4 pages...

I have only read 4 pages of the book so far and its pretty interesting. The codex was found by Egyptian civilians along the Nile in late 1970's. However, they couldn't read the old manuscripts and didn't know what they had in their hands. Bart Erhman has been quoted a couple times so far which is cool too.

My new blogs...

I am about to start reading a book called The Lost Gospel: Judas. But instead of going out and buying a new leather bound journal I have decided to use this as my journal. I am going to keep my thoughts and questions of the book on here for those who dont want to read the book to see what its kind of about so look out for blogs coming out right and left the next few weeks. thanks for following!

Well its been a while since i last wrote. Its hard to keep up with it when you don't have internet at home. But summer break has been good. got a job for the last month of it, at Sherwin-Williams. I cant wait for school so i can continue working on my Spanish in class. This year will be a lot better, no Sophomore slumps!

Well...

The internet was very scarce on the trip to Chile so i haven't been able to update this like i wanted. But we are all safe. We have had a tremendous amount of fun. We went to so many cool places. Temuco, Villarica, Pucon, Valdivia, Vina del Mar, Santiago, schools, churches, hot springs. all so much fun.

Flight back home tonight. Back in the states early in the am manana.

Hola de Chile!

It took almost 24 hours, and one 30 minute delay but we made it to Temuco, Chile! Safely at that. We are all tired after being in airports the past two days and the 10 hour uncomfortable plane ride from Dallas to Santiago. We have a packed two weeks of touring and most importantly mission work, and being with the kids and communicating with them and enjoying each others company. Keep praying for us and ill gradually put a couple pics up of the stuff we are doing!

GRACIAS!!!!!!

Last Week

School is coming to an end. Finals coming and going. Summer is starting. And I need to start packing for my mission trip. I need to start taking stuff home from the dorm. I need to start finishing up videos. I need to start finishing up PowerPoint presentations. All in less than a week and a half!

WHHHHHHooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!

Mark: the Gospel

In my New Testament class we just recently finished studying the books of Mark and started with Luke. The thing that keeps coming up to my attention is the way Mark portray Jesus after he finishes a miracle and other works. Jesus tells those around Him to not tell anyone of the works that He has just done. Questions pop up like, "Why wouldn't he want anyone to know?" or "Doesn't He say to go 'tell it on the mountains'?" I don't think it is the fact that he doesn't want anyone to spread what he did, but if they did go tell everyone of the miracle he has just done out of true faith and believing that Jesus really was the Son of God. He wouldn't want them to go out and tell stories as if the were gossip or amazement by itself. I think Christ was aiming deeper than what is perceived just by studying or reading Mark. If you really believed that He is Christ and the Son of God, then you will go and rejoice in his works. Rather than going out and telling a story without meaning behind what you are saying. Kind of like how The Odyssey would have been told over and over by story tellers.

Next time you are out and the topic of Jesus Christ comes up, and you are a Christian that fully believes that He is who he says He is, take pride is discussing it and have meaning behind it all.

Been a couple of weeks...

Its been a while since I have wrote one, and its been an exciting period. UK loses in the NIT o Notre Dame. The girlfriend has ACL and meniscus repairs, which went very well. She reached 90 degrees the day after surgery and has improve a whole lot since then. I think she will have a faster recovery time than expected. Praise God for that. UK is also about to sign the next new coach for the following 8 years for $35 million in John Calipari. Bringing in 3 out of the top 6 recruits in America plus two transfers from Memphis, plus Patterson, Meeks, Liggins, Miller; Kentucky will be stacked next year. Calipari has he essential to bring excitement back to basketball and also be an ambassador of the state, unlike Gillespi. Baseball season starts next week, GO REDS!!! My Chile Mission Trip is about a month and a half away. Oh geeze I'm excited!!! We are almost ready. I need to start packing. Hmmmm.....

Abraham Lincoln faces to the right on a penny while all the other presidents face to the left on US coins.

Sin and Death

Have you ever wondered what the world would be like if sin lost its power or if death lost its sting??? Would the world not be a much better place to live? No more disease, no more hate, no more disputes. Just a pure world that is safe to live in.

Its what we are promised. In the Book of Revelation, we are promised a new Heaven and a new Earth that is that is "prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband" NIV verse 2. The New Jerusalem, as it is called, is pure. "He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son. But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars—their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death"verses 7 and 8.

We have so much to look out for as Christians. A pure new world for us to live in, among the Alpha and Omega that we have had faith in since our first day as a becoming a follower. as it says in Revelation, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them." HE IS COMING TO LIVE WITH US! the Ultimate Sleepover!

Lets go again!

So the other week the Oscars were on and I didn't think to much of them because they really aren't my type of thing. Many movies got awards, but there was one that took the show, Slumdog Millionaire. I overlooked it because i didn't know anything about it and it was just the Oscars.

