What's Going On?

Once again, it's been a while. Here's some food for thought and some updates.

Congratulations to our President-Elect, Barack Obama. Clearly, the country believes in you and backed you in a decisive victory over John McCain. We support you when we can, oppose you when necessary and always pray for you. We respect you and your family, but we cannot respect some of your views, such as your stand for the murder of unborn babies and your support of human embryonic stem cell research. God himself has placed you in this position and so we plead with God that you would change your mind on the issues pertaining to the sanctity of human life. God help you Mr. Obama.

I've settled into my new position as Youth Director at Village Bible Church and have hit the ground running. I am learning my way around the office and figuring our procedures. One thing that I have much to learn about is how to handle the paper work and financial processes. I am also trying to learn how to balance my 20-hour-a-week job, my full-time schooling and having time to spend with Amy. It's been challenging to find a happy medium, because Amy is busy working hard to support us and is also trying to keep up with her Financial Accounting class. Pray for us.

My book reading this year has been abysmal, and I'll end 2008 with by far the lowest count since I started keeping track in 2005. As it stands right now, I've read 27 books on the year. Now, with the semester ending in December, I will add some of the books that I've been assigned for classes. However, I doubt there's any chance that I'll rise above 35 books. I know, I'm a failure. But there's always next year!

Speaking of being off the pace, you'll notice on the sidebar that this is only the thirty-second post of the year on this blog. To match last year's pace, we'd have to post 71 more times before January! All I can say is that we'll just have to try harder to post more regularly.

Also, click on the Web Album 2 link on the sidebar to see some new pictures from some of the things we've been doing.

In two days, we'll be heading up to Santa Clarita for Thanksgiving with my family and we'll have Amy's brother Tom with us! It will be a fairly small group, so we're glad to add to that number with Tom. Other than my mom and dad and my two brothers, my grandpa will also be joining us. It looks like there's some rain in the forecast for the rest of the week, but our annual football game on Thanksgiving Day should be rain-free. Amy and I are looking forward to some long walks (to work off all the calories!) in the colder Santa Clarita air. It should be good! There is so much to be thankful for!

Happy Reformation Day!

Oh, is it Halloween too? Sorry, the fact that people waste tons of money every Halloween makes me more inclined to remember the fact that 491 years ago, a Roman Catholic monk nailed 95 theses to a church door and changed the world. If you have no idea why that's significant, then maybe you should browse around here today. Yeah, it's that important.

Sometime soon I'll post about my reading so far this year and the outlook for the rest of 2008 and for next year as well. To see someone else's reading for 2008, go here.

Also, I wanted to make sure that I added this video on the election. Very centering and focused. I think these seven minutes are better spent than almost any other half-hour or hour-long talking head show on TV.

God Answers Prayer

"You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures." - James 4:3

Yesterday, the members of Village Bible Church voted unanimously to hire me as the part-time Youth Director. Amy and I had been praying for this for several months, and God answered our prayer in a way that was "far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think" (Ephesians 3:20).

After the worship service, the church reconvened in the sanctuary for a business meeting. The meeting was called to order and details were explained. Then, Pastor Ron gave a short biography of Amy and I and then called me up to the stage for a short testimony time, followed by a Q & A time. The questions were good, God graciously gave me the right words to speak, and then we voted. The votes were counted in about three minutes and the tally was announced.

Now, the deacon board will make me an official offer and Amy and will accept and starting November 1, I will have a new job as Youth Director at Village Bible Church!

Soli deo gloria!
To God alone be glory!

In Case You Were Wondering

In chapel today, the Biola Gospel Choir sang. I realized two things:

1. I'm not charismatic.
2. I have very little rhythm.

Just thought you should know.

Wow!

I must say this actually does make me salivate!

Books, books, books!

“Even when reading is impossible, the presence of books acquired produces such an ecstasy that the buying of more books than one can read is nothing less than the soul reaching towards infinity... we cherish books even if unread, their mere presence exudes comfort, their ready access, reassurance.”

– A.E. Newton

In the Library

I'm sitting here in a group study room in Biola's library working on homework and I thought to myself, "I should update the blog!"

So I started to.

And now I'm not sure what to write.

Oh, check out our second web album on the sidebar and see pictures of our trip to the San Diego Wild Animal Park with our pastor's three-year-old son. That was fun.

This past weekend I took most of the guys from our youth group to San Diego for a little weekend road trip. There were 12 guys and and three adults. Pastor Ron and a dad of one of the kids game with me. This was partially a reward for every guy at Wildwood memorizing all of Matthew 7. They had absolutely no clue where they were going as we left the church Friday afternoon. Here's the short version:

We headed down to a parking lot near Old Town San Diego. From there we jumped on a train that took us right to Petco Park and the Gaslamp District. We purchased tickets for the San Diego Padres-Pittsburgh Pirates game and enjoyed a good game, a great view of the San Diego skyline (which incidentally consisted of several banking institutions, some of which no longer exist, thanks to the last few weeks) and wayyyyyyyyyyyy overpriced food.

