"But what comes from the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this is what defiles a person." -Matt. 15:18

One more thought from the Together 2010 conference, and I hope there are more posts to come about it.

"But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ -by grace you have been saved- and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus," -Eph. 2:4-6

"Whatever we value, we will grow to be like." This was one of the first statements spoken by Dr. Bruce Ware at the conference, but though it stuck with me, it didn't hold the same weight at the beginning of Together 2010 as it does a whole day after the conference's termination.

Joyfully anticipating the conference, I had missed the areas of indwelling sin that were alive and active in my heart.

The following day, after hearing that Dr. Ware speak that statement, during the corporate worship time a short video was played, which was done to a powerful song written by some of our Church family in the Pasadena. I had seen the video several times, and as it began was unmoved by the depictions of the areas of sin I had chosen to follow - until there was a picture of the prodigal child embracing her sin in the form of a demonic being. "Have I been doing this?" I thought. And after reviewing my notes from the first sermon I looked on, "Whatever we value, we will grow to be like."

In the first session, Dr. Ware went over a powerful passage in Isaiah 6, where in Isaiah is before and beholding the power and glory of God. Bruce Ware talked about how we must understand and know God as transcendent- That he is exclusively God. As Mr. Ware intricately and effectively showed the awe of this seen in Isaiah, I felt as though I was in Isaiah's shoes. I was standing before his throne, beholding His glory. And I believe similarly as Isaiah did not recognize his own sin until he was beholding the glory of God, so too did God work in me. As God spoke through Mr. Ware, He spoke into my heart, and I could see that I was embracing my sin, myself, and making myself God.

And like Isaiah, I thought "Woe is me, for I am lost."

"The only thing God owes us," said Dr. Ware, "is eternal condemnation."

"But," he continued, "we must know God as imminent." ...And "the story doesn't end there." God initiated Isaiah's forgiveness. And Mr. Ware reminded us of the words from Ephesians 2, "But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ."

Through this conference, Together 2010, I believe God has challenged me to grow in my understanding and knowledge of Him, and my value of him. Because, "whatever we value, we will grow to be like." -I thank God that he is at work in me, and that through His Spirit I could behold a glimpse of Him this weekend.

T10

Just got back from a conference held by the western churches of Sovereign Grace Ministries, which is called Together 2010. It was a great time of gathering as just a fraction of the body to worship God together, and sit under his word, which was graciously given by Dr. Bruce Ware. And I thank God for his Spirit which was at work in Dr. Ware as he was preparing, as he gave the message, and His work in me through what he spoke through Mr. Ware. I also thank him for continually for his Spirit in each of my family members and friends, and his work in them. It was encouraging also to fellowship with friends spread from various places of California and Arizona.

Gathering with his people is always up building, and being together specifically to worship corporately really is a heavenly like experience. I cannot wait till this preview is over and the ultimate gathering of the undeserving before the Holy God is forever. So we pray, your kingdom come!

I have so much more to say about this conference that I probably won't get around to all of it, but I hope to have another post soon covering a fraction of what God did in me.

Goodbabymanship

Soccer is the only professional sport I know of where the players are encouraged to be wimps. Not that Soccer players are wimpy, but when it is an advantage for them to pretend they're hurt, they'll take it.

Makes sense I guess, point fingers and get a penalty kick right in front of the goal... Just doesn't seem very sportsman like. So, I've decided to call this whining, Goodbabymanship. The definition being "a form of bad sportsmanship in which one pretends to be a baby to the referee in order to gain a better standing in a game." In other terms, you are Good at being a baby man.

But no matter what I have said, I've enjoyed watching the World Cup this year, and I suppose it does add another element to the game. It also helps round out the players. Their coaches must have had them take up acting lessons or something, and why not let them use their new found skills in the game, right?

Gotta' be hard for the refs. though. How can you tell when the babies are faking or not? You'd think the refs. would get it when they see the player get up, kick the penalty kick, and play the rest of the game.

Not to practice goodbabymanship myself, I'm not really feeling the pressure the referees are. And that's another thing about Soccer, why do they have all those high speed cameras pointing at so many angles when the refs just blow them all away and decide the call they thought they saw. That's ridiculous! One of two things needs to happen. One, the refs. actually look and see if they judged play correctly (and catch these babymen). Or Two, they need to have less cameras so the fans just blissfully believe the refs calls. If they did one (or both) of these I think there would be a whole lot less riots...in my house.

