I'm not a star

Yesterday at church, the message was about Philippians 2:14-18:


¹⁴ Do everything without grumbling or arguing, ¹⁵ so that you may become blameless and pure, “children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.” Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky ¹⁶ as you hold firmly to the word of life. And then I will be able to boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor in vain. ¹⁷But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you. ¹⁸ So you too should be glad and rejoice with me.


Dale focused a lot on the end of verse 15, about shining like stars. He said those at the Academy Awards (which were last night for those of you who, like me, didn't watch them) weren't actually stars and that the true stars were all around us. He listed off many of the groups of stars in our church. Click here if you want to view (or just listen) to yesterday's message. I'm in 4 of the groups he mentioned--people who moved from Ames to plant the church, people who show up at 5:30 to setup, people who run tech during church, and people who tear down after church.

But like the title of this post says, I'm not a star. I'm just a normal guy. It wasn't really that hard to move--I easily found a place to live, easily got into school, had a decent group of friends that were also moving, etc. The hardest part of that was leaving those that stayed in Ames. Setup, tech, and tear-down are all things that I enjoy. So really, I'm just doing what I like to do. How is that different from anyone else?

Good Life

As I was walking home from classes yesterday (at around 10:45 am), I said this is a good day. No, this is a good life. Naturally, that started that Anthem song playing in my head. Well, as I've mentioned previously, God's joy has been overflowing in me. Nothing seems able to bring me down. It's awesome.

Anyway, the reason for this post is not that. The reason has to do with Salt last night, and links back to the post from January 29. I was hanging out between Salt setup and practice, and "mom" said she needed to talk to me. She started by talking about how I had said I liked her. She made sure that I knew she wasn't interested, and I told her that I could tell from her reaction when I said that. She told me that it wasn't personal, it was just that she doesn't think I'm the kind of guy God would want her to be with--or something along those lines. She also told me that she still wanted to be friends, because we have to work together, seeing as we're the two main lights people at the church. I told her it's not a problem, and that I've had the chance to move on emotionally.

Even having that conversation didn't bring me down. The joy is still welling up in me.

Also, I've been having more dreams than I normally do. They've been.....interesting to say the least.

Let there be light (or not)

Yesterday at Veritas was interesting. I was on lights, so I got up early and helped set up. When setup was done, I tried to turn the lights on. It didn't work. I messed around with the board, problem solving, and found that I just had to flick the switch on the back. Practice went on, and at times, I left the light board to get the clock, help the electric guitar player hook up the microphone for his amp (it was forgotten during setup), and help fold the programs.

When practice was over, I tried to set the lights for the first song. It didn't work--well, it worked for one of the four light bars, but not the others. I spent the next 10 minutes trying to get the lights back under control--unplugging them, plugging them back in, unhooking cables and hooking them back up, turning the light board on and off, messing with all the sliders on the light board, and flicking the switch on the back. All I succeeded in doing was getting the lights to turn off. They wouldn't come back on. I talked to Clint, and told him I'd have to leave the house lights on.

So I got to sit in the front row, worshipping God fully instead of partially focusing on what I had to do. It was great.

After the service, I talked to Clint again, and asked if I could bring the light board home to see if I could figure out what was wrong. Whereas the lights aren't necessary at Veritas--the large windows help a lot--they are at Salt, so he said okay.

I plugged in the light board (and the light bar I also borrowed), and it immediately worked. So now I've got a light board, a light bar, and a 25-foot cable in the apartment that I need to figure out how to get to Salt on Wednesday.

Oh well, that's Veritas for you. You never know what's going to go wrong, but you know God will be there.

New School?

As some of you may know, I've applied to the University of Iowa for next fall. Well, they've now gotten all of the transcripts they wanted (including my high school transcript--which was probably caked with dust, since I graduated the better part of a decade ago). We'll have to wait and see whether they're okay letting this (hopefully former) lazy student in. I'll keep y'all up to date on that.

Also, in my last post, I ended with the sentence "I wonder what He'll do tomorrow." Well, I had a test yesterday--which was the "tomorrow" mentioned above. It was interesting, to say the least. It was the first test I've had here at Kirkwood that took the full 50 minutes. Why, you ask? Because the printing service didn't get the tests printed in time, so the entire 6-page document had to be projected on the screen at the front of the class. I've already told this to a few people, and one asked me how the teacher accounted for the differing paces that students take tests. Well, she went by what the slower students needed. I was bored and frustrated most of the time. When I take tests, I like to burn through from start to finish, not thinking twice about the answers, then when I get to the end, I'll go back over anything that gave me trouble. Instead, I spent most of the time sitting and waiting for the next questions to be projected so I could move on, and agonizing over one small section that I had trouble with, which threw off my confidence for a while. I think I did well, but that was not a comfortable way to take a test.

