These aren't your Grandparents' Christmas decorations

Every year around Christmas when the houses start getting decorated with Christmas lights I remember how much I like the Trans-Siberian Orchestra's rock versions of Christmas carols.  Why do lights remind me?  Most of you probably already know...

Sometime a while back (I think I was in junior high?) someone decorated their house with a ton of lights and set them to light up in time with one of the Trans-Siberian Orchestra's songs.  And then posted the video on the internet (or was it far enough back that it got spread around as filler news on nightly newscasts?  I don't remember).  Ever since then it's been the thing to do for people who have too many Christmas lights, too much money, and too much time on their hands.  The results are often amazing. 

I found what I think to be probably the best video I've seen of a Trans-Siberian Christmas House this morning, so I decided to share it with you:

Intellectual Honesty and Articulating your Beliefs

"Since human resource managers and psychologists both value behavioral consistency as qualities of reliability and mental health, it would seem safe to assume that the choices people make tend toward an overarching goal or goals."-- JV

I think JV is on to something, but I would make an edit to his comment that changes the direction by 180 degrees.  I would say that it is "safe to assume that the choices people make tend to reveal underlying belief or beliefs".  This still fits with JV's examples, such as the first example of the scholar:  The scholar believes in the importance of improving themselves intellectually or in contributing to a body of knowledge, and their consistent actions reveal that belief. 

Dave made a point that hits on what I think is one of the most honest parts of the Atheist position.  He said that, "...one of the big reasons to have a religion (read: God) is to have the value set of the religion, and the comfort of the belief that someone or something is out there guiding us,"  And I think that most Atheists truly believe that is why most people "have a religion".  Atheists, as Christopher Hitchens said in the debate JV introduced us to, as well as in an essay conversation with Wilson on Christianity Today in 2007, choose not to believe in God because it would be "too easy and too comfortable", but it would not be intellectually honest.  To tie this in to the comments above, their actions reveal their belief that sound reasoning and intellectual honesty is something that can be attained and something to strive for, which I also believe.  But what about those many many people, me included, that believe in God because they believe it is the most intellectually honest position?

Atheists and Christians, Buddists and Muslims, Democrats and Republicans (just to provide a non-religion example) all have their value sets.  These value sets often, if not always, direct their actions.  Obviously, value sets (read: beliefs) are not a simple thing.  They are often convoluted and obscured and complex which makes it difficult to articulate what we believe and what we think other people believe.  I think this is a good place to re-quote Sister Carlotta:

You are so convinced that you believe only what you believe that you believe, that you remain utterly blind to what you really believe without believing you believe it.'"

--Shadow of the Hegemon, pg 80-81

Dave made the excellent point that (difficulty aside) we should be able to articulate the positions of our counterparts [people who believe differently than we do].  And that's what I was trying to do with Atheism in my last post.  So maybe using "god" was a little goading on my part, but I don't think that it was confusing the dialog.  Because what I'm trying to get at is: what do you trust?  Christians believe that there is a Truth out there and that it can be articulated and understood as God.  Atheists believe that there is a Truth out there, but that God doesn't fit anywhere in the picture.  The truth, as they see it, is that Nature explains everything. 

To put it another way: Christians believe that God created the world. That at some point in time nothing existed but God and then He created the Universe.  Atheists believe that Nature created the world.  That at some point in time nothing existed and then the Universe came into being of its own accord.  Does one of those things really require more belief than the other?  And you can't get out of this question by saying that science proves one or the other.  Christian sceintists believe that science provides evidence of a Creator's design.  Atheist scientists believe that science provides evidence of Nature's development from nothing to the current state.  Their assumptions and value sets affect how they interpret the scientific data.

The reason I keep pushing on this whole assumptions / value set thing is that I think it is crucial to being able to get anywhere with the next two questions.  I don't think that we have to agree with each others' value sets in order to dialog, but I do think that we need to be able to try to understand (at the very least) our own value sets in order to have an honest dialog.

