Nonsensical Ramblings of Mark

I have to admit that a lot of times I do not feel all that comfortable with God. I mean, sometimes I wish He would just leave me alone. Why this dogged determination of His to conform me into the image of His Son? Why this world this way? Why am I convicted more than assured? I often feel like the steward who says to the Master - "I knew you were a severe man who takes what you do not deposit and reaps what you do not sow." Why indeed Lord. Why do I shake my finger at you and wave you off with my puny hands? You are nothing that I would have invented because the fabric you clothe me with irritates and chafes. Will my flesh ever fade? Will my spirit ever strengthen? Will I ever, forever, say "Yes! Yes!" and move to the strength of that conviction? Not this side of heaven You say? Then more - more of the foretaste my heart aches for. More practicality born out of the realization and embrace of my position before You. Grace is all I need...and all I have.

I am sure this puts me firmly in the pagan camp. Well, maybe. At any rate I am one of those people that looks forward to December 21 or 22 every year as this marks the Winter Solstice - the shortest day of the year. For me, a daylight lover, this is my yearly rebirth. The slow descent into the cold, blue, dark of Winter gives way to the promise of Spring. I know, you're saying that Winter has barely begun and you are looking forward to Spring? Dreaming of April are we? Yes and no. I do not hide my dislike for the taskmaster that Winter is - he punishes me with his dry wind from the north pushing me deeper, still deeper into myself until I barely even recognize who I am. I celebrate that the days of the instrument of darkness that he envelopes me with, come December 22, are numbered. Slowly, even slowly, a minute is added to the span of light here, a second there, and in despair he hurls even more tumult until his death throes consume him in March. Then, hope firmly laid aside in it...

Well, the photo scavenger hunt went off with nary a hitch last night. My team (the "epricots") really got into it and had a good time. My wife made up quite a few homemade treats to cap off the night and things went about as well as they could have. Here is the clue list we used (with answers) for the inside group: Item #1: I'm an organizer for papers and bills. Don't forget my rollers and rails! (filing cabinet) Item #2: It's like the North Pole in here. (freezer) Isaiah 1:18 Item #3: You can snuggle up near this on a cold night and read a good book. (fireplace) Matthew 3:11 Item #4: You will find me with four legs, but no hair. People may ride me for hours, but I don't go anywhere without needing to be tugged, jerked or turned on, I always manage to be ready for work. (desk) Hebrews 1:3 Item #5: Before me they used Morse Code. (telephone) Philippians 3:14 Item #6: What object has a KEY that opens no locks, has SPACE but no room, and you can ENTER, but not go...

Wow yesterday was busy. I got into work and had a surprise 4-hour meeting to attend in the afternoon. I needed to get some information prepared for the meeting so that took the morning. Imagine that...I had to work at work. Things have calmed down a bit, but not by much. We will be having a photo scavenger hunt in the Champions club (3-6 grade boys and girls) tomorrow night so I am busy getting stuff together for that as I thought of the idea and am the coordinator of the night. I think it will be a good time. I have had to scale things back a bit from my original vision, but that's not all together a bad thing. Just need to be flexible, which a I am, up to a point I guess. Nothing else much new here. I am solidly into the Minor Prophets in my Bible reading program (Amos) and I think I will go for it again next year. I have really enjoyed it and I am getting a lot out of reading through it with the program I am in right now. Thankfully my wife has taken an interest in reading in be...

Slowly but surely I am getting things up and going on the Ubuntu laptop. This morning I just got the DVD player working (got the Sheerluck Holmes DVD in there now) and now I need to tackle local and network printing. All in all if I can get that stuff working (and some of the games my son likes to play working in Wine) I'll be a Linux-only guy as far as my travel system goes. There is really nothing else I will need to make this transition and the Ubuntu distribution is fun to work with. There is a giant amount of information on the web about it and I am thankful for that. Maybe someday I can return the favor for another Linux noob like myself. We'll see.

So I am constructing this post in Ubuntu Linux (v. 6.10) running in a 9 gigabyte partition on my laptop using Firefox 2.0. It took a little bit to get the internet connection to work (I had to enable the network connection) but all in all it was not too bad. My next goal is to get the dial-up modem to work, but that should not be that big of a deal. I am a happy little Linux user now and am looking forward to learning a lot more about the OS as time goes on. I haven't dumped Windows XP yet (that is running on the other, much larger, partition) as there are still things I need it for at work. But, maybe someday, we'll be a Linux shop at home. We'll see. I do know that right now the desktop computer I have at home is a non-starter as far as any OS beyond Windows 98 SE goes. But, hey, a dual-boot laptop with XP and Ubuntu should satisfy my gravings for the new and different for a while.

I had a flash that came across my mind as I sat with the church on Sunday and I am not sure where it will all lead. The pastor was talking about the incomparable person Christ is and I got to thinking about something. I had always placed an almost too great an emphasis on the work that Christ performed here on earth and especially on the cross. There is no question that the salvation he provides to us in an awesome display of love, sacrifice, justice, holiness...all of that and more. Taking a step back from that I realized (this may be so elemental that it is laughable) that Christ would not have been able to accomplish what he did had he not been the Person that he was from all eternity. OK, so the work that he did is (can I say this?) subordinate to the Person that he is, namely, the eternal Son of God. Who he is lends credence to the doctrine of the impeccability of Christ. Rather than focus on what he did I am going to try to focus on who he is. I think that is more in line with th...

One thing we Baptists (as a corporate church body) do not do well is prepare. I know that this is probably something I need to undertake myself (if I only had the discipline to do it), but I really miss the Advent season that I grew up with as I attended the Catholic church. The four weeks that preceded Christmas were unbelievably meaningful to me, and to my family I suppose, and they were an effective vehicle for me to prepare for the day of Christ's first fleshly appearance on this humble ground. I appreciated the colors the sanctuary was decked out in...the mystery (to me anyway) why we lit the pink candle in the advent wreath on the third week rather than the fourth...the evergreen that symbolized life in the midst of the death of winter...the anticipation that it all produced in me for Christmas day. I could almost taste the desire for that day. It all put me in touch with the longing that the Jews had for their Deliverer. Even though Christ was a disappointment to the vast ma...