Martin Luther, pounding the 95 Theses into the Wittenberg door.... with his FIST! Shortly thereafter, the corrupt Roman Catholic empire crumbled.
Happy Reformation Day!
Shame on all you pastors that starved your flocks today and didn't host a Reformation Evening service, to celebrate with worship and praise our risen savior Jesus Christ on this wonderful, eventful holiday. Greater shame on you pastors if you went out demonically "trick or treating", while neglecting to give your congregations good spiritual Hebrews 5 food, as today, of all days, is the day to celebrate and appreciate the glorious Reformation freedom of the church today - freedom to own Bibles in English, freedom to correctly observe the ordinances, freedom from the satanic papist grip, freedom from the perverse and devilish fusion of church and state. Tonight was the night to celebrate the Reformation... and did you?
The more you neglect it, the more easier it will be for the papists to steal it all away someday. With Roman Catholics there is no such thing as ecumenicism - there is only the cold, cruel will of the Mother church, enforced through inquisition. You do her will or you die by fire. History over and over again cries out with the blood of the martyrs... don't forget them in an ocean of candy that you let your children beg from the strangers of the neighborhood tonight.
You'd think that a google search for something like "Reformation Day Party Houston Texas" would bring back something... anything.... but it doesn't. I just don't get it. EVERY PROTESTANT CHURCH IN THIS COUNTRY should be celebrating on the the 31st - celebrating that the church of Jesus Christ is no longer under the oppressive, satanic grip of the Papists. EVERY CHURCH should mark the 31st as an evening for families to gather at the church, to celebrate their freedom, to worship with singing, to read from Bibles that we are FREE to own, that the satanic forces of Roman Catholicism can no longer prevent us from owning. But instead it seems like most evangelical Christians just get caught up in the nonsense of Halloween, and sending their children off, dressed as monsters, to beg neighbors and strangers for candies filled with dyes and deadly chemicals. WHY?
The Reformation is one of the single-most important events in the history of the church - so why isn't it celebrated globally in evangelical churches?
I think that pastors do far more HARM than good by avoiding a formal celebration of the Reformation on Oct. 31st, and do even more harm by participating in trick or treating, as they are basically telling their congregation, "hey folks, forget that whole Reformation thing, and just go out and beg strangers for candy."
Martyn Lloyd-Jones addresses this much better than I could. I've long disliked the idea of a "lay elder" or "lay preacher", or in other words, a guy who works with computers during the week and then somehow on Sunday is competent enough to lead a congregation in worship? Give me a break.
If I go to see a doctor, it's a doctor who is full-time in his practice, not a guy who practices medicine "only on Sunday". From Chapter 6 of "Preaching and Preachers" (p. 100) (my highlights added)
The first principle I would lay down is that all Christians are
clearly not meant to do this, and that not even all Christian men are
meant to preach, still less the women! In other words we must consider
what is called 'lay-preaching'. This has been practised very
commonly for a hundred years and more. Prior to that it was comparatively
rare, but it has become very common. It would be interesting to go into the history of that, but time prohibits our doing so. The
interesting thing to notice is that this change once more, was primarily
due to theological causes. It was the shift in theology last century
from a Reformed Calvinistic attitude to an essentially Arminian one
that gave rise to the increase in lay-preaching. The explanation of that
cause and effect is that Arminianism, ultimately, is non-theological.
That is why most denominations today are generally non-theological.
That being the case it is not surprising that the view gained
currency that preaching was open to almost any man who had become
a Christian, and later, any woman also.
My assertion is that this is an unscriptural view of preaching.
There are of course exceptional circumstances where this may be
necessary; but I would then query as to whether it is actually 'laypreaching'.
What I mean by exceptional circumstances is that it may
well be the case, owing to the state and the condition of the Church lack
of means and so on-that the Church may not be in a position to
support a man full-time in the work of the ministry, and particularly
preaching. Definitions are important at this point. The modem view
of lay-preaching, largely derived from the teaching of Methodism and
Brethrenism, is that this should be the normal practice and not the
exception, and that a preacher is a man who earns his living in a
profession or business, and preaches, as it were, in his spare time.
(Also helps reinforce the idea that Methodists often get things wrong, too)
Boom! Captain America simply stands back and watches as Quicksilver goes on a bad-guy bashing holiday. Yes, this game is a total time-waster, but man that guy can clear a level fast!