As JV mentioned and Dave alluded to, evaluating the "rightness" and "wrongness" of a person's value set is a lot harder than defining it or understaning it.  But I think trying to evaluate the "rightness" or "wrongness" points to something that people don't always want to say directly, and that is that each person believes that her or his value set more correctly describes the world. 

So what are your values?  What are the rules that can't be broken?  What can you trust and fall back on with any certainty?

Okay, I'll give it some time to get feedback from you on this latest one, and then in the next post we'll move on to the next question that I wanted to address:  Is there a God?

Thanks in advance for your comments.

Happy Thanksgiving!

To everyone who is checking blogs and doing stuff on the internet today I wish you a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday of the year.  It all centers around giving thanks for what you have, family, and a communal meal.  I love my big, weird family and can't give thanks enough for the privilege of being able to spend Thanksgiving Day with my wife, mom, dad, brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts, ancles, grandparents, nieces and extended family.  I only wish Melissa's family and my family could be in the same place so that we could celebrate together. 


I'll leave you with the words of thanks which I really like and are attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson (but I can't find anywhere that helps me cite where this prayer is from):

For each new morning with its light,
For rest and shelter of the night,
For health and food,
For love and friends,
For everything Thy goodness sends.

Does Belief Matter: Continuing the Discussion

Does it even matter if we believe in God at all?

If you're starting the discussion here the original post might be helpful to give you some background.  You can find the original post, and the comments I am responding to now by clicking here.

Ok, I was going to try to respond to a few of the comments with a comment of my own, but I want people to keep engaged in the conversation and I know that some people don't go back to read comments on a blog after a day or two.  So for clarity's sake and to see if I can get more people's input I've decided to post my reply to JV, Nate, Ariah, and Dave as a new post.

Believing in God: What's the point?

Is there a God?  If there is, does it matter which God it is?  Does it even matter if we believe in God at all?

I know, each one of those questions above has been the subject of whole books, of entire categories of books even, and here I am putting all three of them at the top of one of my blog entries.  Who does this guy think he is, right?  I don't plan on writing a book here on this blog, but I do want to talk about these questions for several reasons:

1) I know that many Christians come to a serious questioning point in their faith over one of these questions, or a similar question about who God is and how He (She? It?) relates to us.
2) I know people that would answer these questions exactly opposite to the way that I would.
3) I know lots of people that have no idea how to answer these questions, or don't think that there is an answer, or never even thought about these questions.
And...

Jesus Answers the Question

Thanks everybody for your answers, they were great! I purposely tried to ask the question using today's language so that it wouldn't be an automatic tip-off that I was asking the exact same question that a Pharisee asked Jesus in the Bible.  Aleya started us all off with the right answer, but the conversation continued because people rightly understood that it needed to be a little more clearly defined.  Rachel and Ariah worked to define "love" a little more clearly and Whitney and Robin both seemed to then begin working out what exactly it would look like to "Love God".  And Whitney, I think you are right that to love Him we must know Him.  Robin, I love that you brought up the point that while Loving Him is the correct answer, the acting out of that love is going to be a form of worship for us.  I think you meant worship through music, but you stated it so well when you said, "love manifests itself in worship".  I think our love for God, in it's full and complete sense, will have a very strong element of worship.  How could it not if we truly know Him as Whitney mentioned.

But Jeremy saw my question and recognized it as the same one from Matthew and Mark where the Pharisee asks Jesus what was the most important commandment.  Rachel summarized the answer in her comment, but thanks to Jeremy for bringing out Jesus' full answer.  When the Pharisee asks Jesus his question, Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 6:5 for the first answer, and then summarizes whole chapters of Deuteronomy for the second part of His answer:

Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, [a teacher of the law] asked him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?"

