"Meh" Is Now A Word

Meh becomes a word thanks to The Simpsons.

Acer Palmatum Atropurpureum

Here's a current look at my red leaf japanese maple bonsai. I repotted it, did some pruning after it grew a lot late this summer, and did a little wiring to change its shape. I recently took the wires off to keep it from scarring. The driftwood is from Gold Beach. You can see the changes since the first day it was repotted here, which was about six months ago.

Cascade College to Close Its Doors

It was announced yesterday that Cascade College will close its doors after the Spring 2009 semester. I attended from 1996-2000 and received a Bachelor's degree. I met people who will be friends for the rest of my life. I found a new desire and passion to lead worship and to be involved in the church. Because of Cascade College, I joined with a group of people starting a church plant in Salem, Oregon. It is the place where I met my wife. I have many memories from that place even after I left. I directed the singing group, Witness, and developed relationships with people that I never even went to school with, bound simply because of the love we had for this school.

Pray for Cascade College and the future of Christian education in the Northwest, pray for the churches that will be impacted by this loss, and pray for the faculty, staff, students, alumni, and people that will be affected by this unfortunate event.

Cascade College to Close Its Doors

Pray for God to work through all of this in the lives of people in the Northwest.

New Home

Our offer to buy a house was accepted. We are going through the process of buying a house built this year (2008) on the South end of Keizer, Oregon. It's a 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom house with a decent backyard. No more rent, just a bigger payment that will eventually, in 30ish years, turn into no payment (except those pesky taxes). We hope to have our friends and family visit us soon, unless something freak happens and we can't buy it. Also, if no one gets any Christmas presents from us this year, now you know why.

Go to my wife's blog to see pictures: Kori's blog.

Thanks to Trevor Elliott for all his help.

Spiritual Crisis

We are currently in a crisis in our country and in the rest of the world. Our citizens are losing or have lost trust in our politicians and our government. We are facing a rapid decline in the integrity of our economy. Falling housing values are eminent. Even in our interconnected world, people are lonelier than ever. None of these, however, are the crisis I am talking about. We are in a spiritual crisis.

People are putting their trust in faith in politicians to fix our struggling economy and to make decisions affecting our standing in the world and the country's citizens. I see people putting their hope in a certain candidate to uphold a morality for our country and to lead us into better times. People are looking for hope in a crumbling world around them for love, friendship, and acceptance through buying a certain image and level of comfort that is unprecedented in the history of our country. People are criticizing government for all it does yet look to it to solve their problems. People are looking for direction where there is none.

Christians should know better than to put our trust in people, or money, or a false hope or anything besides God. Our trust belongs to God alone, yet He allows us to give it freely to whom we choose. Hope can only come from God, for without God there is no future for anyone. God loves His people so much that He gave up everything to prove it to them. These current crises are simply evidence to us that we Christians have a lot of work to do. We have got to stop worshiping money, power, comfort, people, government, and everything else this world has to offer. God must be first and only in everything.

Here is my encouragement to you: with God you have nothing to worry about. If the government falls apart and is no more, there is still God. If the economy implodes and you lose everything you have, there is still God. If you and your family are hungry and homeless, there is still God. If you lose your life, there is still God. With God there is a kingdom in heaven prepared for us, where there are no moths or rust or rot and where streets are paved with gold, where no one goes hungry or thirsty, and where everyone lives forever. This is the hope that people need. This is the hope that we are called to share with others. This is the hope that will change our country and the world.

Hobbies

I'm convinced that I have too many hobbies. I like to think that I'm good at so many things that there just isn't enough of my time to go around. I like to think that, but more likely it is that my attention span is short and my talents are so spread out that they rarely come to their full fruition, becoming a Jack of all Trades and a master of none.

I've been in the process of setting some of my hobbies aside to make way for those that currently interest me more, figuring out which ones are deserving of more time. Unfortunately, the process actually takes me away from doing the hobbies themselves. I've been getting a lot more reading in, but my writing has suffered along with music, graphic manipulation fun, and (as you probably noticed) blogging. I haven't been blogging. That's how much I haven't been writing. Add in other fairly new hobbies, such as gardening and bonsai, and there just isn't enough time. This doesn't account for other things I consider hobbies, like watching movies, video games, word puzzles, hiking and camping. I know there are some in there I'm missing too.