I've been messing with two Internet music streaming sites recently, PlugDJ and Turntable.fm, and after testing these out for a while have determined that it's not just that I don't like these sites, but rather, I don't like the format of community DJ'ing of music like this. Here's a list in no real order of things that bothered me about this format of listening to music, and why I'll stick with LastFm and Spotify (I work in tech all day and listen to roughly 8-9 hours a day of streaming music to help me concentrate, so I spend an INSANE amount of time evaluating new sites like this). Here are some thoughts:
Community radio means that you periodically have to listen to garbage
And it's not just about listening to garbage, but it's about that fact that unlike LastFm and Pandora, you can't skip tracks. Sure, you can give it a "Meh" rating, but you can't skip it. So you either have to mute the song or just take off your headset and go get more coffee, vs. LastFm where you just ban the track and instantly skip it. Problem solved.
Sure, there was plenty of good, new music in some of these DJ rooms, but plenty that was awful again, including someone including this (presumably as a joke - they were shortly after booted from the room...)
Limited number of rooms and/or available DJ spots
Going through the lobby, there were a limited number of stations I was interested in listening to, and if there was some genre I'd want to join, there's no open DJ spots. Which is fine if all you want to do is listen to music, but if that's the case, why wouldn't I just go to LastFm where I can at least skip the songs I don't like?
Profanity in room titles and music/video selection (and no way to filter it)
If people want to listen to expletive-laden rap music, whatever, but I don't, and I'd prefer to have some filter system that can cut out garbage like that. Same with language used in the chat or in the room titles. Whatever, I'm old fashioned, but I just want the music and the titles without a bunch of !@#$% describing the name of the room.
Strange abuses of the system
I've also been in some rooms where if you DJ and for some reason play music that is slightly askew of what the others are playing (and I'm not talking about the sax guy, but just somehow slightly off of what the bulk of other music is) you get booted from the room for an hour without a warning. What on earth...?
Even stranger is that I've found some rooms where if you vote DOWN certain songs, you get booted from the stage (with no clear answer as to why - no dialog in the chats or anything.) This alone is frustrating enough in that, if I don't want to DJ, the other option is just to enter a room and just listen to music, that I can't skip, so instead of that, just give me a service like LastFm where I have the freedom to skip songs!
Buggy systems
Here are some of the bugs I've noticed with both of these. turntableFM frequently would just link to a dead, black room, and no amount of refreshing would do anything to make the room load. Backing out and picking a different room would frequently do the same thing.
PlugDJ fared a little better, but would really be a massive drain of system resource, being someone who's not using a top of the line computer. Other tabs would completely freeze, and it actually managed to kill my Internet connection(!). Beyond just that, videos would freeze and frequently need to be refreshed.
Final thoughts:
Both of these sites offer an interesting alternative to the standard streaming music, but the negatives outweigh the positives for me. If there was some sort of skipping/banning option, maybe this would have potential, but I suppose that the nature of a DJ program would be that you have to just sit and listen to whatever is broadcast, even if it's a 1:00 clip of 'My Little Ponies' singing. I'll stick with LastFm.
Went to the polls today for the basic purpose not of voting FOR Mitt, but rather for voting Obama out of the Whtie House. This is the first election I think that I've ever been to where I haven't cared at all about the candidate that I voted for, but rather, I will vote for whoever is the leading candidate that isn't Obama.
He's basically blown 4 years, with his only legacy being a ridiculous medical care tax to get burdened with. The economy isn't much better, food is insanely expensive, we're still sending troops all around the middle east, and I don't see how things are any better off. I'd like him gone. Now.
Understand that I'm not crazy about Mitt and his false gospel cult beliefs, nor the fact he's on the same pro-abortion band-wagon, but he has one thing going for him: he's not Obama. And he appears to be leading Obama in several of the swing states, so he's got my vote. I hope the guy wins, even though I don't care much for him.
Now enough about politics. I hate politics. But this time of year, in an election year, it's all you hear about. So I've voted, and I'm done with it. If Obama wins, we have Nebucadnezzer for another 4 years (and maybe he'll go nutty and grow his hair long and start eating grass). But enough: my vote is cast. I'm going to start reading more about the Mennonites, or Martyn-Lloyd Jones, or something else more interesting...
