 until after I had written my meanings, I did that so I could see if I actually got close, I think I did pretty well, I pretty much missed the one of the thorns but I think I got pretty close to everything else.

This also raises the question of whether or not a Christian can become "unsaved" I think this passage seems to be saying that, but I do know that a lot of people would argue the opposite. While I would love to go into that, I think I should probably wrap this post up.

Endurance And Victory!
-Chris

Kestrels Midnight Song, Review

2010-09-07T23:55:00.000-04:00

Some of you might recall the interview I did a short while ago with author, Jacob Parker. Those of you who don’t recall it, I suggest finding something to improve your memory. Anyways, I recently was able to get my hands on a copy of his book, Kestrel's Midnight Song, I found it somewhat different than I expected but very much to my liking.
Micah is a young shepherd who is very attached to his sheep, however small his flock may be. When Micah’s master sends him and his sheep to the Castle of the land of Gable to pay for the taxes with wool, Micah has no idea what to expect. Along the way he encounters many dangers to him and his sheep along with a mysterious but somewhat simple man named Bart. He also meets two travelers who have learned of a secret plot by a secret group of men known only as the Marauders to free their head captain, Kestrel, from a tower prison and take over the kingdom of Gable. Micah and his sheep may unknowingly be part of the secret plot to free the ruthless Kestrel and reunite him with the legendary Caelum flute.

If you’re expecting a typical fantasy of huge-battles/legendary-weapons/romance/mystical-creatures/one-ring-to-rule-them-all type of thing, you might be a little disappointed, or you may like it. Not to say that this doesn’t have awesome stuff like the Aegre Bird (see the cover) and the Caelum Flute, but it seems to be much more about the people than about armies. In some ways Kestrel’s Midnight Song seems to be a parallel of us and Christ, Micah the shepherd seems to have an irrational love for his sheep, climbing down a cliff in a blizzard to find a lost lamb. Just think about how much more Jesus loves us.

KMS is an excellently written book, although there are a few misspelled words, they aren’t too obvious. One of the things I really liked about KMS is how Parker displayed his faith, I’ve noticed in some Christian novels that “Christian” pretty much means “clean” while other books practically shove Christianity down your throat (not that either of these are necessarily bad), Parker seems to have taken the path of just assuming it’s true, there’s no huge back-story about the Jesus figure of this world, just Christians. I also love his display of the forgiveness of sinners and what it can do, it all comes down to one line “He loves you”

I highly recommend reading Kestrel’s Midnight Song by Jacob Parker

He likes to be asked

2010-08-17T23:20:00.000-04:00

Hello everybody! Sorry it's been a while, anyways...
Points if you know where this quote is from, bonus points if you know who said it, here's the full quote:
"Wouldn't he know without being asked?' said Polly. 'I've no doubt he would,' said the Horse (still with his mouth full). 'But I've a sort of idea he likes to be asked.
Okay, so this is from The Magicians Nephew by CS Lewis (as most, if not all of you probably already knew) and it has kind of gotten me thinking, which sometimes does actually lead to something good (at least I hope it does). So, I've been thinking along these lines for a couple days, even before I remembered the quote. A lot of times I get kind of upset with God because He doesn't seem to be listening to me, but I started realizing that most of the time it was because I wasn't asking anything. I was just going along, knowing God knew everything about me, knew what I was thinking and would just work with that, it didn't really matter if I prayed about stuff or not, because God already knew... Right? Well... yes... and no, God does know everything about you and what you're going through and all that, but God doesn't want to be some impersonal machine just cranking out everything we need and sending it down when he sees we need it. God wants to be asked. Although, I kind of have to add a disclaimer, just because you're praying for stuff doesn't mean you'll get it, God will do what's best for us, and that can mean holding something back that we really want. Like no sane person would give a baby a lit candle or something like that, even though the baby may really want it, by not allowing that baby to hold the candle you are protecting it from something it doesn't understand. In time, as the baby grows up, it's able to understand more and is able to hold the candle without burning itself.
I really have two main things in this post, and surprisingly, both have CS Lewis quotes! Here's the second one (even more bonus points if you know where it's from, although it's rather easy)

"My dear Wormwood, the most alarming thing in your last account of the patient is that he is making none of those confident resolutions which marked his original conversion. No more lavish promises of perpetual virtue, I gather; not even the expectation of an endowment of 'grace' for life, but only a hope for the daily and hourly pittance to meet the daily and hourly temptation! This is very bad."

