Monday, December 11, 2006,12:47 AM
Change
hmm....two posts in one day....something is going on.

Well here it is...

Got an email from Stan in Australia, He instructed me to get in contact with Global Partners to work out my visa stuff and to find out what I need to do. He also gave me a list of things he would like me to help with if I come. So ...yeah....If God provides the funds, and the doors continue to open like they are....I'm going to Australia.

It is kinda sad...I'm graduating and I'm moving on with life. I don't really want to...I like confortable things....I don't like change too much. But this is what must and is going to happen.

I'm a little frustrated about myself personally. I realize I'm a really hard person to get to know. I sat down the other night and was having a conversation and the person who I've spoken to maybe once or twice said to me.

"You know, I knew guys like you in high school, crazy and wild....and always cool. But you're different, your crazy but you're intelligent, you have opinions and deep interests and care about things. I would have never imagined you this way, you are one of the most interesting people I've ever met at SWU."

I took it as a compliment...but it stung too. I'm probably one of the dorkiest people on earth but I don't want to come across that way. And I certainly don't want to come across as sensitive, even though thats probably one of my better qualities. And I don't want to come across as intelligent because....honestly....being intelligent ...ticks people off sometimes....nobody likes a smarty pants. So, I have within me a wierd duality at work. I want so desperately to combine the two and not have to play one and hide the other, it just gets frustrating. I hate people not getting me...I'm like a freaking iceberg....and I hate the fact that 90% of who I am is never seen. So this what I need God to help me change.....because this is something that needs to be changed.



I don't know why all this stuff is happening now....probably because I'm entering a wierd place and feelings and emotions are coming to the surface. I'm excited about graduation and I'm excited about life and where God is taking me.



So this song is amazingly beautiful and I guess sums up alot of feelings for me.....Kite by U2


 
posted by Jason
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Sunday, December 10, 2006,12:17 PM
stumbling blocks....
I missed church this morning....but I have done some thinking. I was talking to my friend Andy last night and I realized I placed a stumbling block in front of him. I at times do not feel a terrible conviction about recreational cursing. Among friends who curse or in humourous situations, or privately I sometimes curse. I have felt convicted about it from time to time. I realize it does not advance the kingdom any and probably causes people to look at me twice sometimes. So why do I do it? Well, It probably happened that another Christian that I looked up to started to curse and it was funny so I thought it was funny and so I did it too.

We have more influence than we really think sometimes. So I was thinking about all of this and I've found a few scriptures that speak to this issue.

Matthew 18:6, Mark 9:42 and Luke 17:2. I'm going to quote the Luke passage.

Jesus said to his disciples:
"Things that cause people to sin are bound to come, but woe to that person through whom they come. It would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around his neck than for him to cause one of these little ones to sin. So watch yourselves.....


In 1st Corinthians 8, Paul writes:

So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one. For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"), yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.

But not everyone knows this. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat such food they think of it as having been sacrificed to an idol, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.

Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.


WHOA...Paul dropped the hammer in that passage.

Okay, to the point. We have enough trouble trying to live out a life pleasing to God without other Christian's doing things that confuse ones who aren't too sure about things or people like me that have a great deal of respect for people and when I see someone I respect do something, may be influenced by that. I don't think we are all weak, but I fully believe in peer influence and the influence of character on other people. If you saw someone you cared about and respected do something, that was not necessarily bad, but was in that gray question area, would you not feel more open to doing it? I think we are influenced by people more than we like to think or admit.

My conclusion is that if something causes another brother or sister to fall or stumble then you better knock it off. I don't care if its drinking, smoking, cussing, gossip, the list could go on and on but the point is the same.....if you choose to do something and through your choice cause someone to stumble or even waver in their convictions about something you have sinned by placing a stumbling block in their life.

There are some things I cannot knowingly do now because they can cause someone else to stumble and if I did do them then I would be willing sinning against God.

I'm honestly just tired of cheap grace and hollow holiness.

Am I wrong? I think I've formed an valid arguement here, If I need to elaborate I will.....but If you disagree with me lets discuss it.
 
posted by Jason
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Saturday, December 09, 2006,2:54 AM
One...


Is it getting better?
Or do you feel the same?
Will it make it easier on you now?
You got someone to blame
You say
One love
One life
When it's one need
In the night
One love
We get to share it
Leaves you baby if you
Don't care for it

Did I disappoint you?
Or leave a bad taste in your mouth?
You act like you never had love
And you want me to go without
Well it's

Too late
Tonight
To drag the past out into the light
We're one, but we're not the same
We get to
carry each other
hurry each other
One

Have you come here for forgiveness?
Have you come to raise the dead?
Have you come here to play Jesus?
To the lepers in your head

Did I ask too much?
More than a lot.
You gave me nothing,
Now it's all I got
We're one
But we're not the same
Well we
Hurt each other
Then we do it again
You say
Love is a temple
Love a higher law
Love is a temple
Love the higher law

You ask me to enter
But then you make me crawl
And I can't be holding on
To what you got
When all you've got is hurt

One love
One blood
One life
You got to do what you should
One life
With each other
Sisters
Brothers
One life
But we're not the same
We get to
Carry each other
Carry each other

One...
One...

--U2 --One


What a beautiful song....
 
posted by Jason
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Tuesday, December 05, 2006,1:10 AM
every new beginning comes from some other beginnings end
So here I am....in the twilight of my college career. Who knew that four and a half years ago I'd actually be this close to being finished. It is a strange feeling to know that I've accomplished something. I think back on all the people i've known, all the friends I have, all the crazy things I've done and I can't help but smile. It's been fun, I've had my rough moments, my sad moments, my moments where I throw stuff in frustration....but here I am....almost done.

I have one assignment to finish by wednesday and I'm done. Its great. I have things lined up to do after school. For the first time in my life I feel like I have some of my act together. I'm waiting on an email from Stan, I sent him another one on Saturday about stuff so we'll see what he says.

Random thought: Rob Bell and his Nooma dvds are amazing....if anyone wants to throw a graduation gift my way....there are 14 of them....mucho gracias.

So yeah....this is an end of something....doesn't feel that different from anything else.

Man I wanted to write other stuff...but I'm too much of a pansy to say whats really on my mind....GRRR..I'm going to bed....if I bite my tongue any harder I might bite it off.
 
posted by Jason
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