I created this Photoshop stupidity on my old blog, and felt it deserved a reposting, as I see garbage films like this all the time advertised at Walmart. I can't figure out Walmart: are they supposed to be a family-oriented, family-friendly business, or just a massive, soulless conglomerate out to decimate the entirety of the free market in this country? Ahhh, what good does it do for me to lament, I spend far too much money there. But why do they have to openly advertise and sell garbage films like this one? I felt like my intelligence level dropped a few notches just from being unfortunate enough to see the trailer for this film (the trailer was enough to dissuade me NOT to support movie theaters anymore. I'm starting to think Hollywood can't make a decent film anymore...)
There was a post over on Desiring God about the topic of sports that got me thinking. The writer, opening with "will there be touchdowns in the new creation?" more or less delved into a somewhat ridiculous endorsement of the idea of sports in heaven, with a thought that sports are something of as a foretaste of heaven. Of course, the writer didn't bother citing anything about the half-naked women cheering for the players, the brutality and violence of games like football that frequently send men to the hospital, or the plethora of comericals on television for sexually-explicit films, alcohol, and junk food consumption (nor, on the subject of watching sports, how being a lethargic, motionless couch potato while watching sports is a way to "waste one's life", ironic on Piper's blog.
I really don't get into sports, and I really don't get into pastor endorsing sports. I think the negatives of sports far out-weigh any positives. I've known of far too many people personally who lament their chronic, life-long physical pain and disability that resulted from sporting events played during their youth. If Christian kids need a good physical outlet, instead of stupidity involving throwing a small ball around, why don't they build a house for someone in need, or find some other outlet to use their energy, other than blasting out a kneecap while throwing an inflated ball through a hoop?
More on this later, but this post just had me thinking (and blogs that don't allow comments invariably have me leaving my goofy thoughts here instead.)
I just read a review of turntable.fm and wanted to check this out, but no matter what "room" I select from the lobby, every room is just blank. Browser doesn't seem to matter at all either.
Sounds like a cool idea, being able to tune into an internet radio station with others and either listen to songs and rate them, or even be the DJ and spin the songs that you like - very novel idea. But every time I try to select a room to listen to music, all I get is the blank screen above. No javascript error or anything.
Even though he tends to remove my comments, I still enjoy Russell Moore's podcast of music, and I just listened to his broadcast on the music of Jimmy Buffett: A Pirates Life at Forty by Jimmy Buffett and had some thoughts on this.
For years I've HATED the music of Jimmy Buffett, as every song he sings has something to do with alcohol and intoxication, and that's just something I really don't get into. I used to work with a bunch of older women at a small office years ago, and all of them were fans of Buffett and his drinking music (as well as smoking and NASCAR). I never saw the appeal of his music, and Buffett struck me as the type of ornery drunk you'd generally want to avoid. I mean, does he have anything else, other than booze, to sing about? If so, I haven't heard it, and yes, I have heard other songs than the awful "Margarittaville" song - I've got internet radio cranking almost all day, so whenever I hear his music, I hastily skip it.
I'd like to hear Jimmy Buffett sing some songs about rehab. Perhaps some imaginary songs about how his wife left him because of his alcoholic rages, or his tendency to spend all of his wealth on drink (not sure if that actually happened or not, but it would make for a good song.) Maybe even a song about a drinking binge that led to a hospitalization? Or songs about being in a bar, drinking too heavily, and then violently vomiting all over the floor next to Cliff and Norm. Whatever. Can't stand his music.
A pediatrician near us refuses to take new patients who refuse to vaccinate their children, and on considering this policy, I couldn't help but think of how Nazi that policy sounded. "We don't care what you think or what you've read or what research you've done: if you refuse the drugs that we mandate, we will not treat you." So in other words, it's an acceptable form of discrimination based on one's personal views about the efficacy and safety of vaccines. Good thing the government will step in to investigate inhuman medical practices like this...
