"There's gotta be something more. Gotta be more than this." I heard this song recently and it got me thinking. It's this person singing about thier job. By the end of the song they've quit thier job and are at home drinking wine! So thier view of "something more" is a life of laziness and ease. But as Christians we know what that "something more" is. We have something to live for far more than just a good job. But those unsaved in the world know deep inside that something in thier life is missing. They are looking for "something more" and we have the answer. So as we are in the world let us strive to be a light in the darknes and show the way to the lost.

My New Glasses

I know I just posted last night but since I recently got new glasses, and ya'll keep asking for more pictures, I decided since I finally got some that I'd post them.

These were taken while I was watching the practice this past Sunday for a drama.

It's for the NCHEA Conference that I'll be helping with in the beginning of April.

Julia Rehm took both of those pictures.

Grace Nelson got this one while I was out in the hall.

I have two parts in the drama, one as a ship captian and the other as a Redcoat.

Caption Challenge

In my last post I mentioned some more pictures from our zoo trip and also said they should have some pretty funny captions.  Well I tried to think of some but didn't come up with much so...

I'm letting you come up with the captions.

Below are the three pictures and it's your job to think up creative captions for each of them.
And the winner gets... well havn't thought about that yet.

Our trip to the Zoo

Yesterday my family visited the Omaha Henry Dorely Zoo.

The passes expire April 1st and it was a nice day so...

Our first stop was the butterfly exibit (a family favorite).

Josh was kind enough to let me use his camera so I became "photographer" for the visit.

The exibit houses some other animals, some quite interesting.

Here's the two youngest (Joy and Matthew) on the octapus.

One thing that was new for me was being the oldest child on the trip.

(Angie was visiting a friend and Caleb was roofing)

Our next stop was the aquarium.

This was Matthews favorite fish (he loves orange)

I was surprised to find they have a large penguin exibit.

Some of the penguins had some funny antics

The pond that this creature found itself in had a sign by it that

said they think this was the type of condition in which life first began. (A flooded forest.)

I didn't realize how hard it was to photograph sharks... until I tried it myself.

This was the best picture I got and as you can see it was pretty bad.

A black and white fish is alot easier to photograph. :)

and siloetes are pretty easy too. :)

If anyone can tell me who this aquarium watcher was I'd really appreciate it. :)

I got some other pictures that should have some great captions.

They'll come later as soon as I can think of some.

Skating

This past Friday we went to Skate Daze in Omaha for a homeschool skating party.  The Stangl family puts one on in our area every year.  It was alot of fun despite the fact that I had never been to a skating rink before.  But I was able to learn quick (from some great teachers). 

I think this picture is my personal favorite.  I'm not real sure how my brother managed to capture the three of us in about the same position.  That's David Rehm, Lydia Stangl, and Me.

There's me again skating.  I actually started out on skates but then switched to blades hoping they would work better for me.

There were quite a few "teachers" at the rink.  Those that didn't mind going slower to help the newer skaters.  Here's two of them here. That's Ellie Stangl in the blue shirt, and Sam Lyons in the black.  If it wasn't for him I doubt I would havbe stayed with the blades.  He gave me some great pointers.

Every once in awhile it got kinda crowded in certain spots. 

More pictures will come later.

I actually only got one picture of someone falling.

That's one picture that won't be coming later for obvious reasons.

Snowboarding and the Righteous Man

Well it seems this is becoming a series drawing analogies from my recent snowboarding trip. I have at least one more topic in mind after this one. So if any of you have something against snowboarding, then I’m sorry but you’ll just have to bear with me a little longer.