Later, at Salt setup, when it was time to clear the stage and space in front of it, I still hadn't gotten the lights set up (the ladders had been in use for other projects). When I turned around, all the lights had been put away in the closet. Of course, everything worked out. It wasn't a big deal to get the lights back out--just a minor annoyance. When I was getting ready to hook up the cables to allow me to control the lights, I noticed that the light board had been forgotten. Another minor annoyance, but again, no big deal. Just have to keep going and wait for the sortie that was sent out to retrieve it to return.

When setup was finished, I noticed that my thumb was hurting. I have no idea what happened to it, but my right thumb has been hurting since then.

And yes, I'm still feeling the joy. I keep waking up with worship songs on my mind, and I don't really feel like listening to anything else on my iPod. This morning, it was "Come All You Weary", which popped into my head durning teardown last night. I hadn't heard that song in months, so I'm not sure why that came up. One of the band members said it's because we need to play it at Salt again soon. Sounds as good a reason as any other.

Well, I've got to get to Human Biology class soon--though last time, I spent part of the class calculating 2^46 on paper (70,368,744,177,664 for those of you that were wondering). There was a reason for that, but it's a little complicated to explain in the time I have now.

Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee

After the events of this post, I had been having problems finding joy in life. I was down for a while. Even after getting over the rejection, I just wasn't joyful. Since Salt Company at Old Brick, I've been excited about every little thing.

At connection group last night, we had a new guy with an amazing story of redemption. It was awesome to hear his story, and his fire for God. When it came time for prayer requests, what came to mind was joy. I wanted the joy of the past few days to continue.

After connection group, we all went over to a worship music party. For the next three hours, there were around 20 people singing to God in a trailer. For a little more information on the party--and the host's day leading up to it--head over here.

I woke up with "Blessed Be Your Name" on my mind, so that was the first song I had my iPod play on the walk to class. I soon slipped and fell on the ice. I got up and went on. A while later, I fell again. Again, nothing hurt, so I got up and walked on. When I was about halfway to class, I fell for a third time. This time, I got up in pain. As near as I can tell from what hurt, I must have made a fist with my left hand, and that hit first. So remember, punching concrete is bad. I didn't fall down again, but by the time I got to class, my forefinger and thumb were starting to swell and change colors. I couldn't flex that hand without pain, but I had already walked all the way, so I wasn't going to just go home.

After my first class, I went to the library. I usually hang out there during my two-hour break on Tuesdays and Thursdays, working on homework. However, the guy I usually sit with wasn't there, so I went to sit elsewhere. After my classes ended, I walked home, and realized that God was giving me opportunities to find joy in unpleasant circumstances today. I wonder what He'll do tomorrow.

Another Nerdy Post

Those of you who have been reading this blog for a while may remember this post, where I argue for the existence of God through a combination of Astrophysics and Quantum Mechanics. If you don't remember it or weren't here for it, whatever. This post will be similar to it. This time, we're going to argue from Evolutionary Biology.

I'll start with a little information before I jump into the big stuff. As many of you probably know, humans have 46 chromosomes (23 pairs). Having an even number of chromosomes means that we can successfully procreate. An odd number usually results in death--in utero or shortly after birth. The rest of the time, an odd number will result in sterility--like breeding a horse with a donkey to get a mule.

Now, according to the Theory of Evolution, we broke off from the other great apes--chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans--most recently, so they are our closest living relatives. So they should have 46 chromosomes as well, right? WRONG. They have 48 chromosomes. What happened there?

Close analysis of our DNA vs. a chimp's DNA reveals that our chromosome pair #2 (they're numbered from 1-22, generally largest to smallest, and then the sex chromosomes--X and Y--are 23) closely matches two of the chimp's put together. This would mean that at some point, these chromosomes fused together into one. However, this kind of mutation is rare, and it usually doesn't end well. And then there's another problem. It would have to happen TWICE to make one viable (non-sterile) individual.

But wait, the odds are stacked even further against this working out. It has to happen twice to get one individual, but that individual would not be able to procreate with its former species--it would need to find another individual with the same rare mutation. This means it has to happen at least four times to be able to produce viable offspring. Noticing the pattern yet? It still gets worse. We'd have to have a breeding population of this new species, large enough to offset any deaths with new births--and extra births so they can grow in population. If the breeding population is far too small, they will die off faster than they can reproduce, and we wouldn't exist. If it is only a little too small, inbreeding becomes a problem, and genetic defects begin to run rampant through the population, and they would die off--albeit more slowly than in the first scenario--and we wouldn't exist.