After the game, we ate a late dinner at In-N-Out before Pastor Ron drove home. The other two cars drove north to Vista to stay at a friend's grandpa's house. We were locked out at 1:30am and were forced to wake Grandpa Dennis up to unlock the door that he said was going to be unlocked for us. We slept, some showered, some ate and then we were off.

We headed south again, this time for La Jolla (a really, really nice part of San Diego. Kind of like the Beverly Hills of San Diego.) and San Diego Bike and Kayak Tours. We had made reservations to rent bikes and ride them all over La Jolla, Mission Beach and Pacific Beach (this is the beach we went to last summer after Tom graduated from boot camp). We had a great time and only two guys crashed, however one of those guys ate it twice, the second time quite badly.

After that we stopped at an awesome beach in Carlsbad (thanks Becca!) and played in the water for an hour before finally heading home.

Okay, so that wasn't a very short version but that's how it went. Look at that, we blogged twice in two weeks! Wow!

I Can't Come Up With A Good Title For This Post, So This Rambling Explanation Will Have To Do

To begin with, here is a link to our second web album. You'll also notice it's been added to the sidebar on the right side of the screen. There's a whole bunch of pictures from our camping trip to Santa Rosa Island. Also, the first web album has had its last update. Take a look here.

Yes, we have a frog, and his name is Fred. Amy has taken tons of pictures of him, so take a look in both web albums. A lady at Pan-Pacific inherited the frog from a neighbor (I might be butchering this story!) and asked if anyone at work was interested. Amy jumped at the opportunity because she'd always wanted a frog, and a free frog sounded even better. So we now have an aquarium on top of our entertainment center. He eats mealworms and crickets three times a week. A few weeks ago he ate a rock and we were very concerned, but we're assuming he passed the rock since he's still croaking.

I'm in the library at Biola University as I write this and am supposed to be studying, so I'll get back to Greek and try to update sooner rather than later.

Ciao.

A Whole New World

I know when you read the title that you were hoping that there'd be a video of me singing the Aladdin song, so I'm sorry to disappoint. What I meant by that title is that on Thursday morning at 8:00am, I'll officially be back to school. Graduate school. Seminary. It's a daunting task, but Amy and I are both very excited about it. Last night, we went to Talbot New Student Banquet. It was a great time of being introduced to Talbot School of Theology at Biola University.(notice the guy in the brown shirt on the right side of the first picture that pops up on Biola's site. He's wearing a Hotchkiss shirt! That's the dorm I lived in at TMC!)

There was good food and cheesecake for dessert, but the best part of the evening was being able to sit at the same table with two professors. Dr. Garry DeWeese and Dr. Clint Arnold were very friendly and curious hosts at our table. We talked about how we got to Talbot, where we were from (lots and lots of questions about Amy being from New Hampshire, which she very much enjoyed!), what program we're in, etc.

Toward the end of the night, a microphone was passed around to all the faculty present. They introduced themselves, what department they teach in and several - sometimes very funny - interesting facts about themselves or their spouses. It was very helpful for Amy and I to be there together and meet and see who I will be learning under for the next several years.

This semester, I'm in five classes:
Beginning Greek I
Personal Foundations of Ministry
Theological Research Methodologies
Theology III
Hermeneutics and Bible Study

In other news, Amy and I are looking forward to a mini-vacation this Labor Day weekend with our newly married friends, Travis and Katy. They invited us to go camping with them on Santa Rosa Island, an island in the Channel Islands chain off the coast of California. We're jumping on a boat that takes off at 8:00am Friday morning from Ventura Harbor and hoping to return sometime in the afternoon on Monday. We'll be roughing it, since we have to hike a mile and a half from the shore to our campsite and nothing that we bring can weigh more than 45 pounds. It should be a blast! We'll post pictures and our experiences when we get back.

Adieu

Pictures

Here's some pictures from the last month and a half. For all the pictures, click on Web Albums on the sidebar.

Amy and I at an A's-Angels game on June 30th. Amy got free tickets from Pan-Pacific (the plumbing company where she works). They were nice seats down the first-base line.









Travis and Katy's wedding at Forest Lawn.













Dad singing romantically to mom at Travis and Katy's wedding.











Amy and I at Travis and Katy's wedding.













Me, Travis, Brian and Nick.













Jared and Holly's wedding.













Scott and I at Jared and Holly's wedding.