I’ve created a new section of this site, it’s a Bible blog, dedicated to things I’m learning in God’s word. This is basically to give me a focused area for theological and Christianity related things. I’ll soon be making a development section as well. The new URL for the Bible blog is bible.randypeterman.com. This will allow for several things, but you’ll have to go over and check it out (even though it’s young and only has a few posts at this date). I’m excited for some interaction. I’m sure that some readers will be slightly shocked, moderately disturbed or generally disgusted 🙂 However, everyone is welcome to comment, so please feel free to do so!
Monthly Archives: November 2004
James 1:21
Tonight in Greek we looked at a very interesting difference in the NASB and King James version of the Bible when it comes to James 1:21. Below are the two versions to compare.
NASB
Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility recieve the word implanted, which is able to save your souls.
King James Version
Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.
On the surface the two look like the mean similar things. However, looking closer the King James implies a duality of responsibility that are ongoing:
- Lay apart all filthiness
- Receive the word
However, the NASB, which apparently reflects the Greek (according to my Greek teacher), there is only one ongoing task: receive the word. The laying aside of filthiness will then be an ongoing result of taking in the word! This is a powerful contrast to the King James’ implications. I’m often reminded that the Holy Spirit gives us righteousness and that we are not able to be righteous on our own. If we’re imbibing God’s word then it will be less likely that we’re sinning. How wonderful it is that the Lord renews our minds (Romans 12:2) and prepares us in condition for what our position has already obtained, the heavenlies (Colossians 3:1-3)!
The Technically Amazing ‘Incredibles’
Tonight my parents watched the Abigator while Jess and I went to see the Incredibles. This movie wowed me on technical levels, but left me wanting in the humor department. As always Pixar does a top notch job of making computer rendered ‘cartoons’ the absolute best available (Shrek 2 has absolutely nothing on this). I honestly couldn’t tell you what the movie was about in some senses. I kept staring at the images and being Mr. Geek rather than slowly but surely taking in the story. There were some really cool parts of the movie that were funny, but I don’t remember the hysterical laughter of Aladdin (which was the funniest kids movie of all time in my opinion.. but I awate Sponge Bob’s movie). There weren’t touching moments like in Nemo, either.
Overall this was a darker movie, but without the comedic line-up that some of the pixar movies have had, I didn’t expect it to be so. Since Pixar is obviously branching into a new direction I am impressed and look forward to future movies, and hope to have this one in our ‘fold’ once the DVD is released.
Go see it, it’s worth $20.00 or less dollars for two people 🙂
Mozilla Firefox Start Page
If you haven’t seen the new Firefox browser, give it a whirl, it’s stable as it ever has been, but it also is loaded with happy Googleness: Mozilla Firefox Start Page. What it immediately made me think, which I don’t know as fact (rumor reports are not normally part of this site): Mozilla.org could be getting funds from Google search ads. And you bet I hope that’s the case. If Google is sharing its income with those who will host ads on their sites, then why not with mozilla.org? Sure, it’s only a guess, but I hope so, because it would be a nice way to support mozilla.org.
Interdepartmental Handicap
I just paid off my Honda Civic, which feels good. However, the process for doing so was uber-retarded. I went online to Chase.com and logged into my account by typing in my username 530… Hey, don’t try to trick me into giving away sensitive information! Anyway, I logged in, and clicked on the (finally present) ‘Pay off my car’ link. There I was presented with a really old address that I lived at over two years ago. I happened to live there when I bought the car 4 years ago. The instructions on the web site were to call an 800 number and change my address information to make the payoff.
So I called.
I did the rigamaroll of automated touch tone systems and then waited online with a 30 second loop telling me how important I was but that I’d have to wait my turn. I waited for not very long, which was nice. Then the gal on the other end of the line (which is a bad term since I was on my cell phone) asked for security reasons for me to confirm my address. I did. She told me that was wrong. I chuckled and thought, “Silly people have our old Ash lane address.” I was wrong. Turns out they have our old, old Ash lane address from when we first moved onto Ash lane (we moved downt he street later). The problem is that I haven’t used that address in years and so I had to look it up in my files. So I finally got her approval with the ancient address and then she wanted to change my address. Which I appreciate. Except that she then wanted to send me out new monthly payment coupons.
I explained again that I just wanted to pay off my car. She said I couldn’t do that over the phone, but I could do it online and via mail. The problem is that the mail system works poorly because if my envelope with check enclosed arrives one day late, they’ll charge me 43 cents for that day. Which means I could literally almost own my car. I could have a loan on my car for 43 cents and sit waiting, wondering what the heck was going on because the mail took a day too long. So I logged in (while on the phone) to my account again and got told by the server that their was an error!. There was an error all right! My car loan was through Chase-Manhatten. That was the error. Ford Credit, who handled my Stratus load, was outstanding. They were the best financial organization I’ve worked with as far as online information, telephone support and prompt handling of payments.
In the end, I let the chase.com site do its thing and finally it stopped having the error and I was able to initialize the payment. I’m hoping that the electricity doesn’t mess up my transaction and I can just breathe easier knowing I’m getting to a place where I can just have one huge payment per month for my house.
The other thing that irritated me is that I had called to change my address on the phone at Chase a long time ago (before I moved to CO) and then I’d changed it online with their ‘online address changing form.’ That apparently is not related to the ‘We have your account under a really old address’ database that they handle things with for the phone department. Why have the same set of information, related to the same account, related to the same customer, stored in many databases, not accessible to the different departments and not manageable by the customer on your online account editing page? Why do that? Because you can. Because you’ve got your customers locked into your system and they can’t do a thing about it. Nice, huh?
