Failure

So, last night's Salt topic was on discouragement. (Unfortunately, things were complicated and the message didn't get recorded--I know, sad day) Anyway, there was talk about how many people have gone through depressions, and it reminded me of something I realized a couple months ago. In my past, I would go through depressions. I never attempted suicide, but there was a lot of times where I considered it. My reason for never going through with it was because I was afraid of how people would treat me if I failed. I wasn't afraid of succeeding, I was afraid of the consequences of failure.

In other news, last night was the first Salt or Veritas that I wasn't on the schedule in 2 months, and I was still there from the beginning of setup until the end of teardown. I need to take better advantage of my days off.

In still other news, I started actually listening to my audio bible. I got it in October, but I hadn't really taken advantage of it before. So on Sunday, I started listening to it, and I've been listening to it every time I'm going somewhere, or when I'm studying in the library at school. So far, I'm 2/3 of the way through Deuteronomy, and it'll end up taking about a month to listen to it all the way through. So if you see me with my earbuds in, I'm probably listening to some NIV Old Testament awesomeness.

Injury Update

It's been nearly 5 months since the injury mentioned in this post, so a little reminder. I dropped a heavy weight on my toe, and it bled and hurt a lot. Anyway, lately I found out that the toenail is cracked. I kinda started picking at it, so it's nearly separated from my toe. If I wanted, I could give it one good tug and it would be off, but then the sensitive part under the nail would be exposed--and it's half the length of the nail that would be gone. Unfortunately, now I want to pick at it and try to pull it off. It bugs me that it's loose. Yay for mild OCD. So I either have to wear socks and shoes everywhere or learn to restrain myself. I hate socks. They won't stay up, and I don't like the restricted feel. If I want socks to stay up, I need to buy sock garters, but they're somewhat expensive.

Vernal Respite

Tomorrow is the official end of my first actual Spring Break since I started this blog, and I think I'm more tired coming out than I was going in. But I'm probably just sleepy because I'm bored--and maybe a little frustrated. I spent most of the week just hanging out in the IC. On Thursday, my dad came out to bring me to Des Moines to hang out. We spent a couple days just chilling at home, watching TV and talking.

On Saturday, we went to his church, the Lutheran Church of Hope. It looked to have seating for about 3,000, and has 3 services each week. After that, we came back to Iowa City, so I could be up early and set up for Veritas.

When I got back to my apartment, I decided to check my mail. There was a letter from the U of I Admissions Office. Unfortunately, it wasn't an acceptance letter--it was a letter stating that they'd hold their decision until getting a transcript that included the classes I'm taking now. This means that I won't be accepted until May at the earliest. This creates a not-so-insignificant list of problems, including:

1. I almost have to sign up for classes at Kirkwood to cover all my bases
2. I can't sign up for classes at Iowa until after all the freshmen, which means I might not be able to get into the classes I need to, so it could force me to take another semester--beyond everything I already have to do due to the transfer process
3. I'm not sure what's going to happen with financial aid--I can't seem to find any deadlines on when I need to be signed up, except for the FAFSA, which I've already done

So yeah, I'm currently experiencing a trial of my patience and anger. We'll have to wait and see how things turn out.

Beautiful Things

Recently, I was talking about sports, and I realized that moving to Iowa City has helped me with my rage. While in Iowa City, you can't easily root for the Cyclones or against the Hawkeyes. These are things I learned to do from a very young age. So, I've mellowed out when it comes to these teams to avoid strife. This has even spread to professional sports. I can watch my teams play without getting very excited or angry--and with how well my teams (the Dallas Cowboys and the Colorado Avalanche, if you were curious) did this year, that's a good thing. I once broke my TV remote in half during a game. I can't remember which team it was--but I think it was the Cowboys--or if it was because the refs were "cheating" them or because they were just playing horribly. And if you think the team doing well calms me down, it doesn't. Once, while my baseball team (the Chicago White Sox) was destroying the other team--something like 9-0 in the 3rd--and one of the outfielders dropped a fly ball, I shouted at him. My teams were never allowed to lose. They had to blow out their opponents every time--at least the ones they were supposed to beat, I was semi-realistic.

This, and everything else that God has done in my life have made "Beautiful Things" by Gungor really hit home.

(Side note: I bought this album because of the song "The Earth is Yours", and I like two of the other songs better--so far--"People of God" and of course, "Beautiful Things")

Now for something completely different. Now I know this isn't very timely anymore, but all the people who bought gold, worrying that the global economy would crash are idiots. (Sorry if any of you are in this group) Gold is not going to hold its value if the global economy crashes. All it is is a shiny rock that is malleable and ductile. It's also ridiculously heavy and soft--pure gold can be molded by hand. Gold's value will not come back for a while. The things that will hold their value in the beginning are necessary goods and services. For example, milk, bread, fuel, shelter, medicine and water would become a few of the things with actual value. We would be reduced to a barter system for a while--or to a society where you only have what you can get by lying, cheating, or stealing--and luxuries like gold would not gain any value until other things had stabilized. So the lesson here is, if you really believe paper money will go the way of the Dodo, then sell off all you gold and jewels, and stock up on fuel and water--or buy some cattle.

Sorry about all that, that rant comes back sometimes.

Technology is ridiculous

The past couple days, I've been realizing how crazy technology is. With only my iPod, no internet connection, I have access to 7 different Bible translations (ESV--which I have two of--NIV, NASB, KJV, NKJV, HCSB, and the Message--the last one for kicks). I also have a Mirriam-Webster Dictionary, and translators from English to 6 different languages--Spanish, German, French, Italian, Russian, and Czech (though those last two use the Cyrillic alphabet, so I can't read them unless I study that). Then there's about a day of music, and an audio version of the NIV--which is almost 3 days of audio by itself. Then there's the useless games, a level, a decibel meter--which peaks out around 90--a clock, and all the apps that need the internet. All this in a device that's smaller than a wallet. Yet tech-savvy people in this country look at my iPod and say that its storage capacity is small. It's "only" the 8GB version, the smallest that is currently sold by Apple, with 32GB and 64GB versions available.

This was thrown into sharp relief when I read Gabe's blog this morning. He shared a video of a tribe that was absolutely ecstatic to get the New Testament translated into their language for the first time. We have easy access to the Bible, any time we want it, and can even choose (and argue) between which version we want to read on any particular day, but we just shrug it off as normal. Why can't we have the same enthusiasm for God's Word?

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.