Despite the lack of evidence from the pictures taken, I did fall quite a few times during the day. The majority of those falls occurred in the first part of the day when I was first practicing the basics of being able to keep my balance. We got our gear on and went out to the bunny slope first thing. Micah explained the basics and then we each tried it. I started down and of course I fell. Now that area wasn’t exactly private and it’s kind of hard to fall and maintain your dignity. Usually you roll a couple times and depending on how you fall, you can end up in some pretty interesting, and embarrassing, positions. Also you get covered with snow which soon melts and becomes very uncomfortable. And when you barely get started down the bunny slope and then fall it can be kind of discouraging and seem hopeless that you will ever learn. All these things could have caused me to give up then and there, turn around, and give up trying. But I got back up, went to the top of the hill, got some pointers from Micah, tried it again, and once again fell. I fell multiple times just going down the bunny slope and never actually did it correctly. And most of the time it was because I made the exact same mistake of leaning too far back. After a half dozen tries or so Micah said it was time to move on to the bigger hill. The main factors that added was speed, which made falls harder, and obstacles, which made it harder to stay up until steering was mastered. But even when steering was mastered you sometimes didn’t have a choice. I soon mastered the art of quickly recovering from a fall. The less time I spent on the ground the better. So when I continued to fall, and it may have seemed hopeless, what was it that caused me to continue to get back up and try again? Well I think the main thing was what I had invested in it. I already paid and they don’t give a chicken rebate, so there was the aspect of wanting to get my money’s worth. There was also the aspect of the people around me. Sure they all were seeing me fall over and over. But which would have been worse, having them see me fall over and over, or them seeing me fall and then give up? Also I saw them falling as well. It wasn’t like I was the only one down on the ground out there on that slope. But I think there was one primary reason. I wasn’t about to go home to my Dad and tell him, “Yeah I went there and spent the money to try snowboarding, but I fell down so I decided to give up”.



Now let’s look at an example of a new believer. He’s has recently confessed Christ and now seeks to live a life pleasing to Him. He wishes to leave the life he once knew and live for Christ. But not long after his conversion, he falls into sin! The discouragement is intense. He thought that after he became a believer, his life would be different. But here he fell; possibly back into the same sin he was in before he was saved. Those around him heard his profession, and now they all watch him fall. It is very embarrassing to him to be in this position. And he feels hurt that it seems he has been forsaken. Everything seems to tell him to give up. But he summons courage, gets back up, goes and asks his teacher for advice, starts off again, and before long he again falls! And he is still on the bunny slopes of Christianity. These things that are causing him to fall are simple things. But over and over they cause him to fall. And most of the time it’s the same problem as before. But he keeps trying and before long he is moving forward in his Christian walk. He is gaining ground and despite the fact that the temptations and trials are greater, his falls are still becoming less and less frequent. And he has now learned how to quickly recover from his falls. The less time he spends on the ground of defeat, the better. The Bible says “The righteous man falls seven times, and rises again”. The point here has nothing to do with the number of times he falls. Instead the point here is that he will always rise again. So why do they always rise? Well it could be because of that which they have invested in it. I could also be the fear of what those watching may think if they see them easily give up. They may be encouraged when they learn that other Christians fall as well so it is not just a problem they have. But what is the greatest motivation to them? They will not go home to their heavenly Father and say that they gave up after once failing. They wish to please their heavenly Father so they continue on despite the trials they encounter. This is a test as to whether one is a true believer or not. Because the verse goes on to say that the wicked fall into evil. When they fall they stay there and wallow in their evil. Their false profession goes by the wayside as they indulge in the evil. So when you fall, and the Bible says you will, remember that a righteous man falls, but he always gets back up.

Snowboarding and Sin

I think my snowboarding this past Saturday is gonna be a lot more profitable than I originally thought. I keep thinking of similarities between snowboarding and life itself. Well before I get into this post let me first clarify the title. I’m in no way saying that snowboarding is sin. Of course, like anything else, it can become sin if we let it come between us and God. But that is not the focus of this post. Instead, like the last post, I’ll be bringing out similarities between snowboarding and a certain topic. In this case that topic is sin.