Obviously, we exist, so the breeding population of this new 46-chromosomed species was large enough to survive for the past 5-7 million years (the best estimate of how long since we split from the apes).

You know, it seems the more I study the natural sciences, the more I see God-shaped holes in our understanding of the world. Life's funny that way.

I can't be serious

So, at the beginning of last semester, I said that I was going to be a serious student. Apparently, I can't actually be fully serious. To show you what I mean, here's what my notes from last semester's biology class look like:

I somehow managed to pull a B in that class. And here's the notes I've taken so far from this semester's human biology class:

I'm getting an A in this class--though we've only had one quiz, one homework, and one test so far (and one extra-credit assignment, which actually puts me at 102% in the class to this point--I think). So yeah, the grade is the important thing, not the notes, right?

Super Bowl Sunday

Once again, I was out late hanging with friends on a Saturday night. I was up until one in the morning. I didn't wake up to my alarm, though. I had forgotten to turn it back on after getting to sleep in last week. I was instead awakened by my phone--I had received a text. I looked at the clock. 5:30. It didn't register right away, so I checked my phone. It was from my roommate, telling me to wake up. I rushed into the bathroom, and was able to get ready in 10 minutes, and we left about 10 minutes later.

I helped out with setup, and when we paused for prayer, the worship leader told about the hymn on the set for the day (and the last two weeks). Yes, It Is Well made the set list for three straight weeks. Anyway, the worship leader told us that it was written by a man who had just lost his four daughters (all of his children at that time) in a shipwreck. This made me ask myself, "Could I still say 'It is well with my soul' after something like that?" I didn't think I could. But then, the more I think about it, the more I realize that I should be able to--probably not right away, but after some time for prayer and processing. If I couldn't, I wouldn't be able to say it now. Sure I haven't been through the death of 5 children (his first son had died about 2 years before), but I've been through depression, parents' divorce, near-death experiences, and a public middle school.

---By the way, while typing this, I was looking on iTunes for a version I liked, and #29 in the song list (searching for "it is well") was Single Ladies by Beyonce---

Anyway, I watched the Super Bowl at a party with about 45 people. Luckily, the hosts had two large TVs on separate floors, so it was almost like two 20-25 person parties. I didn't really care who won the Super Bowl this year--my dad is a Packers fan and my mom is a Steelers fan--so I could watch it with some detachment. My roommate and I left right after the game ended, so we could avoid seeing Glee--some of the people at the party were talking about staying to watch it. I went to sleep shortly after getting back from the party, because I'm old, and I had Spanish at 9 today.

Apocalyptic Snow

As some of you may have noticed, there was a little snow here on Tuesday. Kirkwood was closed from 1pm Tuesday until Thursday morning. I'll let you know about some of the fun involved the past few days.

Wednesday afternoon, they were plowing our parking lot, and I noticed that a truck was parked behind my roommate's car. My roommate was not happy about it, and went out to dig his car out of the snow--and shovel some of it onto the truck. The owner came out while this was going on--with three of his friends. He was not happy, because he had been told by the landlord to park there. That's another thing on the list of why we'll never rent from this company again--no key for the first week, no blinds for two months, no response to complaints about the blinds (including phone calls, emails, and visits in person), the washer breaking down 3 (or is it 4? I lost count) times since we've moved in, and now this.

Yesterday after class, I decided to go to my bank (I had to deposit my student loan money). I then wanted to go to the post office (I needed to mail a request for a transcript for admission to the U of I). The bank wasn't a problem--other than it's on Highway 1, near the Veritas offices, at the top of a big hill--but both post offices I went to were closed--one closed 15 minutes after I got there. When I was getting close to home--after 2 hours on my feet, with a lot of pushing my way through snow up to my knees--it no longer felt like I was walking. It felt like I was falling forward, and had to keep moving my feet to avoid face-planting on the cold, cold concrete--from around the North Market Park until the apartment. If you want, here's the Google maps view of the route I took. In all, it took about 2 and a half hours from the end of my last class until I got home.

Today I tried going to the post office--the second one on the Google maps view (D on the map)--and found out it is only open from 11:30 to 4:30. I went to the mall, bought a few things at CVS, and would have hung out at the mall until 11:30 if my iPod had gotten a good wireless signal. That wasn't the case, so I gave up and walked home, falling a couple times, and getting snow down my pants and down the back of my neck--that was from shaking the snow off my glove after falling down.

Well, I'm tired now, and I've got a couple blisters from the boots, so I'm going to end this post. I'm not sure when I'll get to the post office, but it should happen sometime next week.