convo with my co-worker

co-worker: k thats enough of ur bad additude
me: ? is that the opposite of subtractitude?
co-worker: hate u

Reformation Day

I’ve been doing a Matt Redman marathon at work (thanks Spotify!), specifically his last two albums “10,000 Reasons” and “We Shall Not Be Shaken.”  Even more specifically, I really enjoyed the song below:

excerpts from This Is How We Know:

This is how we know
This is how we know what love is
Just one look at Your cross
And this is where we see
This is where we see how love works
For You surrendered Your all

And this is how we know
That You have loved us first
This is where we chose
To love You in return

For You so loved the world
That You gave Your only Son
Love amazing, so divine
We will love You in return
For this life that You give
For this death that You have died
Love amazing, so divine
We will love You in reply, Lord

Savior of the world
King Jesus we love You
For we have been loved

Thankful for both the justifying and sanctifying power of the cross.  Happy Reformation Day everyone!

“All our sins for Your grace / What a glorious exchange”

Why We Find Pride in Others So Annoying

I know, I know, two Tumblr posts in one day, what’s going on?!  But this was an important one for me to read, much-needed, and just wanted to share!

(from C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, chapter 8)

There is one vice of which no man in the world is free; which every one in the world loathes when he sees it in someone else; and of which hardly any people, except Christians, ever imagine that they are guilty themselves.

I have heard people admit that they are bad-tempered, or that they cannot keep their heads about girls or drink, or even that they are cowards.

I do not think I have ever heard anyone who was not a Christian accuse himself of this vice.

And at the same time I have very seldom met anyone, who was not a Christian, who showed the slightest mercy to it in others.

There is no fault which makes a man more unpopular, and no fault which we are more unconscious of in ourselves.

And the more we have it ourselves, the more we dislike it in others.

The vice I am talking of is Pride… .

… In fact, if you want to find out how proud you are the easiest way is to ask yourself, “How much do I dislike it when other people snub me, or refuse to take any notice of me, or shove their oar in, or patronise me, or show off?”

The point is that each person’s pride is in competition with every one else’s pride.

It is because I wanted to be the big noise at the party that I am so annoyed at someone else being the big noise.

How To Articulate a Christian Worldview in Four Easy Steps

(from Kevin DeYoung’s blog)

One God. We worship one, personal, knowable, holy God. There are not two gods or ten gods or ten million gods, only one. He has always been and will always be. He is not a product of our mind or imagination. He really exists and we can know him because he has spoken to us in his word.

Two kinds of being. We are not gods. God is not found in the trees or the wind or in us. He created the universe and cares for all that he has made, but he is distinct from his creation. The story of the world is not about being released from the illusion of our existence or discovering the god within. The story is about God, the people he made, and how the creatures can learn to delight in, trust in, and obey their Creator.

Three persons. The one God exists eternally in three persons. The Father is God. The Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, is God. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Father and the Son, is also God. And yet these three—equal in glory, rank, and power—are three persons. The doctrine of the Trinity helps explain how there can be true unity and diversity in our world. It also shows that our God is a relational God.

For us. Something happened in history that changed the world. The Son of God came into the world as a man, perfectly obeyed his Father, fulfilled Israel’s purpose, succeeded where Adam failed, and began the process of reversing the curse. Jesus Christ died for the sins of the world. He rose again from the dead on the third day. By faith in him our sins can be forgiven and we can be assured of living forever with God and one day being raised from the dead like Christ.

Obviously, this doesn’t say everything that needs to be said about the Bible or Christianity. But I find it to be a helpful way to get a handle on some of the most important distinctives of a Christian worldview. Feel free to steal it and use it for yourself. It’s as easy as 1, 2, 3, 4.

reality check of the day

“My problems are not outside of me.  My problem isn’t my spouse, my house, my work or some jerk who insults me or is unkind to me.  My problem isn’t that I don’t have enough or that I didn’t get the right breaks.  My problem isn’t my health or lack of wealth or my environment.  My problem is me and my heart.  My expectations.  What I think I should have.  What I crave that I’m not getting.  My problem is sin.  Sin is what’s wrong with the world.