And [Jesus] said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depends all the Law and Prophets." (Matthew 22:34-40)

I mentioned that the Pastor was talking about this passage on Sunday.  He was actually focusing on the second part of the answer that Jesus gave.  The teacher asked for a single answer, and Jesus gave him two.  Why?  Because they are so closely intertwined that they really shouldn't be separated.  The pastor began his sermon with an anecdotal story about a Mennonite man who was asked by a stranger one day if he was a Christian.  And the Mennonite's answer was, "I'm the least qualified person to answer that question.  You should go ask my neighbors." 

Now, I talked with David and Melissa about it a little, and David commented that he didn't necessarily subscribe to the whole "preach the gospel, and if necessary use words" philosophy.  I think he's right, and I think too often people use that as a "way out" of  speaking about our beliefs and our God.

But I think that Jesus made the point clear: Loving God is specific, it's all out, no-holds-barred.  It's not just with words, it's with your heart and your mind and your soul.  In Deuteronomy is says, "with all your strength".

So thanks everybody for your answers.  Keep the conversation going.

Most important thing for a Christian to do

So rather than a long involved "part 2" post today (don't worry, that's coming soon) I have a question for you instead.  This is a question that I'm curious to hear your answers to after having listened to a sermon related to this on Sunday.  So here it is:

"What, in your opinion, is the most important thing that we are called to do?"


I'll give my answer in a bit, but I'm interested to see your responses first.

Writing about not having anything to write about...and other things

So my last post where I wrote about anything worth writing about was over two weeks ago.  You'd think that in this self-obsessed day and age I'd be able to think of something about my self or my life that I figured was worth writing about.  And I did.  But then I got back home and thought to myself, I don't really have anything to say.  The blog should be witty and clever and thoughtful and God-honoring and...list a bunch of other cool adjectives here.  And so now I should talk about how people, especially of our generation, are self-absorbed and focus on themselves all the time.  Or something like that.  But the reality is that I'm bored.  I'm actually waiting to go pick David up from the airport and his plane has been delayed until midnight thanks to the cool front that moved through Houston and brought a lot of rain and wind with it.  So I thought, "now's a good time to write something in your blog."

Now that you've been warned what kind of post this is: read on at your own risk.

The other reality is that there are about 7 people that read this blog other than me, and they are all friends and family of mine (Hi Mom!).  So really it doesn't matter if this blog is hip or cool.  It's basically just my journal.  And you happen to be reading it.

Alright, contrary to the evidence presented in this blog I have been doing some interesting things and I'll try to catch you up:

First in chronological order is the fact that we lost our cat.  That was Sunday night on the 11th, right before I posted about finishing my cardboard chair.  I spent my free time that week either looking for her, posting flyers about her, or updating my resume and cover letter to start looking for assistant or substitute teaching jobs again.

Jump forward to the next weekend (life happened in between of course...work, Shwey searching, etc).  Melissa had found out about something called Free Night at the Theatre.  We managed to score tickets to a one man performance of Hamlet and Jeremy and Amanda (Jeranda? Amandremy? ...I'm asking for Jeremy's sake) came with us.  Melissa went all out and made some amazing lasagna for us for dinner beforehand.   The performance was intense, and the actor was impressive.  He managed to convey so many emotions, delivering so many lines spot on (at least, in my uneducated opinion) and must have been completely worn out after being so physically and emotionally active for 2 straight hours.  We think that he only forgot his lines once, and he recovered in such a way that it could have been an intentional part of the scene, so we're not actually sure (Jeremy would say he is sure).

Tuesday night (Oct. 20th) Mom and Dad took Melissa and I out to Cheesecake Factory as a belated birthday gift.  It's a bit of a tradition for them to take us out to eat on our birthdays.  I think it started because it was one of the few ways to have guaranteed one-on-one time with them without being interrupted by life and the immediate crisis of one of the other 8 siblings.

...oops, it's 11:40.  Time to go pick up David from the airport.  Yeah, it's awesome.  He's coming down to hang out with us over the weekend.  So I guess I'll have to catch up to the present in another post.

Peace.

Should this be my next project?

Photo courtesy of www.inhabitat.com

Just kidding!  We don't even have a lawn at the moment.  And do people actually do this?  Has anybody seen anything like this in person?

