I enjoy reading reviews on movies, music and books before I buy. I’m not exactly bringing in the big bucks and would like to find out if something is worth my time and money before I take the plunge. But have you ever found yourself reading a review on Amazon or iTunes thinking, “Okay, we get it. You have a lot to say. Just get to the point!” My friends, I have found the solution. It’s a website called Blippr, whose users provide “radically short ratings and reviews.”
On the first Sunday of May two of my good friends, Kyle Kozloski and Nicki Nedelisky, got married in Ocala, Florida. Now, I know that I’ve been to a lot of weddings in the past eighteen months, but this one was special. No, I wasn’t in it, but I felt as much apart of this wedding as any other, including the ones in which I’ve had a role.
You see, this past year Kyle was one of my two roommates and Nicki one of my three next-door neighbors. On top off all that, all of us were campus ministers with The Navigators. When we all moved in to the respective sides of our hole-in-the-wall duplex in August ‘07 Kyle and Nicki weren’t even dating, much less thinking of marriage. In short, I got to witness these chapters of their love story unfold from a very unique angle. Before I become too far removed from it, I’d like to try to tell some of that story.
I only blogged once in May (and, technically, I wrote that post in April). That’s a record low for any month since I started blogging over four years ago. Honestly, though, I’m not at all upset about it. The spring semester was one of the most intense four month periods of my life. As such, I spent the month of May recharging my batteries.
In an attempt to spice things up a bit I took a break from many of my regular activities and commitments and began some new ones. I started sleeping in, which for me means waking up between 7:00 and 8:00 AM instead of 5:30 AM. I stopped running to rest my bum foot and started weight training with my friend James. I’ve been cooking more and eating out much less. I spent less time one-on-one with students and instead put a lot of energy into leading a Bible study on 2 Timothy. But most significantly, I barely did any writing in any form all month. I’m hoping the result will be a freshness in my blogging and journaling that I think it disparately needs.
I have a few topics that I’m really looking forward to writing about here over the next couple of weeks. Keep checking back for updates.
Today is the first ever RSS Awareness Day! The organizers (Daily Blog Tips) have asked participants to blog about RSS on May 1, so here’s my contribution.
Now, I know that typically an awareness day is used to highlight a major social problem in the world. So if you’re unfamiliar with RSS you might think that it sounds like an abbreviation for a disease, as in:
Person 1: “Yeah, my dad’s living in a home now. He’s got ESRD.”
Person 2: “My mom just found out she has RSS.”
Person 1: “Oh, I’m so sorry.”
Person 2: “Yeah, she doesn’t have much time.”
But that isn’t the case. RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. An RSS document, commonly called a feed, contains either a summary or the full content from a website. You as the user can subscribe to a site’s syndication feed using a feed reader.
This past Thursday was the final Nav Night of the spring 2008 semester. We spent the first half of the evening honoring the graduating seniors. This year we had twelve students graduating. We had one person get up to speak on behalf of each of them. I had the honor of speaking for Aaron Gavila, my old roommate and good friend. We concluded our senior send-off by praying over them.
Continue reading ‘Nav Night: Spring ‘08 Finale’
Each spring since I’ve been at Florida State the Navigators have gone on a prayer retreat to spend time seeking God. Each one of these has been different. I don’t mean that the activity has been different. In fact, of all the things we do year after year, this is the one event that follows the same structure each and every time we go. We arrive on Friday night and start praying. We spend all day Saturday praying. Then we spend Sunday morning in prayer. When I say each one is different what I mean is that God says and does something unique each time. This time was no exception.
If you’re a longtime reader of my blog then you know that I’m not typically a big fan of my birthday. I’ve had this blog for my last four birthdays and have written about my disdain for the day each time (read: 20, 21, 22, 23). There have been two major reasons. First, I would rather be celebrated for something I do than for who I am. Second, the quality of relationship I experience on my birthday is generally very poor.
Recently, however, my views have begun to change.
The last time I made baseball predictions I was 100% correct. Here’s what I think it going to happen this season.
National League
East: Mets
Central: Cubs
West: Diamondbacks
Wild Card: Braves
American League
East: Red Sox
Central: Tigers
West: Mariners
Wild Card: Indians
World Series
Tigers over Mets
Please, tell me why I’m wrong.
Last Thursday I gave the message at our weekly Nav Night meeting. Since most of our Bible studies are on Ephesians this semester Dave asked me to give a message on Ephesians, something that would be an overview of the entire book. I wanted to bring something to the table that the students probably weren’t getting in their study.
I decided to use Watchman Nee’s Ephesians commentary Sit, Walk, Stand as the model of what I would share. Nee’s take on Ephesians is that the book can be broken down into three parts: our position in Christ, our life in the world and our attitude toward the enemy. We sit with Christ in the heavenly realms (Ephesians 2:6), we walk in a manner worthy of the calling we have received (Ephesians 4:1), and we put on the full armor of God so that we can stand against the devil’s schemes (Ephesians 6:11).
The message was recorded and today was added to the ministry podcast. Listen to it and let me know what you think. I also encourage you to subscribe to the podcast (via iTunes or RSS).
Facebook has always been a target for criticism when it comes to privacy. The News Feed/Mini Feed hysteria and Beacon fiasco both come to mind as two prominent examples. Recently the NY Times wrote an article claiming that it was impossible to completely delete your account. (Facebook has since addressed this issue.) Zuckerberg and his cronies have been a little slow to figure out that people just don’t like their information being used without their precise knowledge of how and by whom. With this latest update they may have finally figured it out. Today Facebook unveiled its new privacy controls. The biggest changes have to do with a user’s ability to control who sees what on their profile.