People commit atrocities against others.  People get hurt really bad.  People suffer tragedies and go through great sadness.  People hurt and kill innocent children.  All because of sin.  I’m not minimizing any of this.  But in an ultimate sense, my greatest enemy is the sin which dwells within me.  Satan is the god of this world.  And he tempts me to sin and react to being sinned against with more sin.  But even Satan doesn’t dwell in me like sin does.

That’s why I need the gospel.  I need Jesus and his blood to wash away my sins, then I need the Holy Spirit to change my desires and give me the power to live for God’s glory.

Praise God that he reveals to us that our problems aren’t outside us.  Our problems aren’t the things that happen to us. Our problems arise from how our heart interprets the things that happen to us and what we believe about God when they happen to us.  Our problem is how we react to the things that happen to us.  Do they drive us to God, or reveal sinful cravings?

What’s wrong with the world?  We are.  But because of the gospel, the world will be better as well, because Jesus is making us who have trusted in him into his own likeness.  Because the Holy Spirit is working in us, we will be increasingly a sweet fragrance of Christ wherever we go, for his glory.  Let it be so, Jesus.”

“WORST… GIFT… EVER!”

Got this excerpt of a book from a blog (challies.com):

I was going to call this book Jesus of a Thousand Hearts, because of the way he continually breaks into my life. He “speaks” to me through hearts. I’ll find stones in the shape of hearts in rivers where I’m fishing. I’ve seen them almost step-by-step up a mountainside when on a grueling climb. Praying in the morning I’ll look out the window and passing by will be a heart-shaped cloud. Dinner rolls, seashells, stains on my jeans. I’ve won the lottery when it comes to hearts from Jesus. But I am ashamed to admit that last summer, I grew a little impatient with them. I was going through a trying time and seeking God for the answer to many questions. Often, he would simply give me a heart in reply. I’d be walking down the sidewalk, and there in the cement see a heart-shaped hole, made by a bubble when they poured the sidewalk.

I actually grew a little dismissive of them. I didn’t want hearts—I wanted answers.

So, Jesus stopped giving these treasures of our friendship.

Last fall, while walking through an alpine meadow bow hunting, I was asking him, How come you don’t give me hearts anymore? I asked it in a pouting kind of way. At that moment something gray caught my eye. I looked down midstride, and there in the grass, about as big as a dinner plate, was a dried piece of cow manure—in the perfect shape of a heart.

If I didn’t know Jesus adores me, if I didn’t know he is playful, and if our relationship didn’t allow me to receive a playful tease, I might have misinterpreted the icon. But I loved it. It was both, Oh, so now you want a heart? and, I adore you still. A cow-pie heart. That is so Jesus. Wish I’d taken a photo of it—we could have put it on the cover of this book.

Seriously?! Jesus wants to speak to us through heart-shaped cow dung?

But as ridiculous as this book sounds, don’t we often put a lot of hope and trust in what we consider to be “signs”?  Let’s make a commitment to the Word which is unfailing and undeceiving, inerrant and infallible, whereas the “heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9).

So thankful that Christ chose to speak to us through the cross and not animal excrement.

a summary of yesterday

found this article on Google which described what happened yesterday perfectly… NEVER GOING BACK TO SAN FRANCISCO AGAIN

A plan to foil city’s infuriating scam: towed cars

ON SAN FRANCISCO

September 24, 2011|C.W. Nevius, Chronicle Columnist

San Francisco — The parade of tow trucks begins lining up along Fifth Street around 3:45 in the afternoon - five or six of them in a row, eager to ruin someone’s day.

At 4 p.m. sharp - it’s 3 p.m. on some streets in the Financial District - a metered, legal parking spot turns into a tow-away zone. Arrive a few minutes late, and your car has vanished.

Wait until you hear what it will cost. Fees start with $186.50 to the Municipal Transportation Agency, added to a $199.25 tow fee for the AutoReturn towing company.

Don’t have the money handy? Hurry up. The first four hours of storage are free. At hour five the daily fee kicks in, $51.25. Every day after that runs $59.75. Oh, and don’t forget the ticket under your windshield wiper. That’s $85 for parking in a tow-away zone. The bill can easily exceed $500 - for being five minutes late.