As you can probably guess this is from The Screwtape Letters, from Uncle Screwtape to his nephew, Another thing that I did was just go "Dear God, please give me all the peace, hope, joy, long suffering etc. that I'll need for the rest of my life. Thank you. Amen" Okay, it wasn't really like that but the meaning was the same, pray one prayer at the beginning and then just sit back and relax... Uh, no. Sorry, doesn't work like that. God isn't selling some "Cures-All Character Defects" magic ointment, which you only need to replace at Christmas and Easter. I know that I kind of covered this is the last section, but I have really started praying a lot more, I'm not trying to brag, and I think the real reason is that I've started realizing that I need a lot more, and also just asking for stuff like self-control, when I need it, instead of putting in an order the night before.
Anyways, sorry that was kind of long, I hope it prove useful to someone.
Endurance and Victory!
Chris

The Balance Of Everything

2010-07-27T17:52:00.001-04:00

Okay, I know the title sounds a little wacky, but I think sometimes we need to start paying attention to the balance in our life. Why? Because so often as humans and Christians, we get to thinking one way and start leaning more and more towards that view. For example, some people think work is necessary (as it is) but they start to focus only on work and neglect any sort of leisure, aka. doing something for the pleasure of doing that thing (more on that in a later post) as I believe you will agree, this is unbalanced. On the other hand it is also unbalanced to only do things you like all the time and not to bother working or learning. We also have the ultimate environmentalists who will do anything to save a plant or animal and on the other hand we have people who are just like "I don't care about what happens" I should know, I was one, and then I thought to myself, "this is stupid, what am I doing?" just because some people went to an extreme to save anything, after seeing some of the stuff they were willing to do, I went to the other extreme and just wouldn't be bothered about it. The Bible does tell us to be stewards, does that mean to kill people in order to save animals? No! But that is what some environmentalists want to do. As Christians we can also greatly unbalance things, such as the issue of Mary in the Bible, on one hand we have the Catholics who seem to put Mary on the same level as Jesus, which I believe is a great mistake, but on the other hand pretty much the rest of the Church seems to ignore Mary because of the attention the Catholic Church gives her. Mary is a very important person in the Bible, I don't think it's right that we ignore her while studying the lives of other men and women in the Bible, the balanced approach seems to try to look at Mary with the same perspective as we do with the other people in the Bible. That means not just reading about her around Christmas and then getting on to the "more important" stuff, but we also shouldn't be worshiping her every Sunday. Find what's in the Bible, see what's there, don't skip anything. One thing I've noticed about humans in that we like to argue, sometimes we may even take a point we never intended to just because we're debating or merely don't like the way some people argue their point (as in my environmentalist example) we just don't want to be associated with them. The point is: look at your life, is there something out of balance? I'm pretty sure you'll find something. Are you willing to fix it?

Back From Camp!

2010-07-16T14:19:00.000-04:00

Hey guys! In case you didn't notice, it has been a while since I posted on this. Most of the reason was camp, since that is now over I will probably fall asleep for the next two days but after that I will hopefully have a TON of great stuff to post!
Endurance and Victory!
-Chris

Venom and Song

2010-06-29T23:36:00.002-04:00

The Seven Elven Lords of Berinfell have come back to the lands and the peoples of Allyra. After living on earth as any humans would, they've come back to rule over the seven elven tribes and defeat the Spider King once and for all. However, they cannot succeed so easily, for standing in their way is the Spider King's mountain fortress; Vesper Crag. Full of Gwars, Drefids, Warspiders, evil creatures known as Wisps and human slaves from our own world. The Seven teenaged lords have been sent to a special training ground where they will learn to fight as one. They undergo grueling tests but emerge victorious, but they also learn of a dark secret in the Elven history. However, it is soon realized that their training is not enough, they must undertake a journey to an ancient castle to find the keystone, and along with it, the secret of the Rainsong. This alone may enable the Elves to make a successful attack on Vesper Crag. But will it be enough? Find out in Venom and Song.

This is an excellent book, well written and engaging
Not to say that there aren't some problems with this book, there are a great many characters, which can be confusing, especially if you start with the second book, so my suggestion: Don't! Really, go find a copy of Curse of the Spider King somewhere and read that before continuing, you'll understand Venom and Song so much better. Also, skip the character page, it'll just confuse you. If you want, go back and read about a character when you come across him in the story.