Oh yes, it's real.  Here's where I found the picture:

http://www.inhabitat.com/2005/06/04/lawn-couch/

http://www.inhabitat.com/2006/05/28/grow-your-own-grass-furniture/

Extreme Home Makeover: Project Complete!

Yep, it's done!  And, as promised I've got lots of pictures of the process and the finished product.  Obviously we will still be improving it -- Melissa has some great ideas which she talks about on her blog.  But the furniture is complete.  I've even got pictures of Melissa sitting on it, just in case you are skeptical. 

So, are you ready?  Here we go (click on any of the pictures to see it full sized):

Here's the before shot.  This is where the loveseat is going to be.

Looking for a Job? Do what this guy did

LONDON (Reuters) - In a pinstripe suit, silk tie and polished shoes, David Rowe has all the trappings of a successful London city worker, except for one stark difference -- he is wearing a sandwich board that says "JOB WANTED"....

Wish I'd thought of this.  Now I'd just feel like a copycat.  Or a creeper, since I'd most likely be doing it outside of Elementary and Junior High schools.

Here's the rest of the article: http://bit.ly/yXMPD (it's a link to Reuters website)

She's here! I have another niece!

Text message i received from my brother a few minutes ago:

--ORIGINAL MSG: The human has arrived

Birthdays!

My birthday was Saturday.

Saturday I was busy doing other things and just posted some Hassaniya rap music here for you. You don't have to understand it, just appreciate it for me. It's my birthday after all. But I promised to tell you all about what I did for my birthday, and even though I'm a day later than I might have said I'd post it, here it is:

What's the Right Thing to Do?

Okay, this is the video version of me reading my favorite sections of books to you. I think I found my new favorite video series for a while. Yes, the video is an hour long, but watch the first 5 minutes or so and you'll probably see why I liked it. I think I most interested to see if anybody brings up God in these conversations. It doesn't happen in this video, but maybe in one of the next ones?



Check out the three episodes that have been released so far: http://justiceharvard.org/

Hassaniya Rap!

Hi everybody.  Thanks for all the birthday wishes on Facebook!  I've got a coupla things I want to write about from today, because today was great.  But it's after midnight here in the great country of Texas so I'm gonna save it for tomorrow.  However, I wanted to put something up for my birthday and thanks to a friend on Facebook (Jay) who was also a Peace Corps volunteer to Mauritania (not at the same time as me though) I've got a little something for you here to tide you over till I write something for real.

One day in Nouakchott Melissa and I got into a taxi and the music sounded pretty good.  It was also in Hassaniya.  The driver, like many Mauritanians we met, was surprised that we knew Hassaniya and was happy to tell us all about this group.  Apparently they sing a lot about social issues and situations in Mauritania.  I was impressed.  Well, Jay posted what I think is a music video from this same group (I mean, how many can there be?  Mauritania is a small country).  My Hassaniya isn't good enough to follow the message of the music very well, but I'm gonna try to listen to it a bunch over the next few days and see if I can't decipher it a bit.  My guess from the words that I picked up is that they are singing about the poor and the problem of poverty in Mauritania...but then, I could be completely wrong.  For all those Hassaniya speakers out there feel free to correct me and translate any parts of the song that you want.

Here's the video:

Can I read you something?

I am constantly asking Melissa that question. I love to read, and when I find something particularly insightful, challenging, sad, or (most often) funny, I just HAVE to read it out loud to whoever will listen. I think it's because I want others to enjoy what I am enjoying. Melissa often puts up with me interrupting her in whatever she is doing (eating, reading her own book, working, cleaning, sleeping...) and only rarely gets annoyed at me. But, I realized that I've got a new outlet for those parts of books that I just have to share.

