Jason’s Exodus

Quick rate: Fairly good

— Usual spoiler alert, or not, meh —
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The air was clean. The view was pretty. And fairly awesome. The company was good, and so was the food.

Thus was my holiday.

Oh, and the board games were crazy.

I and a few Quantums spent some time in Port Stephens. We stayed in a holiday house near the top of Soldiers Point, with a view facing east out into the port. It had 3 levels, 2 living areas, 3 bathrooms and was right on the water, all of which meant that it was also fairly good for the two babies on the trip.

The agenda? Relax, and beat the daylights out of each other with board games. And so we did. It was a good time, and I’m quite relaxed now. If only I didn’t have an essay to write.

I’ve started a new project. Bible study suggested we record thoughts as we read the Bible and prayed. I decided that I’d blog it.

So behold, this holiday has given me the chance to try out a new format for my Bible reading – I had been reading paragraphs of Greek and snippets of Hebrew. Now I’ve decided to actually think on what I read, and you’ll find the results of this here, at The Barefoot Exegete. Shout out to Dougie for the inspiration for the name. I’ll still be blogging my random thoughts and opinions here, and that site will be reserved for my exegetical work.

Big news day today.

I guess I was as much a fan as the regular person who grew up in the 80’s. But when MJ got weird, most of us moved on to.
And so, when I heard, I prayed the short prayer I always pray when I hear of someone’s death. But I’m not moved in any other sense.

Intriguing was how that completely overshadowed Farrah Fawcett’s death – then again, I wasn’t old enough for Charlie’s Angels, so I’m even less moved.

Then on a completely different note, I keep hearing this stuff coming out of the church planting conference at college today and yesterday. (I’m not there because I’m not that type really – though if someone wants a blazingly efficient and organised sidekick, I’m right here.) Al Stewart coming back to Sydney (and likely to bring Tony Willis back with him! Now there’s a sidekick.)

I wonder if a big wave is coming or not. Pop stars will come and go. Fortunes of parishes will rise and fall. Where are we right now? We’re slowly climbing our way out of a massive case of lost money, the Georges River region is essentially a barren spiritual desert, and whole stretches of land need to hear the gospel preached. And this world mourns for a man who could sing and dance. And turns away from the one whom they have pierced. I hope this conference gets some good guys out there.

[in case you don't know, I've removed "interesting" from "standard response vocabulary" and added "intriguing". It sounds cooler too.]

Here’s the rough itinerary:

- at home till Saturday
- Sunday at Chappo
- a week up north
- back at Chappo for the rest of the time, except Saturdays, doing that blasted essay.

By the end, the following should have gotten done:
- another Visual Ex
- that damn essay
- read a few books

At first, it was a thing Snowy and I had at the conclusion of our holiday in the summer. In the way down, we said that we’d have to declare victory when we got major stuff out of the way.

Then there was the song.
Ahh, the song.

So shall the sweetness of victory be, until I start having to write this essay, but for now, it’s time to relax.

Victory, victory, victory!
Milo!
Struck our blows!
Crushed our foes!
Till their nose …
was under Milo!
Eh!

In the few spare moments I’ve had, I’ve been wondering over the question of double predestination – ie. that not only are the elect predestined for salvation, but the non-elect are predestined for damnation. I think the occasion of these thoughts has been Arminian and Open Theist ideas about election.

One of the questions that arises is, well, why? Why does God do this? How can a loving, caring, powerful God make creatures destined for judgment?

At this point, I wish to posit a theory. It’s only a theory, and I don’t really have much to back this up from. This is how it goes:

God makes life “complicated” to help us realise how much we need to trust God and glorify him only. This includes the complication of living and sharing this world with the reprobate.

See, life would be stupidly boring if there were no non-Christians bothering us with their temptation and worldliness. Life would be so much easier too, not having to tell the gospel to people we don’t really know are going to be saved. We’d probably go slack since we’d all know that everyone was going to be saved.

But hardship in life should point us to the cross. The many thousands who have not heard should cause us to tell. The wariness of falling should urge us to love.

Thoughts?

re: Earngey’s post. My head was pumping out a fair whack of response, so much that I decided to post it instead of leaving a massive comment.
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1 Sam 9:21
Saul answered and said, – “ha-lo”

1) I now possess a kneeling chair. My hip flexors are feeling friggin awesome now.

2) Last week and weekend was quite tiring, since:
- I’d been up late on Wednesday with the Graham Cole thing
- I’d then woken up early on Thursday for the Champions League
- I’d been up late on Thursday playing soccer
- Then there was the whole weekend away thing … Merroo beds didn’t help but at least sleep was had

3) Re-reading A Call to Spiritual Reformation for Bible study. Probably a good time in my life too, to ensure non-complacency.

4) Wondering quietly what the future holds. Wondering if my proficiency at languages could translate into some other path.