It is the choice of these doctors, I suppose, but it reflects very poorly on their practice. I've long wondered if pharma-crazy doctors like this get a big bonus check for the volume of mercury-laden drugs they push into kids each year? I think of friends of ours who have a severely mentally-disabled child, who was (wrongly) administered an overdose of vaccines (the medical records were lost, so the shots were given again.) And of course, the vicious mental damage that the child received from these drugs, disabling him mentally for life, making him incapable of working or accomplishing things with his life, all just happened for no reason - just out of the blue. No connection to the shots (even though the symptoms started to manifest shortly thereafter.) I mean, historically, this happened to people all through history, right? Even back before vaccines - children just suddenly, for no reason, would just manifest autism symptoms, right, doctor?
And you know, if there was ever a solid, definitive study to be released, conclusively linking vaccines to autism and mental disorders, it would be completely marginalized and buried. Doctors would never be allowed to read it, and even if they did, they would ignore it in favor of the pro-drug propaganda in glossy color. This is just a part of why I would never be a medical doctor. Your primary purpose is to sell drugs. Sellouts with no genuine concern about the health of their patients.
Every year around this time I'm searching around the web for a local church offering any sort of Reformation Day party on Halloween, and, sadly, finding nothing.
I'm still between churches now, so don't have a local pastor to bug with this idea, but honestly I shouldn't need to. EVERY protestant church should be celebrating the Reformation on Oct. 31st!
Everywhere I look online, there are no Reformation Day parties or events. I've exhausted Google with all of my searching, but alas, there are absolutely no churches doing anything on October 31st to celebrate the Reformation around my area. What's wrong with you pastors!!!
The only thing I've been able to find are "pumpkin patches" at some area churches, but what good is that theologically? How is that celebrating the gallant efforts of the reformers? (then again, these are Methodist churches hosting these events, so no surprise they are lacking in doctrine and substance.)
Some Baptist churches have "Festivals" going on, but these are just games and candy. Don't people want to read about the reformers to their congregation, or do they just want to poison their kids with processed white sugar and dyes? What's the point, if all you're doing is having a candy party? I mean, if the Reformation is that meaningless to you, pastors, then why not just give your congregation instructions to go and trick-or-treat with their kids? Are there ANY pastors in the world that actually practice Richard Baxter-direction for their congregations?
Why not just line up to go and apologize to the Pope?
Speaking of the papists, even the local catholic churches don't do anything to celebrate the Reformation and.... oh, yeah, I forgot, the Reformation is when the catholic church got stomped by the sola scriptura super-heroes, so I guess they don't think too favorably of Oct. 31st (to them it's just another "let's pray to some dead saints" holiday or something...)
Don't forget the Reformation. If you do, don't be surprised if we lapse back into history of the Bible and the church suppressed and the papists burning Christians all over again...
So I was stuck in line at Walmart the other day (and my three readers already know my feelings about Walmart...) and to the side were some awful DVDs, particularly one featuring my least favorite actress ever, Reese Wither Spoon, called "This Means War". I stood there studying the image on the cover, with a photoshopped Reese flanked by two guys, the one on the left who played the second-rate Captain Kirk in the Star Trek re-launch (aka another nail in the coffin of the franchise) and the other guy was, I dunno, some other guy...
But here's the thing: the Captain Kirk guy - something about his head is wrong. It seems to be freakishly misshapen, whereas the guy on the right, his head above the eyebrows seems to be freakishly smaller, almost as if there was a terrible transporter beam malfunction and cranial substance was swapped from one to the other. See what I mean?
So, I decided to do something about this, and broke out trust ol' Photoshop, and made some changes. I think what happened was, in a terrible transporter accident, the Kirk-guy had his upper-head swapped with the guy on the right. So, like a good Scotty, I made things right and fixed the transporter accident. Check it out...
The Kirk guy now looks like someone you'd see in a catalog while waiting to get a haircut, but at least his head seems more properly proportioned, I think. And the guy on the right looks like a guy from my college Algebra class. But something is still wrong... let me think....
Ah yeah, Reese has got to go. To make this movie a lot better, she needs to be erased from this film, and instead, these dueling guys need to be competing for the affection of a woman with a lot more style, character, and acting prowess. I've got it!!!
Had a lot of fun with the original Goldeneye for the N64, way back in the day. If I had time, and money, I might checkout the revamped version of the game.
Thinking back about it, I realize how corny the game sprites are for this, but who cares - deathmatch was a blast. Was one of the more memorable FPS games I can think of...
I'm a big fan of sermon audio, but they really need to do something about the ridiculous plethora of "King James Only" sermons, which beyond just being absurd, have something of a cultish nuance.