I want to say that I'm going to be paring down the hobbies, but more likely I'll add more and more. What I need to be doing is arranging my time to enjoy them all more fully, perhaps even lowering expectations for some of them and adjusting my time accordingly. It all comes down to enjoying hobbies for what they are and not turning them into a chore I don't like doing anymore. I don't want a hobby to feel like a job. Here's a question: if my job were one of my hobbies, would it cease being fun?

On that note, my wife got a job with the state. She likes it better than her last job.

You Don't Have To Yell

It seems like whenever people get to talking about politics, they become more heated than they normally do about other things. Many Christians get more excited about these things than they do about talking about and living like Jesus. In a time of recycled and heartless music, there are few artists that portray the heart of a poet and of a servant. Chris Rice is one of these few. I thought I would share these lyrics with everyone, and when you start thinking about politics and opinions, remember who you serve.

You Don't Have To Yell
by Chris Rice

So-called reality
Right there on my TV
If that's how life's supposed to be, well
Somebody's lyin'
The camera's on and we can tell
To keep your fame you have to yell
'Cause tensions build, and products sell, and
We're all buyin'
I hope we're smarter than this

Everybody take a breath
Why are all your faces red
We're missin' all the words you said
You don't have to yell
Draw your lines and choose your side
‘Cause many things are worth the fight
But louder doesn't make you right
You don't have to yell, oh
You don't have to yell

I tuned in to hear the news
I don't want your point of view
If that's the best that you can do, then
Something's missin'
And experts on whatever side
You plug your ears, you scream your lines
You claim to have an open mind, but
Nobody's listenin'
Don't you think we're smarter than this?

Everybody take a breath
Why are all your faces red
We're missin' all the words you said
You don't have to yell
Draw your lines and choose your side
Many things are worth the fight
But louder doesn't make you right
You don't have to yell
You don't have to yell

Everybody take a breath
Why are all your faces red
We're missin' all the words you said
You don't have to yell
(If everyone will take the step
Back away and count to ten
Clear your mind and start again
We won’t have to yell)
Draw your lines and choose your side
Many things are worth the fight
But louder doesn't make you right
You don't have to yell
You don't have to yell

Copyright 2006 Clumsy Fly Music (ASCAP) (adm. By Word Music, LLC)

Vote: Would Jesus Vote?

I know, the title is ironic.

The question is: would Jesus vote? Would He participate in the democratic process? It's a fairly yes or no answer, and I intended it that way. No third party option to skew any results. You can leave your comments here, but also take a second to click the poll on the sidebar in order to track these results. You only get one vote, so don't ruin it for everyone by trying to vote more than once. I know I'm asking for big trouble here, so I'm not even going to bother saying what I think, since many of you who read this blog probably already know how I feel. This will run up until election day, so there's plenty of time to think about it. After that, the poll (as well as this post, depending on how nice everyone is) will probably go bye bye. Don't forget to vote in the sidebar poll.

4 Years of Blogging

I have been writing on this thing for four years now. I have seen other blogging friends come and go but hopefully I have not been, and will not be, someone who gives it up completely. I have started other niche blogs, but this one will always be a blog about Tim as long as it exists. Here are my attempts to give others a glimpse into the chaos in my brain. So much has happened since I first began this blog, and here are some things that have changed since then:

• I lived in Portland with my sister
• I was running sound for a professional a cappella group
• Cascade Hills didn't exist yet
• I wasn't married to the most wonderful woman in the world

So now that all of these things have changed, I think it is safe to assume many more things can take place in the next four years. Already, my sister will soon be following me to Salem, my interests in new things are taking shape, Cascade Hills continues to grow and has launched a daughter church, and my wife and I continue to make new plans for our life together. I hope you continue to tune in here for happenings in my life and my perspectives on God, life, politics, media, and many other things in the world.

Horrible Books

I'm currently reading what is turning out to be a horribly written piece of fiction. It is full of grammar problems, incomplete sentences, characters that I don't care about, and a world full of plot holes filled with pretension. When you're faced with this situation, do you keep reading or do you plod through it in order to use it as an example of bad writing? Do you consider this a waste of time? I recently forced myself to finish what I consider another awful book only to gain more appreciation for those better books (see Rich's list, excepting that first Lewis guy). It makes me feel a little better about myself, but it also causes me to think about what I write and the challenge there is in even getting a book published. Why are there so many bad books? So what do you do, keep reading or toss it aside?