Why we love zombies…

My wife and I saw a preview for that new zombie movie coming out and she asked a very valid questions, “What’s the deal with all these zombie movies coming out?”. It’s a good questions. Why does the American public love their zombie movies? We have had our fair share of pirate movies recently thanks to Disney but nothing compared to the number of zombie movies. America even enjoys High School musical, but statistically not as much as they do their zombie movies. This all seemed very strange to me until I began to do a little research. Believe it or not there are zombie experts that have explanations for America’s zombie craze.

It became clear that America was not so much into gothic clothing and blood but more into the limitations that zombies overcome. Even though zombies are very limited they seem to be so versatile. Max Brooks, author of Zombie Survival Guide says “You can’t shoot the financial meltdown in the head — you can do that with a zombie. All the other problems are too big. As much as Al Gore tries, you can’t picture global warming. You can’t picture the meltdown of our financial institutions. But you can picture a slouching zombie coming down the street.” It all seems funny to me, but it makes sense. Not sure if I’ll see Zombieland, but I’m sure millions will.

Responding to tragedy

As I read articles about tragedies, the most recent being the quake in Indonesia that killed 500, I always wonder how we should respond. There are some things I know for certain and one is that we have a good, good God who desires that none should perish. I also know that we live in a fallen world where death is a reality that God allows on a daily basis. When Jesus was confronted with tragedy in Luke 13 his response was that everyone should repent or we will likewise perish. Not the typical expected response, but one that we must echo because it came from the mouth of Jesus. These current tragedies ought to be instigators of worldwide repentance. As a christian I must lovingly preach repentance in light of tragedies.

Kingdom come…in marriage

I have been gone for the past two weeks because….I GOT MARRIED. I apologize to each one of my zero followers for my absence. I figured marriage was a good reason to take a break from blogging. But now I have more insight and stories than ever to share(which really is not saying much).

I have officially entered into a whole other world. A world of cosmetics and curling irons, a world in which I am not alone, but am now doing life alongside a wonderful woman. It’s time for me to put on my Indiana Jones fedora hat and go searching for how to love my wife as Christ loves His church. I am embarking on a beautiful adventure, unmatched by anything else in life. I get to be a part of an inexplicable miracle, two people becoming one flesh.

I have been challenged by wise men to continue seeking to found our relationship in the promises of the Lord, like a wise man who built his house on the rock. So many people these days are founding their relationship on a romantic love, much like the type of love that was so popular during the Renaissance and romantic periods of history where poets and authors taught that culmination of life was found in love that constantly aroused the emotions. God’s design for marriage is far from this. He has designed marriage primarily to make us Holy, not to give us happiness(how the world describes it).

I have been married for a little over a week but God is teaching me things like never before, revealing things that I was incapable of seeing. It is incredible that we have a loving Father who is constantly making us like Christ because He knows that brings Him the most glory and us the most joy.

Retiring early

Is it just me or is the trend in America to retire as early as possible? To stop working at as young an age as a business will allow? Financial advisers and articles promote the idea of early retirement everywhere we look. We have been convinced that we need things that we don’t and we should by things are unnecessary. Police officers are hanging up their 5.11 boots and white-collar workers are handing in their staplers for a promised better life in Florida or some other tropical location. Military personnel are notorious for retiring as soon as possible and leaving it all behind. I’m not saying that retiring is always this terrible thing. The man who works making dowel pins for 30 years is fine to stop working but that doesn’t mean he stops working. God has called to work all the days of our lives, but that doesn’t always mean a  job involving manual labor. We must be constantly working to usher in God’s kingdom all the days of our lives.

New ruins

New ruins have been found of an ancient synagogue dating back to 100 BCE. It’s awesome to hear about ancient remnants that validate the worshiping of the One True God.

Madoff fools everyone

It blows my mind how Bernard Madoff was able to fool so many people for so long. Just in case you have been living in a cave, Madoff ran a ponzi scheme, where he payed investors dividends that either came from their own money or money payed by subsequent investors. There is never any real profits. Madoff’s scheme is the largest recorded in history, thought to include fabricated gains of close to $65 billion. For Bernie, it seems like life was one big party, and there apparently was not a concern in the world for anyone else. Fortunately his days of beach houses, fancy cars, and Rocky Patel cigars are over because he was sentenced to 150 years in prison. I started to wonder if Bernard actually saw these people as people or if he merely saw a neon open sign over the head of every single one of them.

What is even more interesting is hearing Madoff talk about how easy it was to fool the SEC. He said he didn’t have to be that brilliant because you don’t have to be with these guys. It’s crazy to imagine getting away with something like this for over 25 years. Unfortunately lives were destroyed in the process, and that can never be regained. What so many people lost is gone forever.

Obama to address school children today

The anticipation has been building for weeks as Obama plans to address American school children. Obama must realize that addressing children is a lot different than speaking to doctors in Canada scrubs about health care. Children are a unique demographic. They don’t care nearly as much about education as they do about wearing the newest high school musical jewelry. Obama will have to be very intentional about capturing the attention of the rambunctious youth of America.

It was made clear that Obama will spend a significant amount of time walking through his journey of growing up with a single mother. He will hopefully become someone a lot of kids can relate to. I know from working in the inner-city with kids that a lot of them are growing up without a father and can easily relate to that plight, whether they will or not is another question. Obama hopes to encourage kids to focus on education, to not settle for dropping out and working in the local wood factory, but to reach their full potential. It will be interesting to see how Obama uses unique tactics of communication to hopefully reach the youth.

A place of peace

As my fiancee and I are trying to establish a home our main goal is a place of peace. My goal as a husband is to help create an environment that allows discipleship to happen organically. Jesus tells his disciples to find places of peace. I don’t want my home to be a place that is passed up by the disciples. I want everything to be great even if it means searching for unique shower curtains to find the right one. The last thing I want is for people to walk in and it to feel like a total rodeo in my apartment, so I’m willing to spend a little money and energy to establish a place that is conducive to peace.

I’m constantly trying to think of ways to create a more peaceful atmosphere. Anything from soothing music to keeping a homemade candy bouquet on the living room table. There are plenty of creative way to introduce peace, and I’m excited to see what works and what doesn’t.

New Job

Since I’m about to be married, I sat down with a friend of mine who works for Fidelity and is a big advocate of the Dave Ramsey’s financial peace university and we decided to hash out a budget for my soon to be wife and I. It was important to do this because we have a significant amount of debt and we needed to know how much money we need to be making in order to pay off the debt in the amount of years that we want. Now that I have those figures, we both know what type of jobs we need to be looking for. I thought about going back to school and becoming a nurse, or maybe working in a factory making wooden toy parts. Either way, I know that I need a job that makes a significant amount of money in order to be able to honor God and begin diligently paying off our debt.

What should the U.S do in Afghanistan?

Afghanistan has been commonplace in the news in the past few weeks. Everyone has an opinion of the current Afghan strategy. From what I understand, America has close to 100,000 troops in Afghanistan and all I hear is problems with what is happening. I don’t have a lot of insight but I do believe that one of the problems facing the troops is that all of the taliban have nothing else to do. The country needs to beef up industry in order to provide more jobs. That’s just mt two cents, and it’s probably not worth that much.