So Tired

Servers anywhere will tell you that Friday night and Saturday night are, barring some really weird occurrence, the best nights of the week to make money because so many people are out having fun on the weekend.  Last night was no exception.  I arrived at the restaurant to find it absolutely slammed -- at 4 o'clock in the afternoon.  There were about three or four of us who were supposed to start work at 4 pm so when we did that eased things up for a little while.  But then, starting around 5:30 the people just came pouring in...

Tip for Tipping

Those of you who have been a waiter before (and even those of you who have not) might think that you know where I'm going. You might think that I'm gonna rant and rave about how people these days don't tip enough, but that's not what I want to talk about. This is really more like a case study into the lives and psychology of waiters.

The job of serving food requires that a person deliberately choose to be on the downside of an unequal relationship: The power is all in the customer's hands. In any other setting the waiter and customer are (at least theoretically) equals, but not in this setting. In the restaurant the customer is always right.

My Sister's Photography Website

http://AleyaDuncanArt.webs.com

Nouveau who?

So it's been a week since I posted last.  I've got some stuff I want to write about, but I've been busy training for my new job at Red Robin (where they expect you to have everything memorized by ingredients and amounts after the first week).  It's hard for me and I've worked at Red Robin before.  Anyhow, I'm off today to a training for my other vocation, which isn't really a vocation yet because I've yet to even land a single day of teacher substituting, much less a job as a teacher.  Oh well, God knows what He's doing.  If He wants me to be a waiter all year then...I can do that.  Not what I had hoped for, but I'm not God after all so I will let Him make the plans.

And so, since it's the weekend, I figured I'd share a video with you all that Melissa's dad sent to us.  Knowing the internet and Facebook connectivity it's possible you've already seen it.  But if so, then you know that it's funny enough to watch again.  Enjoy.  (It's a little too wide for this blog and it won't let me resize the movie, but you can click on the "full screen" option in the upper right part of the video to watch the whole thing.)

Report: Growing Ranks Of Nouveau Poor Facing Discrimination From Old Poor

Furniture Project Update

So here are the basic plans, and two photos of some of the work in progress.  Did I mention it's gonna be made from cardboard?  Think cardboard can stand up under the stress...we'll soon find out.

the basic idea

Phoenix rises, Furniture updates and Musicians from the 80's

...The Dirty Bird rises from the ashes to clutch me in it's claws!

Yep, I've got a job at Red Robin starting next week. I never thought I'd say it but... I'm glad to be working at the dirty bird. Ok, I'm not there yet (I start training on Tuesday). But I've got a job! I will be making money next week rather than just spending it. And I'll have a flexible enough schedule to focus on teaching, building community, and volunteering (all things I'd like to do here in Houston).

And no, I'm not done with the furniture making yet --

Extreme Home Makeover: RPCV Edition

"In a race against time on a project that would ordinarily take months to achieve [never even be taken seriously], a team [duo] of designers, have just [enter some ridiculously short period of time here] to completely renovate an entire house  [find a way to seat more than three people in their home at any given time].  Can they do it?  Find out next on Extreme Home Makeover: RPCV (Returned Peace Corps Volunteer) Edition."

When I'm Found in the Desert Place

So if you haven't read Melissa's most recent post on Considering Loss, you should.  Cuz I feel like we both went through the same steps and came to the same conclusion...only she did it half a day ahead of me.

I don't know why or how I sometimes get so focused on money.  I don't do it so much with things, I tend to be pretty good about not really caring about things.  But money on the other hand, money is a control issue for me.  So all I've been thinking about is: if I don't get a job, and if we weren't surrounded by loving family and friends, then, worst case scenario, we could default on our lease agreement.  Therefore, I made a bad decision with my money.  Therefore I wasted all that money.  Therefore I've put us out on the street, with no money and bad credit and no job and...

Hahaha...he's trying to write another blog?!

Yeah, that's what I'm saying to myself too.  But it's the only way that I journal.  And even though I didn't do it alot on Xanga in college, I still appreciate reading what I wrote back then.  It gives me insights into what I was thinking and feeling, and it reminds me of events that I had long forgotten.  So here's my blog, reborn.