I don't want to throw any stones; Just pass the babe-chow, baby-man, I'm gonna point my chubby, infant finger at someone else for my problems!

Well, I was thinking I was going to have to be more of a baby in this post considering I was voting for Spain to win at the beginning of the World Cup this year, because I thought they were really good. Well, they weren't. At least at the beginning. Finally they are coming back! But the other teams they would be going up against are teams like Brazil and Argentina. My family was doing sort of a Fantasy Soccer rally this year, so I'll be a good sportsman until then.

I was really disappointed when the US finally lost to Ghana, but my brother had some humorous words about it. "Think about it this way," he said, "If Ghana wins it will make 6 million people are happy, if the US wins, only about three people will be happy." No one watches Soccer here.

Last Sunday my church had a park day, and in honor of the FIFA we played Soccer. (The spectators were as numerous as the people who watch Soccer in the United States.) Man, I wish I was in better shape, or had taken those acting lessons...I was sore. But I'm not sure how acting lessons would have cured the pain.

Oh well, I have said my 5 bits on Soccer. Let's hope I don't have to do it again. Or else I might practice Goodbabymanship.

Sorry about all the negative space in the drawing. And yes, that probably is the worst Soccer ball I have ever drawn.

Toy Story 3

Hey Ya'll! Earlier today I watched my long awaited Toy Story 3 for Father's Day. I have been counting down the days until it came out, and two days ago Toy Story 3 came to theaters and I...couldn't watch it. But, I saw it today! And in 3-D!

As I said in my last post I had family from Texas here this past week (that's why I started my post with "Ya'll"), and we had a great time. We got to go to Disneyland all day long on Monday, and my little cousins were such troopers and stuck it out the whole time. I was amazed by their stamina, and good senses of humor. One of my youngest cousins, Jacob, got the irony of the signs on all the trash bins which says, "Waste Please." A great time was had by all, or me anyway.

A couple of days before that, my brother and I watched the World of Color show in California Adventure. It was an amazing show! Unfortunately we didn't get these vague ticket'er things so we could see it from the front. But even from the back it was definitely the best show I have seen at Disneyland in the two years that I have had a pass there. Sadly, two days after that all day'er at Disney with the family, my brother and my's passes expired. So, I guess I will have to wait until I get another pass to see exactly what the show is like.

But I forgot what I was talking about...Watch Toy Story 3! It and the short before it were great!

Another guy in a math book

Yeah, I don't have anything new yet. I did this in my math book on one of the last days of school. Drawing in my math book is not an uncommon practice, as you know if you have been on my blog for awhile. If you have been on my blog for even longer then you know that I have drawn in my grammar books...my oldest posts (and newest ones) have epically terrible spelling and punctuation.

Well, my fam is here from Texas; Gotta' run ya'll!

And this guy kinda' looks like the Mayor from Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, which if you haven't seen it...lol...that's all I got.

So close, and yet so far.

I'm sure if your budget is anything like mine that you have purchased the "Off Brand" of some product at the store. If your budget isn't like mine, then an "Off Brand" is the product that tries to be the "Name Brand" product, usually made by the store you are shopping at. Target, Wal-Mart, and your local Asian market have perfect examples of what I am talking about.

Recently I got some Off Brand floss from Target. It looked like all the other flosses, (must not be too tough to match since all floss is is pieces of string). The package looked like all the other ones, with "Mint Flavor" written on it. The only difference was that it was cheaper. Score right? Wrong. Some wise guy at the Off Brand factory dipped the floss in latex balloon flavor instead mint. ...And of course you don't know that until it is your mouth. Couldn't he at least have made it taste like the string attached to the balloon?

Having the budget I have, I didn't want to get a new one until this one ran out. Thankfully once that one ran out, my mom had some extras... Unfortunately her's was packaged by the same wise guy.

Not my first, but probably my worst experience with Off Brands was back when I wouldn't eat anything else but cereal (which was pretty much up until last week), during my rebellious 6-11 year old days. Since cereal is so expensive, especially the ones with the great cartoons and sugar on them, aka the only ones I would eat, my mom decided to pull a fast one. I don't really remember why I didn't go with her to the store, maybe this whole thing wouldn't have happened if I would have, but the next day I was pulling out the cereal for breakfast and my mom said we had Lucky Charms. Very enticing gimmick. So I reached up for the cereal and grabbed the most colorful one. As a kid of 6-11 years old, I could tell right away that this wasn't Lucky Charms, there was no Irish guy. Everything else was pretty close, the bits and marshmallows looked about the same on the box, but it was under water themed with a scuba guy. And scuba guy was crazy looking. Besides, the box said something along the lines of "Buried Treasure."

