December 25, 2005
April 01, 2005
A New Holiday
Happy National Atheists Day!!!
The fool says in his heart, "there is no God." Psalm 14:1
B
December 24, 2004
December 23, 2004
The World Truly Needs Him
It is well known that holidays can bring out the best and worst of humanity. This year, more than ever before, it seems that political correctness has squelched the truth of the season from the festive, colorful atmosphere. It makes me sad to see signs exclaiming "season's greetings," or "happy holidays," instead of "Merry Christmas!"
Of course, this is done so as not to alienate non-Christians. I must ask, "so what if they feel alienated?" Christmas is a Christian holiday. Christians had such a good time celebrating it that other people wanted in on the joy, too. Now that nearly everyone celebrates Christmas, non-Christians think they have a right to take the Christ out of it, rendering it completely meaningless except being a mutually agreeable occasion to dress-up, go in the red, and be silly.
Think about it. It has become a date in early winter when people exchange gifts around a dying electrified conifer. Furthermore, any magic or whimsy still associated with the day is attributed to an imaginary fat man in a red suit who happens to be another perversion of Christian history.
Christmas has become the day when everyone goes to a party and some people just happen to also recall the birth of a baby boy many years ago in a faraway land.
NO! NO! NO!
Christmas exists because the savior of all mankind came into the world. Christmas exists because God chose to become a man like us in order that we might know his infinite love for us. Christmas is the coming of Jesus Christ.
I love Jesus and I love Christmas. So, tomorrow and on Christmas Day, I'm going to say "Merry Christmas!" to as many people as I can.
B
November 25, 2004
Gobble Gobble
[Sings] Turkey Day! Turkey Day! Today is Turkey Day! [Sings]
B
October 31, 2004
April 11, 2004
February 15, 2004
...The Greatest Of These Is Love.
Tonight, I went with Masha and John to see Love Actually in Gregory Hall (same lecture hall as my economics class). What a great movie! Really, it's got to be one of my favorite three movies, ever. I'm not going to give a whole review, so you'll have to see it yourself. I will say I particularly enjoyed the scene of the guy with the cue cards, and the scene when Jamie goes to Portugal to find Aurelia.
That was about the only event of significance today. A rather ordinary day, but, unexpectedly, one of the best Valentine's Days. Love to everyone, from family, from friends, from God.
B
December 31, 2003
It's Over!
There was one of those year-summarizing news montages on television this morning. As I watched a potion of this synopsis, I was reminded of just how much can happen in a year. For the first time, I realized that 2003 will soon be over. It seems like it just got started.
If I were to be granted a wish, I think I'd ask for time to slow down. There's too much to do, and too many people to know, with the current rate of time. Rate of time?!?! The deriviative of time with respect to time? "Time dot?" Can there be such a thing? It's way too early.
Thank you friends for another great year!
B
December 25, 2003
Merry Christmas!
Check out some of the photos I have so far.
B
December 24, 2003
Christmas Eve
In addition to the Christmas story I posted a few days ago, I think I'm going to upload some photos of our house at Christmas. Here's one I took tonight. Quite fitting for Christmas Eve.
December 20, 2003
Christmas
Recently, a friend commented that I have become somewhat of an Ebeneezer Scrooge. That is, I'm not very excited at Christmas time. Eventually, I got to thinking of how Christmas was when I was a child. I'll share a few memories.
Preface: Somewhere, I was supposed to better explain the Scrooginess that has developed over the last few years. However, it all sounded so out of place that I'm just going to leave things as they are below...and await visits from some spirits.
One early December afternoon when I was four I took a nap. When I woke up, I wandered into the living room and there against the wall was a fireplace! I should point out that the old Joliet house had no fireplace. My Dad had purchased this fake cardboard fireplace complete with an electric lamp for the "fire" and two electric candelabras on the "mantle." Today, anyone would laugh at this arrangement, but to me it was the greatest thing I had ever laid eyes on. It's majesty at that moment was beyond compare. It was assembled next to the tree every Christmas thereafter until we moved out ten years later. By the time our current home was finished, the poor thing was an absolute wreck and I fear it met it's fate with the recycling bin. I thought it would have been more fitting to burn it in the new home's real fireplace.
I also remember every Christmas my Grandpa setting up my Uncles' old Lionel train set for me to play with. The enchanting sound of that little locomotive rolling on those tracks and the groan of it's horn will gleefully haunt me forever. Such sounds! He also started setting up the old Aurora slot car sets. These were nowhere near as cool as the train, but the old cars with vertical armatures and numerous gears would often break - an opportunity for me to fix something! Grandpa let me take them apart and learn how they worked. So much fun!
Then, of course, there's Santa Claus. Every year I thought I certainly didn't deserve to getting anything (I was quite mischievous most of the year), but there were always even more gifts than I asked for! It always amazed me. And I always used to think to myself on Christmas Eve: "try to stay awake so you can greet Santa when he comes." Which was always followed by the thought: "who are you kidding? there's no way your going to get the courage to talk to him!" I never saw him, but he always brought the most wonderful things for me and Jen (and always ate the cookies we left him).
There were so many other things, too. Grandma's Christmas Eve Polish feast, singing Christmas songs in church, gingerbread men, Baked Alaska pie, family picture time, watching Grandpa add color crystals to his fireplace, driving around to see decorated homes, decorating our own home, Christmas plays at school, and on and on! So many things to make it magical.
Time stands still at Christmas when you're a child. The wonder and enchantment of it all is like nothing else ever to be experienced again. Then one year you realize it's gone. It's kinda like The Polar Express, by Chris Van Allsburg. The little boy and his sister visit Santa at his workshop and he gives them a bell from his sleigh. When they return home, they find out that only children can hear it. Later, when they grow up, they no longer hear it (actually, perhaps the boy does, it's been a while. I think I just further illustrated my point). Like most everyone my age, I stopped hearing the bell years ago, but unlike most everyone else my age, I'm still listening for it.
So yes, Christmas certainly has lost a lot of its whimsy. Over the years, beloved traditions have faded away with little to replace them. I guess that's just the way time works, but I don't like it.
The great thing though, is that now I understand the truth of Christmas and how wonderful it is. As a child, I knew it was about Christ's birth, but I never really understood what that meant. Now I know exactly what it means, and it makes me indescribably happy. Just think, the greatest gift at Christmas is simply the gift of Christmas itself!
Christmas is about the birth of The Savior. Christmas is about sharing the love He taught, not only with friends and family, but with everyone - especially those who do not know His love. Christmas is about remembering that God loves us always, and will bring us home if we simply believe in the gift He gave the world on Christmas.
November 27, 2003
November 11, 2003
Veteran's Day
Today is Veteran's Day! Everyone has the day off of school except U of I students. At least I get a whole week off for Thanksgiving. Tip your hat to a serviceman today!
"Tora! Tora! Tora!" was on last night. Old war movies are great!
I need to expand my posts. What to talk about...I've got it. Of all the different parameter names encountered in engineering speak, the Twiddle Factor has to be the goofiest. Maybe not so much that the name is silly, but rather that my professor kept chuckling about it for quite some time after introducing it.
I can now also quote my World Music professor as saying, "it's great hiding-from-tornadoes-music." Yeah...
B