Written by Wayne Thomas Batson and Christopher Hopper

Books by Wayne Thomas Batson: The Door Within, Rise of the Wyrm Lord, The Final Storm, Isle of Swords, Isle of Fire

Books by Christopher Hopper: Rise of the Dibor, The Lion Vrie

Books by both:
Curse of the Spider King, Venom and Song

To find out more go to the book's website: The Berinfell Prophecies

Seven Foundations

2010-06-25T12:04:00.000-04:00

The Seven Foundations are the cores of pretty much any belief, if you read the last post you should know what these are, if not, they are:

Nature of man
Nature of God
The Universe
Truth
Morality
Family
Politics

Using these seven foundations we are able to see what a particular worldview is made up of. It is sometimes very helpful to map your own worldview, so, right now, just fill in the blanks with the actual things you believe, not the things you want to believe, but what you actually do believe. Once you have written those out you should look at them, this will tell you what you actually believe, it can be a very interesting. Once you have done that, using the Bible, go back over everything and re-write it using the Bible as your base source.

This is my worldview:

Nature of man: Man is basically evil, he has a sin nature and is true to that nature. He can only be redeemed by the grace of God and the sacrifice of Jesus.

Nature of God: God is perfect, He created everything and has the right to judge His creation, He is merciful but is also just.

The Universe: God created the universe, why it is so big I don't really know. I do not believe he created other life forms on other planets (aka, aliens).

Truth: God is truth, His Word is truth.

Morality: God set down rules in the Bible, we are to follow these to the best of our abilities.

Family: The family is meant to mimic the relationship between Christ and the church. It was designed as one man and one woman, anything other than that is blasphemy. Divorce is something which is only permissible under certain circumstances.

Politics: There is no such thing as separation of church and state, both impact each other in so many ways that it is impossible to separate them. Everything you do politically should be justifiable spiritually.

If you want, post your own mapped worldview in the comment section.

Santa-ism

2010-06-17T00:05:00.002-04:00

Santa-ism, what is that? No, I'm not going to talk about the jolly old elf, and, I hate to break this to some of you but, he isn't actually real. I'm actually going to be posting some stuff from my camp notebook. Why? Well, I've seen this worldview displayed in many places. I think this is an especially damaging one. Why? Because it claims to be Christian, but is it really? Read on and find out!

Although Socrates warned centuries ago that the unexamined life is not worth living, many people today live according to an unexamined worldview. Roughly described, this is the worldview of "God is Santa"
Especially prevalent in America today, Santa-ism relies on the vague belief that some god-like being created us and loves us, and doesn't care at all how we behave as long as we don't hurt each other. Adherents to this worldview don't worry about truth or morality, because this grandfather god likes us and wants everyone to spend eternity playing harps with him in heaven.
Proof that Americans adhere to this worldview is demonstrated by recent Gallup polls. More than 80% of Americans claim to believe in a god, but only 38% believe the Bible is the Word of God. The majority of American theists that deny the inerrancy of scripture adhere to the Santa-ist worldview-rejecting the deity of Christ, the need for a Savior, and the existence of hell. They believe that someone must have created the universe, but he would never judge his creation.
In many ways, Santa-ism is an offshoot of deism. Deists believe that some mystical "First Cause" set the universe in motion, and then abandoned man. Since man has been left to follow his own devices, he need not fear judgment.
This "God leaves us alone until we pray when we need a gift" mentality is necessarily hazy, because it doesn't stand up to close scrutiny. Still, we can begin with the Santa-ist's assumptions about god and logically derive their seven foundations.

The Seven Foundations:

Nature of man: Man is basically good. Sometimes he does bad things, but only because his environment stifles his good impulses.

Nature of God: Somewhere up in heaven, far, far away, lives a jovial grandfather god with a long beard. He likes us, and he likes it when we ask him for things.

The Universe: God created matter about 15 billion years ago, and then used evolution to create everything else

Truth: We can discover truth within ourselves, and god likes it when we try to get in touch with our truth.

Morality: If it feels good, do it-as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else too much.

Family: God doesn't want us to be unhappy so if we find ourselves in a bad family situation, or we want to try other things, that's okay with him. Whatever makes us happy

Politics: God just wants everyone to have as much as they can, so the politician who promises the most for everyone is the best choice. Things like the bankruptcy of Social Security and the enormous national debt are not really a concern-god will fix them somehow, because he doesn't lie to see us suffer.

