First Day in Belfast - See a Video of My Room

Just posted a video of my room over at my blog on my year at Queen's. If you're interested, check it out at:

http://yearatqueens.blogspot.com

Cheers!

Ugh...Money

Woke up this morning to what I like to affectionately call my email "throwing up". Every now and then the JBU alumni servers gets hung up, so I won't receive my emails for a day or two and then all of the sudden they'll dump into my inbox. Well, that was this morning with the last three days of emails greeting me. Smack dab in the middle of the list was one from Bank of America with the subject "Account Has Insufficient..." Oh man! I've been trying to track it and thought I was right around $100 - evidently not! Somehow in my trip this weekend back to Siloam Springs, I went over. So, for the $29.08 that I was over, I got hit by 5 $25 overdraft fees. Ouch! What stinks is that $2 of that overdraft were from USPS when I set up my forwarding address on line - they charge you a $1 to access your credit card and check your address (I had two addresses to forward from). So, $2 there now is $52. I'm going to go in this morning and see if I can at least get that $50 knocked off. I haven't overdrafted in years...so I'm hoping they'll give me a grace and knock off at least some of the fees.

I was reading Matthew 14 this morning, after finding out about the overdrafts, and Jesus' miracle of the loaves and fishes was really encouraging. Thankfully, I have two deposits of money that should be coming that will put me back in the black with my bank account - not by much - but at least not in the red. I don't know, it just really seemed encouraging this morning that if Christ can feed over 5,000 people with 5 loaves and 2 fish, that he can probably take care of my needs - no matter how tight things are financially right now. So, I'm going to trust him that he'll provide and, in the end (regardless of my stupid overdraft mistakes), it'll all work out.

So, instead of getting worried or anxious, I think I'm going to stand my ground there - right next to a God who provides, in spite of my mistakes.

(Image courtesy of Alamo Community College)

C.S. Lewis on Education

Read this excerpt today in A Year with C. S. Lewis.

If all the world were Christian, it might not matter if all the world were uneducated. But, as it is, a cultural life will exist outside the Church whether it exists inside or not. To be ignorant and simple now - not to be able to meet the enemies on their own ground - would be to throw down our weapons, and to betray our uneducated brethren who have, under God, no defence but us against the intellectual attacks of the heathen. Good philosophy must exist, if for no other reason, because bad philosophy needs to be answered. The cool intellect must work not only against cool intellect on the other side, but against the muddy heathen mysticisms which deny intellect altogether. Most of all, perhaps, we need intimate knowledge of the past. Not that the past has any magic about it, but because we cannot study the future, and yet need something to set against the present, to remind us that the basic assumptions have been quite different in different periods and that much which seems certain to the uneducated is merely temporary fashion. A man who has lived in many places is not likely to be decieved by the local errors of his native village; the scholar has lived in many times and is therefore in some degree immune from the great cataract of nonsense that pours from the press adn the microphone of his own age.

-From "Learning in War-Time" (The Weight of Glory)

I appreciate the perspective and the reminder. I find particularly agreeable the sentiment that "...a cultural life will exist outside the Church whether it exists inside or not. To be simple now...would be to throw down our weapons, and to betray our uneducated brothers...".

How Does Your Age Change Your View on Politics

"I look at Obama as the thoughtful consensus builder, with all these nuances,
and John as the straightforward happy warrior."
Rick Warren, World Magazine, Sep 6/13, 2008

My mom shared this quote with me to tonight. What's your initial reaction? Fairly positive of both candidates or very heavily swayed one from the other? If my mom's and my differing reactions is any indication of a typical response, your response may depend on your age.

For my mother, this reaction was very clearly that Warren's comment was very heavily in favor of McCain and almost blatantly negative about Obama. I didn't see any of this in the comment, instead, seeing Warren point out something strong in both cases. I think, for my parent's generation, the idea of "consensus" is not an appealing idea - whereas for my generation, this is a very appealing prospect. In the same note, McCain as "warrior" scares me in ways, rather than comforts me.

Anyways, it was an interesting communication difference between generations in view of the same comment.