While snowboarding this past Saturday I must say that I really enjoyed myself. Sure there were disadvantages like the cost, but I still had fun. I had plenty of falls, but really not a lot of pain associated with them. It’s kinda hard to get seriously injured falling onto snow. I know it is possible but it’s not very probable. Especially at the kind of speed I was going. Anyway on the trip home I felt okay. Sure there was a little pain (mainly from the backward falls) but overall I felt pretty good. Then came Sunday which meant traveling an hour to church, sitting in church for the services, and then an hour in the car back home. I had started to feel some aches but nothing unusual considering what I was doing Saturday. Then came Monday, and boy did I start feeling it. It seemed like every muscle in my body had been stressed by the snowboarding. From my neck all the way down to my legs, everything was sore. The effects came long after the fun was over. And once I had finished the fun, there wasn’t really a way I could prevent the effects.



The same is true in regard to sin in our lives. We may recognize some of the disadvantages to the sin beforehand, but it looks like it will be so much fun. So we go ahead and do it. And guess what? Sin is fun! That is a Biblical fact. It speaks of the pleasures that sin affords. But it also speaks of them as passing pleasures. Just like the snowboarding, the pleasures sin offers are very short term. They offer temporary enjoyment without a warning as to the effects that they bring. And many times the effects that we experience from sin are not merely temporal, many are eternal. Many times we are left with a scar on our souls that will be with us the rest of our lives. Sometimes, unfortunately, we unknowingly hurt others by our sins. And sometimes we may even cause another brother to stumble by the example he sees in us. After we commit the sin we have no control over the consequences. There is a saying “You can chose your actions, but you cannot chose the consequences.” Once that sin is commited, the results are out of your control. Yes you can repent, but even though David repented of his sin with Bathsheba, there were still consequences. The child had to die. Do you think it ever crossed David’s mind, as he sent for Bathsheba, that because of this sin he was about to commit, an innocent child of his would die? No the only thought on his mind was the passing pleasure it would afford. So it is with us. We view this thing that looks so appealing as merely something which may cause us a few problems later on. Many times we have no idea how drastically it will affect our life and the lives of so many others. May we each, when temptation comes, remember this truth “The actions we chose today, will affect the rest of our lives.”

Snowboarding and the Christian Life

As you know from my last post, I went snowboarding this past Saturday. It was my first time so I had to be taught everything. I had to be shown how to steer, balance, adjust my speed, and of course how to stop. By the end of the day I had most of the basics pretty much down and was ready to move on to the more advanced slopes and challenges. But I was out of time. Looking back now I wish I had been less cautious about trying out the harder slopes since that’s probably the only chance I’ll have there this season. Now this is a good example of what we see in our lives as Christians. When we first start out, we have to be taught everything. We must be taught how to make our way through life and how to steer, if you will, through the many trials and obstacles we face. We must be taught to keep a proper balance in our life between our ministry to those in the world, but also our ministry to those in our own home. We must balance between the things of God and the things of this world. Also we must be taught to adjust the speed of our lives. Not always being so busy that we wear ourselves out (burning the candle at both ends) but at the same time not merely meandering through life at an easy pace. And of course we must be taught when and where we must stop in our Christian walk to make sure we are still in God’s plan for our lives. So just like me snowboarding, as Christians we have to learn the basics. But then, again like me, as Christians we many times learn the basics and then just keep practicing those basics for the rest of our lives. We never move beyond those first easy slopes because we’re too timid and cautious to try those more advanced slopes. Instead of gaining new heights every day, we just wander around on the lowest couple of plateaus planning on climbing those heights later on in life. We go through the motions and never try anything difficult. Like me we may try the more difficult slopes a few times and decide to stick with the simple ones. Then we near the end of our lives and realize that those more advanced trials and obstacles had to be conquered earlier in life. When we are out of time it is too late. We cannot go back and give it a second try because the season has passed. Just like I did not know that the weather would warn this next week, even so we as Christians do not know the day or the hour that our Savior will call us home. So let live our lives today to the fullest, taking new ground, overcoming those obstacles that slow us down, and always keep pressing on the upward way. Because tomorrow may be too late.