Interview With Jacob Parker

2010-05-28T16:38:00.001-04:00

Hey all! This week I had the pleasure of interviewing teen aged fantasy author, J R Parker about his new book, Kestrels Midnight Song. And now, please welcome the Yodeling Dwarf himself!

Endurance And Victory: Could you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Jacob Parker: Sure thing. I'm eighteen years old, I've lived in Idaho my whole life, and I have the kind of overactive imagination that causes people to end up insane or published. (In my case, both)

EAD: How did you start writing?
JP: Technically, I started writing fiction in first grade when I entered a short story contest. The Story: A super hero and his dog are captured by a bad guy. The Twist: They escape when the bad guy forgets to take the dogs super collar off, which causes an explosion that destroys the lair and frees our heroes from the bad guy's clutches. But I got serious about writing a novel... three years later; Fourth grade marked the beginning of a string of 30,000+ word Harry Potter rip-offs. But I had a blast writing them. I was hooked.

EAD: Is Kestrels Midnight Song your first book?
JP: It's the first book I completed. Those other novel attempts—my curiously familiar characters survived a string of unrelated adventures until I gave up.

EAD: How long did it take you to write Kestrels Midnight Song?
JP: I started around my fifteenth birthday and finished the first draft around my 17th birthday. But editing... I still have some editing to do. It's a long process.

EAD: Could you tell us a little bit about Kestrels Midnight Song?
JP: Kestrel's Midnight Song is about a legendary Marauder who is waiting for his hanging in a cell at the top of a dungeon tower. Rumors are spreading that the Marauders are mounting a plan to free him and unleash the secret he guards. And it's up to a slave girl and a wandering giant to stop them.

Meanwhile, a shepherd boy is traveling across the land with no knowledge that his journey will decide the fate of the world.

EAD: Who's your favorite character in Kestrels Midnight Song?

JP: It's hard for me to pick. I'm really fond of this cast of characters. But I think if I had to choose, I'd pick Isaac Ganthorn. Coincidentally, he's one of the baddies. And I'll probably be the only person to pick him as a favorite.

EAD: Do you have any plans for future books at this time?

JP: Definitely. I'm plotting the series in sequel to Kestrel's Midnight Song. New setting, new characters, new time period. How's that even a sequel? Mwahaha. You'll see.

EAD: What's your favorite Bible verse?

JP: Hmmm, one verse? 1 Corinthians 13:1-3 comes to mind. Yeah, it's more than one verse. Sorry. :P

EAD: What's your favorite fantasy book, and why?

JP: The Harry Potter books most captivated me. I know that's somewhat controversial, but I think I enjoyed them most, and it doesn't seem like anything else comes close, though it's been a long time since I read them.

EAD: Any tips for aspiring authors?

JP: Plenty. :) My first tip would be not to get into writing for the money. That's kind of cliche, and it seems like everyone says that about their profession, but writing novels is perceived as being very, very profitable. When in reality, even some New York Times Bestsellers have to write two+ books a year just to achieve average income for an American (which is insanely wealthy as is, but I digress.) The very, very tip of the mountaintop is extremely wealthy, which is what feeds the misconception that writers are loaded. So make sure you're writing because you love it.

My second tip is to write a lot. Randall Ingermanson, (I think it's him) says most people write a million words before they get published. And from talking with various published authors, it seems like an accurate estimate.

Also, read a lot. It's standard, but it's a good one. From fourth grade through sixth grade I read like a maniac. For those of you familiar with the accelerated reader program, I got somewhere around 500 A.R. points in 6th grade, and I'm a slow reader. I think that period of reading was extremely beneficial for me. There's really no other way to capture the flow, rhythm, word choice, etc. of writing fiction than to read, read, read.

Thanks Jacob! Please go the link at the top of the page to see Kestrels Midnight Song.
Also, Jacob is holding a Huge Online Party! Be sure to check that out, He'll be giving away hundreds of free books!

The Purpose of Christ

2010-05-19T13:46:00.001-04:00

Why did Jesus come to the Earth? If I asked just about any Christian that question (including myself) the answer I would probably get is "To save us" Is this answer wrong? No, but, is it all that Christ came for? Not in my opinion, although saving us is unarguably the most important reason he came I believe there was also another purpose. So, why did Jesus have to come and suffer so much, and then die for us? I'm not going to tell you. Why? because I want you guys to think of an answer, in a few days I will post what I think was a very important reason. But in the meantime, I would really appreciate your perspective on this, please comment on this post with your answer.