[Note: I can’t wait to hear Trint‘s story about what he had happen to him that makes my story seem like a graceful financial transaction.]
Matthew 23:1-4
Matthew 23:1-4 (NASB)
- Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples,
- Saying: “The scribes and the Pharisees have seated themselves in the chair of Moses;
- therefore all that they tell you, do and observe, but do not do according to their deeds; for they say things and do not do them.
- They tie up heavy burdens and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves are unvilling to move them with so much as a finger.”
What a picture this passage paints in my mind. Imagine a group of hungry listeners gathered around Jesus waiting for his direction. The authority with which Christ spoke makes it clear that when he made a statement, people were listening, even if they didn’t understand all that He said.
The short passage points out that the Jewish leaders of the day had usurped God’s authority (through the prophet Moses) and had made more laws! More rules for the Jewish believers to follow. As if 613 laws were not enough, the made more to help keep people from getting near the 613. This is somewhat like airport security in the United States after September 11th, 2001. Weapons like box cutters, guns and explosives were dangerous. Therefore toenail clippers were banned as well. If a 4 inch bumper on your car is good, a 4 foot bumper is better 🙂
What is so precious about this passage to me is that Christ still respects their authority! “What?!,” you migh ask. Christ instructs those listening to obey the authority God has allowed over them, but he doesn’t tell them to become drones. He instructs them to obey God’s law so that they don’t become bound up in the heavy bondage of the Pharisees’ law.
As a New Testament Saint, I rejoice that we’re not under the law at all! In fact the Holy Spirit is given to us to allow us to be free from the bondage of sin and the law. Instead, as we abide in the Holy Spirit we will be doing God’s will, walking in righteousness
and loving one another as God has directed.
Grace is good, especially in the light of this law that was once heaped on the Old Testament Saints.
All Things Theoblogical
This is a theological blog, or at least it will be. I hope to transfer most of the theological content I’ve written at my general blog over here to help create focused areas of attention and content.
Election Result Maps
As Jess didn’t say
there are plenty of maps out there. Are we done with them yet?The Election result maps here are kinda funky, it’s like they crossed a map with Stretch Armstrong. In the end I’d like to see the country move on and get back to one of the following things:
- Get back to the basics. Can we please all turn Amish so that the reality TV shows can stop?
- Pull our money out of the stock market and buy more cars and homes. It is clear that the government is going to do it all wrong anyway, so if they can be irresponsible and just ‘spend, spend, spend’ without saving, why can’t we?
- All buy camcorders and walk around recording ourselves and create our own public access reality TV shows. What could be more real than recordings of our lives condensed into 30 minute segments. Just think about the conversations you could get out of when you get home.
Person1: “What did you do today?”
Person2: “Let me edit it for you… Geez, getting a little impatient aren’t we, Person1?!” - Take up a musical instrument. If everyone in America played the nose flute the world would be a safer place. Imagine a terrorist landing on US soil and being greeted by Hare Krishna skinhead types with nose flutes. They’d never be able to blow things up or email ricin because they’d be laughing so hard.
- Everyone get a blog. Wait. Everyone has a blog. Well not everyone, but a lot of people have them. What’s worse is that they don’t put content on them. Or if they do put content on them it’s stuff like:
<teen blog>
Today I brushed my teeth before breakfast just to irritate my mom. She is so lame. U have 2 C her to Blieve it. Talk 2 U l8r.
</teen blog>
<My blog>
<– Some story about Abby having a potty accident. A sarcastic blog entry. Or something else I’ve managed to write about, including ‘Women of Walmart’ and Women of Home Depot’, oh, and don’t forget ‘Banana Phone.’ –>
</My blog>On second thought, lets all stop blogging and we’ll go back to old-fashioned email lists, that’s way easier.
So, as you can see, Election Result Maps politics are over for America for at least two or three minutes. Let’s stop, enjoy it, and then get back to coloring in the lines, particularly if there are lines outlining 48 contiguous states. Can we please just pick some other colors besides Red, Whine and Blue?
Arafat Dead at 75
Arafat has died. I would say that this is an end of an era, but in truth this is probably just a gnarly transition from one extremist to another. It is like switching from an all bean diet to a beer, cabbage and egg diet. Basically, this stinks. Fortunately I’m sure we’ve got a crack intelligence team that has figured out most everything thing there is to know about the next leader (who should probably figure out where Osama Bin Laden is).
Jerry Springer Strikes Again
This evening our neighbors upstairs were at it again. And when I say ‘At it again’ I mean one male was screaming at absolutely the top of his lungs, “You stupid, [expletive deleted] piece of,” I interupt to point out that we were watching Master & Commander and the next word out of the neighbor’s mouth sounded similar to a synonym for ‘boat.’ It is at this point that I’d also like to clarify that stomping on the floor not more than 5 minutes earlier would have been appreciated because we were at the climactic battle scene towards the end of the movie. The part where the ship turns itself into a bug and surprises the snot out of a bunch of French folk. Cannon firing with surround sound turned on would have only been enhanced by the deep thunderous stomping of my neighbors upstairs. However, as is so common with them, their timing was off and the loud screaming of expletives was an inconvenience to us.
I’m hoping that they’ll either stop completely or do it again one third (and due to apartment policy, last) time so that we can move on with our lives. They’ve been a real hoot to have above us and I’ve learned a lot of things about being an upstairs neighbor from them. I’ve heard musical scales, river-dance like stomping in the bathroom and seen my daughter run out of my living room afraid. Oh, well. Next year we may try to buy a house anyway, which would mean that our neighbors would have to be really loud to get us this disturbed.