June 30, 2009
Wide-Eyed Wonder in God’s Spoken World: Notes for the Tilt-A-Whirl
Notes from the Tilt-A-Whirl by N. D. Wilson
The theme of Wilson’s book is a simple one: life is one crazy ride, but God is in control and He has created so many magnificent things to make the wild carnie ride even more enjoyable than it already is. How often do we stop what we’re doing and just marvel at what God has created for us? Not often enough; and that is N.D. Wilson’s point throughout the book.
I’m not going to lie; I did not like this book at first. At the beginning the book seemed as if it were going to be a philosophy book. Yet, as I read on, I became fascinated with Wilson’s candor and viewpoint; so much so that I forgot why I had disliked it. After finishing the book, I questioned why is it that I had never taken the time to look at the world the way Wilson had; and in what ways would my relationship with God change if/when I do start looking for the everyday miracles that God has given to me. I thoroughly enjoyed reading and rereading this book.
June 25, 2009
Drifting
Yesterday I had the awesome opportunity to start reconnecting with an old friend, which made me happy inside. But afterwards, I felt very disappointed with myself for letting this friendship drift away into almost an oblivion.
In the ten minutes that I spent with my friend, I learned that within the past few months she has done many things that she had hoped to do for a long time. I am excited for my friend that she is experiencing all these things; yet I can’t help but wonder how much more excited I would have been if I had known about some of these things while they were happening rather than after the fact.
The fact is, that I will never know because I cannot go back in time and change what has happened. But I can reconnect with my friend and not let any other valuable friendships drift away.
June 18, 2009
Looking Good
What’s the difference between looking good and actually being good?
As my parents are in the middle of sprucing up the house; you know, touching up the paint and general things like that, they have found an astonishing amount of dry rot on the cedar siding of the house (it almost looks as though the inspector did not actually inspect the siding of the house before my parents bought it). My uncle came over to help assess the damage that was accumulating and asked this question:
“Well, do you want to fix it or just make it look pretty?”
His question got me to thinking. Why would anyone want to merely make the outside look nice when just below the surface, havoc is being reeked and is undergoing extraordinary damage? Is it the cost of fixing the problem, or is it the inconvenience on ones life that a total repair would take that would make a person want to just make the problem look like it has gone away.
I know that this is not only a problem for tangible items, like houses and such, but for people’s attitudes and lifestyles as well. All too often, people take the time, effort, and money to make themselves look beautiful on the outside when the problem and “dry rot” is on the interior. People are all to willing to spend their resources on making something look pretty, but are unwilling to make the necessary changes, repairs, or spend the time/money so that the problem will not occur again.
Looking good is merely a bonus to a “dry rot” free house, attitude, and lifestyle.
June 14, 2009
Newbie to wordpress
Ok, so this is my very first blog and I am rather excited– well technically I think xanga was a blog, but I did not do much with that… so I’m going to claim this as my first blog. I will be the first to admit that I usually do not have anything interesting to say about quite a few topics, but I think that, at the very least, this will be a fun experience. Maybe at some point, my interests will evolve and more people will think I have something of value to say about more subjects. If that doesn’t happen, then oh well, I will have had some fun; which is what I am setting out to do.
Living in Grace 