"This isn't Lucky Charms," I said to my mom.

"Well, it's pretty close."

No it wasn't. After pouring a huge bowl of it, the stuff didn't look or smell like the Irishman's. Let me tell you, it was the worst cereal my 6-11 year old taste buds had ever tasted. That was one treasure that should have stayed buried! And the dirt that covered probably would have tasted better. It was disgusting.

My mom made me eat the whole thing because of how much I would have "wasted" for pouring so much in. What a trick! I should've known she was planning for it to be terrible.

Now I know it may sound like I am exaggerating how bad it was, but a couple years later my mom tried the same ploy on my youngest brother, he couldn't eat anymore after awhile. I asked mom, and decided I would finish it for him. I remembered just how bad it was after about two or three bites. Yeah, I couldn't finish it either, and chucked it. I think that second time was when I was 13.

Product labels always have hilarious mistakes or just terrible writing on them, the Asian market is good example of both. One time our family received food from a Chinese friend and the name of the product translated was something like, "Black Ear Tree Fungus." Mmm, delicious. A couple weeks later I was going threw the cupboard looking for something to eat, "Hmm, no one has eaten of these yet?" Gee, I should've asked why we didn't thank them and then chuck it the second the left.

As people are trying to become healthy, haha ok that's funny, they check the labels before they buy the food to see exactly what is in the food their buying. Once again Off Brand companies were ahead of the game and decided to skip a step; instead of having a clever name like "Lucky Charms" for example, the name would be "Sweet Sugar High Fructose Corn-syrup Artificial Flavor (for additional ingredients see side of the box) Crunch Cereal." Another example of this might be a chocolate bar with the name of "Coco butter-Butter-Walnut-Peanut butter-Milk-Milk Chocolate Syrup-Added Fructose-...Did I mention butter?" and the name goes on. Pretty soon we're going to have to have bigger chocolate bars just so that the name can fit on the plastic wrapping. But hey I don't mind bigger chocolate bars.

Speaking of which, then there are just weird things written on the packaging like "Fun Size" candy bars. That's ironic...the bar is smaller! Keep trying to be healthy, haha healthy isn't fun. Haha. I saw a bottle of Windex that said, "Economy Size." Wait, does that mean the bottle is bigger or smaller than before?

But to go back to what I was saying a little earlier, my family once got some chocolate chips cookies from Stater Bros. On the top it said Made with Real Chocolate Chips. Gee, I hope so. Can you have chocolate chip cookies without real chocolate chips? It's pretty sad that they had to advertise their cookies by informing people that they had real chocolate chips. I can't imagine what the products without real chocolate chips' names must have looked like if they were like the other Off Brands. How did they cover up not having real chocolate chips in chocolate chip cookies?

Well, aren't you glad that I posted a drawing? I even had a book long post to go with it!!! I am on fire!! Hold on let me get the fire extinguisher, wait I can't tell if that thing on the wall is it...the name is too long.

Real Life

Continued It's Life video'ers. Don't think that this is actually how I think about life, yard work, or my dog's poop, I'm just saying stuff to be funny (or trying to be).

If I was actually being serious then my brother and I wouldn't have given the name of these videos "It's Life" with a negative meaning, because Life is the greatest gift from God. I, deserving to die eternally in Hell, never to know love, or hope, or peace, or family, or friends should have nothing to complain about. Now God has made me alive in him, through him, and counted as him! And the worst part of Hell is eternal separation from God. I shouldn't have known him, and let alone be justified by his blameless life and perfect obedience to the Father to be able to come before his thrown and cry, "ABBA! Father!" I the one who should have died forever now have life forever. "The rebel now your child." -The Prodigal.

Well, another thing to praise God for is summer vacation! I have so much planned out, as I have said in the videos.

One of which is yard work which I haven't done for awhile, and though it doesn't sound like it in the video, it is good to be back. But to be honest there were a ton of spiders out there, I was fine until I saw a really huge creepy one... well, yard work is off my list for summer now.

Anyway, here is the drawing I did in between the video in the kitchen and the one sitting down. I love quick sketches because just like when someone is coming over to your house un-invited, you don't have to make it look nice! At least that's the excuse. Happy summer everyone!