Okay, it's been a few days, I got a couple answers (thanks for the feedback, I think I'm going to try to find a slightly less distracting picture, although it will still probably have a castle in it) I guess I would say that, the reason he came is because he loved us. I was looking for something slightly less obvious, I guess I didn't phrase the question quite the way I wanted it.

To lead up to what I want to say, lets go through and list some of the things Jesus had to endure: He was poor, He was mocked for what He did, He was betrayed, He was falsely accused and sentenced, He was scourged with a whip (most likely with sharp pieces of rock or bone on the end) He was publicly humiliated, and He was killed by crucifixion, one of the most painful ways to die.
So why did Jesus have to go through that? Think about it, no matter how bad of a day we have, the chances are, we haven't been beaten, had pretty much our whole back ripped out with whip and been hung on a cross to die. Our definition of persecution is, at most, verbal, we're not homeless and if you have a computer you're probably not poor. The point is, no matter how bad things can get, they are never going to be worse than what Jesus had to endure, and He did it willingly, not for Christians, but for sinners.

Random

2010-05-12T20:26:00.000-04:00

Okay, it's pretty late and I haven't posted anything for a while (sorry about that, internet trouble).
Random: This is where I just kinda put whatever pops into my head, and all the little things that aren't large enough to make a full post.
First, a couple questions about my blog, How did you find my blog? (FB, The Underground or some other way) Do you like what I've been posting, would you want to see reviews (books, maybe movies)? Is there something you'd rather have me post about? Am I so painfully boring that you just want to go read the nutritional information on all the food in your house?

The Screwtape Letters,
Okay, I admit it, I haven't read the book! however, I have heard the dramatization done by Focus on the Family (which I would highly recommend) It was extremely edifying to hear about temptations from a different perspective, never boring in the least. The dramatization was also of very high quality, featuring Andy Serkis as Screwtape and Bertie Carvel as Wormwood. Who are the main characters, with whom almost all the dialogue takes place.

Star Wars,
If you've only watched the star wars movies, you may have a slightly skewed (although perhaps originally wanted) perception of the star wars ~~world~~ galaxy in which the Jedi are the good guys and the Sith the bad ones. If, however, you've read some of the books as well (I've read around 10, I think) you may have a slightly different perspective. First of all, the differences between the Sith and Jedi start to blur, they both want to exterminate each other, and, in their own ways, they want what's best for the galaxy, their is no good side or bad side, only the dark or light side. This is, perhaps, because there are no rules set down by a higher authority to either, obey or disobey. In a fairly literal way, man (or alien, whatever) is supreme. In a small way, the force can be supreme, but only if the force wielding (an extremely small percentage) beings listen. Also, from my knowledge, there is no reward or punishment after death, but only to have your soul dumped into the mass pool of the force. So, ask yourself this: Are the Sith wrong?

And Last, Tolkein Vs. Rowling. A little bonus I discovered on one of my friends blogs, to which I will now direct you: Viewpoint

Assumptions

2010-05-03T10:50:00.000-04:00

Assumptions
So, I've been thinking about assumptions for the past week and what they have to do with out beliefs, specifically Creation and Evolution. Now, when debating, you must have a solid point from which you can stand, but before you can do that you must start with assumptions. Both the beliefs I am going to present today can be narrowed down to one or two assumptions, I chose Creation and Evolution because they are two beliefs I am most familiar with.

Evolution: I have not really studied Evolution but I think I have enough of a grasp to say this: If we give them that the world is already here and we are just talking about biological evolution, then there two base assumptions are, Spontaneous Generation, and Survival of the Fittest. They have to believe in spontaneous generation because, no matter how far back you go, there must be a time where life actually began. They have to believe in survival of the fittest because that is the engine which drives evolution. For example, if giraffes where just horses, and one day one was born with a slightly longer neck, he could reach up higher into trees to get the leaves the other horses couldn't. if there was a shortage of food and the horses ate all of the lower branches, he could still survive by eating the higher ones while most of the other horses died, he would then be able to pass the trait on to his offspring who would eventually become the majority and it would all begin again.