"Corruption" vs. the "pure Bible"? For crying out loud, the King James is a great translation, but it isn't perfect. And holding to ridiculous views such as "double inspiration" isn't just wrong, but it treads into the area of false gospel. If you have to use the KJV, and any other translation is a corruption, then that would condemn millions around the world (self included) for not following this ridiculous teaching a misguided pastor, who has lost track of what the Apostle Paul warned the church at Galatia:
As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned! (Gal. 1:9) - NIV
The gospel is repentance and belief in Jesus Christ, God's free gift of salvation to sinners. It's repentance, belief, and has nothing to do with reading only a certain Bible. Yet there's a cultish edge, where people using other translations seem to be accursed. The KJVO camp is teaching another gospel, and they should heed the words of Paul to the Galatians, as they also got caught up in the same kind of gospel-plus teaching that lead to their condemnation.
SermonsAudio - clean out your sermon library of the KJVO silliness.
Not all of your NetFlix users are complete crooks and swindlers. Believe it or not, a few of your users are actually honest people who are faithful to return the DVD's on a regular basis so that new films from the queue can continue to be circulated. So in light of this, if you have users who are, for the most part, consistently honest straight-shooters, why not make the system a little bit easier for them and allow them to have the benefit of the doubt that they returned a film, and let them get their next disc faster.
Here's a suggestion: add this option next to a film, so they can mark that it's in the mail, and send out their next film faster:
A simple checkbox to say that, yes, I have the film in the mail. Please send me the next one. If a person has a good track record with returning their DVD's on time and promptly, why not allow this checkbox, so that a user can specify that they have a film headed back, and they can get their next film more quickly?
I realize there could be the potential for abuse. For instance, if a person has the two film rental plan, and they have two films checked out, and they have both marked "in the mail", at most they have 4 films are one point if they are being dishonest. Is that really that big of a deal? You check their account, and if they have 4 films out, they get no more until something is returned. If they also consistently abuse the system, remove the 'in the mail' option for that person.
Best case: you vest the respect of members like me who regularly check the queue and return films faithfully, and make me want to stick with NetFlix for a long time. Worse case: you give dishonest people the ability to check out 4 films. But if there is abuse of the system, and people repeatedly hang on to 4 films at a time, you take away the "in the mail" option from that particular person.
Think about it, Netflix. Postal mail is a drag, and this would help speed up the turn-around.
Thanks
P.S. Why won't you share a customer service email address?
Every now and then I'll comment on posts from my other blog, "Intelligently Redesigned Doonesbury", since I usually just post the modified comics over there without any comments. It's no secret that I hate Doonesbury (nothing against Trudeau personally, I just can't stand his odorous liberal bias) so I've taken this other blog and used it as a vehicle to re-write Doonesbury to actually make it funny. All done as satire, of course.
Anyhow, in this weeks comic, I usually aim to keep the dialog as untouched as possible, expecially the size of the dialog balloons, but this week I coundn't help it: I had to expand the final balloon to fit a much better punchline. Yeah, I messed up the border size, but who cares: it's just a stupid satirical version of a satirical comic strip.
If there wasn't such a liberal stench to this comic, I probably wouldn't even bother, but the obnoxious nature of this comic just lends itself to a satirical rewrite...
I have fun sometimes surfing around SermonAudio to find some of the more unusual messages from time to time. Don't get me wrong: SermonAudio is a wealth of solid, expository teaching. But there is the occasional bit of loopiness (particularly regarding the patently ridiculous 'King James Only' messages that make their way onto the site.) Here's an entertaining message: not heavy on Scripture, but rich in the dangers of Halloween:
What's disappointing is that the message just goes through the superficial trappings and generalitites of halloween (and the dangers of Harry Potter, of course) but doesn't go as heavy as I'd like to into the Christian response - or, even into the alternatives to Halloween, which would be Christian remembrance of the Reformation, also on Oct. 31st, but an event far more impactful to the lives of believers (KJVO'ers like to get hung up on the double-inspiration of those amazing Anglican translators of King James court, but they lose sight of the history behind the reformation that, had it never happened, we'd all be polishing the Pope's shoes under a continuing wicked tyranical and ungodly fusion of church and state. Priorities, pastors, priorities. Rome used to burn men like us just for teaching something other than their own false doctrines...)