I give a a 5 out of 5. The girlfriend said that we should go see it and we did. The movie is worth all 8 Oscars, whatever awards they got. They movie was simply amazing! Well directed, well put together, well played, well told. I cant wait to buy it on DVD.

God is so amazing isn't He? I mean there are thousands of languages in the world, millions of bands in billions of billions of ears. It is so awesome that we have been able to translate God's Word and praise songs into many of these thousands of languages. The fact that we have been able to do that in todays world only hit me while preparing for my mission trip to Chile. We are singing praise songs in worship down there and one we wanted to sing was Mighty to Save. With our luck the song by Hillsong has been translated into Spanish and made popular to where we are having these services.

It just amazes me at how powerful our God is and how he can do soooo many things unimaginable to our human minds. Dios Puede Salvar!!!!!!

Economy

I was watching Enemy at the Gates this morning between classes. And if you havent seen the movie it is about the Russians fighting the Germans at Stalingrad. One of the newspaper writers there gets an idea that they sgould make a hero. The hero wasnt some big within the Russian army or the Czar, it was a kid that he was trapped with 500 yards away from 6 Germans and the kid strategiacally killed all six within 2 min. The put him on the front page for a few weeks and was sucsessful with doing it. He was the picture of their war.

That got me thinking, with Obama as the President and saying "We will prosper in the end this recession." Is he the right one talking about it? He is already criticized for every step he makes. Maybe we need to find some one else and make them the picture of this recession, make them the positive aspect on making it back to the top. i dont know who it would be or should be but just not Obama nor a pollitician, they both are smart but they are the top dogs, find someone not so far up but knows what they are doing.

Mardi Gras!!!!!! Which Mask are you wearing??

So I attended the Chapel Service today and the priest from Lexington Catholic, Father Norman Fischer, was the speaker. I knew of him from my days back at St. Mark because he came to do a couple of services for us. But I never really listened to him back then. I was just like any grade schooler that would lose their attention quickly. This time, however, I listened to him somewhat closely. He is a very funny guy and entertaining. Hence the two songs that he performed for us that he had changed the words to make them a Christian song. Overall very interesting.

He did make a couple of points while he was speaking that just caught my attention. One was when he was talking about the masks and how we need to unmask ourselves from the things that are keeping us from following the Lord closer than where we are now. One thing we had said in the service was "Help me rid of my mask." What masks do we take on? Drugs, alcohol, family problems, peer pressure in general.

What can we do to help these people or maybe even ourselves get rid of our masks? One thing that comes to mind is something we discussed in my New Testament class on Monday- teaming up. The discussion in class the other day was dealing with how can we as one person help one of ours friends that is hindranced or handicapped, and the answer was team up with some of your Christian friends and surround them with Jesus and keep them involved with what you all do, like attending church on Sundays or just hanging out in mid-week playing video games. Same thing with these masks, we can team up with our friends of faith to help the friend overcome whatever is going on in their life. Like hanging out with them on a Friday night to keep them away from the alcohol or drugs, or just discussing your faith with them if they are riding the fence on whether they believe or not.

It's kind of funny how God can put events in your life throughout the week or over a span of a month that deal with the same matters. maybe he does this on purpose because he wants to get a point across to you about something or to teach you more on a subject.

This one caught me off guard!

Just looking at what kind of Religious cartoons there are on Google, I came across this one that simply amazed me, but yet it's some what true.

Many Christians in today's world are more critical of others not of faith than they are willing to just sit and talk with them. And more often than not this cartoon explains what happens. We can be critical of them and be as harsh as we can be, but when WE are being criticized, that's when we want to be calm and talk about things.

It's time for this to change. Its not good for the image of our faith nor for our personal selves. When we are critical like this those not of faith look at us and say "I don't want to be in a group that goes around criticizing others that aren't like them." That is not what we are about, is it not? As Christians we are to accept them as God has created them just like he created us.

Treat with disrespect, Gain Disrespect.
Treat with respect, Gain respect.

Remember this next time you are at Wal-Mart or the movies and find yourself in a convo about your faith.

Did you know????

In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus, after every miracle that he does, He tells his disciples to not tell of the happening. That don't go boasting on how great He is, just keep it on the low down. He just keeps repeating this throughout Mark.

Wonder why that is??? I think it is because God wants our faith to be of free will, choosing on or own to follow him. Not to follow him because of Jesus and disciples bragging on the works that he does. But to let the people see for themselves and let the people affected by the miracle go out and profess their newly found faith.

I also wonder if that is why Peter denied Jesus three times after being criticized of being seen with Him? I mean it was embedded into his head to not tell who Jesus was but to let them find out for themselves on who he was. Soon after the denials the centurion is at the foot of the cross in Mark 15:39 and says, "Surely this is the Son of God." This wasn't the work of Jesus bragging on himself or Peter saying "Yes this is the Son of God," the centurion found out who he was after he saw how Christ died and had heard His cry.
Just a thought from learning about Mark in New Testament.