Christian Evolution: I really don't think Christian evolutionists have a leg to stand on (although if you disagree, feel free to tell me so), to the best of my knowledge, they believe that God created the first cell and then let mutations and natural selection do the rest. The problem with this is that it is not recorded this way in the Bible, if God didn't do it an said that He did, that was a lie, a lie is a sin. If God sinned once then there is no reason why He couldn't do it again, which means that nothing in the Bible can be trusted absolutely. Also Jesus is part of God, so Jesus wasn't perfect, since He wasn't perfect He couldn't take away our sins, which means that nothing can save if there is a heaven or a hell.

Creation: As a six day creationist, I must make the base assumption that God is real and He is who He says He is, this means that the account of the creation of the world and of life in Genesis is a He described it in the Bible. The rest of the Bible can still be taken as absolute truth and Jesus was able to save us when He came to the world.

Go Karts (A parable (sorta))

2010-04-25T13:24:00.001-04:00

Anyways, it all started when my friend Grant called me to come over to his house. This was last year in the spring, one of the first sunny days after a lot of rain. After playing catch for a little, we decided to go ride his go kart around their property, (to protect the innocent, (and also the guilty) I will not say who was driving.) So we started along, mostly up in the higher areas and then crossing over a small stream onto a field of theirs which the rent to a farmer, the farmer had recently plowed the field (before the rain) and we started down a hill, as we got lower, it became muddier, we got stuck for about five seconds but managed to get out simply by gunning the motor. However we didn't take the hint to turn around and... Yep, got stuck, really stuck. We spent over an hour trying different and crazy ways to get it out of the knee deep mud but to no avail, it just went lower. We finally decided we would have to go tell his dad what we had done, needless to say, he wasn't too happy about it but he told us to go get their huge tractor started and enough rope or chains to reach the vehicle. Grant's dad drove the tractor to a safe area while we walked to the partially submerged vehicle. With the tractor pulling and us pushing we got it out of there in one try. Now, imagine you were the driver, the go kart was your life, and Grant's dad was God. When you make a mess of your life, no matter how hard to try to fix it, it just gets worse. So finally, you have to go to God and tell him what you did, and he goes and helps you fix your life. But, God doesn't do all the work, for the rest of the time I spent there we had to work to clean up the mud covered go kart. And, like that, after He's done all the heavy lifting, God still calls us to work to clean up the little parts we can do.

Eternity

2010-04-19T11:02:00.000-04:00

So, I was thinking this week, (or past few days) about eternity, I think this is a fairly non-controversial subject for most Christians, but I don't think very many of us stop to take the time to think about it (at least I don't), we just think: "Yeah, it'll be great, I can spend all my time counting my treasure I've stored and seeing my friends" we don't really get the concept, even if you think about it you don't get it, I'm not sure if we're able to fully comprehend eternity, we're so used to dealing with limited time. When I think about eternity my brain automatically sets a time somewhere in the far future where it ends. How big is it? I'm going to give you kind of a rambling answer: there are approximately 25,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 atoms in a pencil lead, with this as perspective, imagine how many atoms are in the universe... Count each atom as a year... And that's not even the smallest fraction of eternity! Yikes! So, what's the point of all this? If you took 10 minutes to tell someone about Jesus and they were saved from the worst punishment imaginable, to the best reward that is ever possible, for eternity... How much time is that?
I realize that pretty much the only times I try to share my faith is when someone who is expecting me to is watching, but I'm hoping to change that. How about you?

A Little Bit About Me

2010-04-16T13:36:00.000-04:00

Okay, if you're reading this then you probably already know a little about me, but if you don't.
My name is Chris, I'm 16 years old (at least right now), homeschooled and a Christian... That's about it for now.

Why the title? Well, I got it from a book, but I really think it sums up what, as Christians, we're doing, it's not Endurance and maybe Victory, but Endurance and Victory. We already are assured of our success and all we need to do endure the world until we get there, please don't think that I'm saying we should just sit around, waiting for our victory, that doesn't seem like endurance to me. So what do I mean by endurance? Following Jesus and the Bible, that probably doesn't tell you much since people can interpret the Bible just about any way they want, but, I believe the Bible to be literal except when it clearly indicates it is not. Do I believe God created the earth in six days? Yes. Do I believe literal sheaves of grain (Gen 37:5) stood up and bowed before another sheaf? No, the Bible clearly indicates this was a dream.

What can you expect to see here? Random stuff about my life, book reviews, pretty much anything I feel like sharing.

Endurance and Victory!