This time of year, I generally lament how there are NO churches that do anything to remember the reformation at all: Oct. 31st evening speakers to teach the congregation about some of the reformational powerhouses like Luther, Huss, Wycliffe, Calvin, etc.) Instead, pastors either get onto the trick-or-treating bandwagon, or they just host equally enane Halloween alternatives at the church, giving out the same unhealthy candy but without all of the demonic constuming.
Pastors, please, don't forget that it was the Reformation that freed us from the yoke of Rome, and remind your parisheners this time of year. And beyond.
I really hate Walmart, and not just because I gave them over $10,000 for food and merchandise over the last year. Rather it has to do with the fact that if I'm going to give them so much money I'd prefer that they didn't have so many practices that I found annoying. Here's a list of things in no particular order that bug me about Walmart, as if anyone cares...
Elimination of greeters
Greeters at the door were one of the few touches of humanity at Walmart. I remember well growing up and seeing the grizzled old vet, with all of his pins on his Korean War hat, who's chat with people coming in, shaking hands, patting backs. How can the Walmart powers not understand that making people FEEL GOOD when they walk into a store is a GOOD thing? Now, I walk into Walmart now and I experience cold emptiness and fear. There's generally no one around, and you get a cart, get your junk and get out. Maybe it's just me, but I'm also more acutely aware now of being watched by cameras: eliminate the old dude and the door, and just watch people from afar via camera. Soulless.
And beyond just the greeters, you can't find associates anywhere (especially at the paint desk). I understand that there might be a security risk for greeters, that if someone tries to steal something, gets caught, that they could pull a weapon then dart - so here's a thought: why not combine the greeter role with a security role? Install armed, tefloned folks at the door, and instruct them to smile and say "hello". How bad would that be?
The soft core women's magazines they sell at checkout
The checkout lane at Walmart is stocked with trashy, soft-core pornographic women's magazines, depicting women in various states of undress and discussing topics far to filthy to bother repeating here. At least in some of the local gas stations they keep magazines like these behind the counter wrapped in paper, but for some reason, the trashy women's titles are right out in the open, where, as you're stuck behind someone paying for their 47 items (in the 20 item express lane) with pennies, all your eyes can take in is either the hydrogenated junk food, or the barrage of women's bodies advertised like slabs of meat.
These sex-obsessed publications have no place in a family store like Walmart, and are little more than soft-core smut to distract people in line.
The garbage soft core and horror/gore movies (and games) that they sell
Walmart seems to have no problem with selling disgusting films of a mature rating. Although they don't just out and sell porn, they aren't that far off with big advertisements for pastry-assaulting films like "American Pie", and there's no shortage of strong, grizzly horror films on their shelves (one title I saw recently featured a cover with a woman mostly devoured by bugs. Great family title there, Sam Walton...) And unlike the video places that rent out adult titles, that at least do viewers of hiding away their smut in a back room, Walmart puts all of their garbage right out in the open, often right at eye-level for kids. The atrociously slow auto service center
I can't even imagine what takes so long to do something as simple as an oil change, but somehow Walmart can turn this into a 2-hour ordeal. And step out into the car shop to see how things are going and you get bombarded with the stench of a thousand cigarettes. Oil change, tire rotation, a massive soul-draining wait and lung cancer, all rolled into one.
They take all my money
I live in an area where Walmart is all you get, so when I need basic house goods, I could either order through Amazon (which is just as evil in their inventory) or buy a couple over-priced items at the local country store. I easily shovel out thousands of dollars to this monster each year, and sadly, I don't have any alternatives. They suck away my meager pay each month and there's little I can do about it, so I guess I have to deal with their junk inventory and inhuman staff.
Final thought: I was in the toy section of Walmart recently and saw, along the floor level, a copy of the shooter game for 'Walking Dead'. So a grizzly killing game involving shooting zombies belongs in the toy section? (I watched a couple episodes of Walking Dead on Netflix and I was NOT impressed. For one thing there's nothing original about the show. And while I'll deal with some of the violence, episode 2 begins with a sex scene that, as far as I'm concerned, was graphic enough to shatter any interest in the series completely (as well as an interest in anything AMC is going to play.) So by putting this game in with the toys what is Walmart saying?
.jpg)
