LOL, I came across this today. Look at the guy working in the cubicle next too him. I wonder how much those ‘old’ PC’s cost back then? Couldn’t have been cheap.

So I have been intending to post some photo’s for a while. Jon and Ariel are getting back from their honeymoon today so I thought I’d better post them now or never.

Thank you Jon.
Jon’s bro’s.

A fountain in down town Philly.

I have very few pictures from the wedding, and not even a picture of the whole wedding party! So we’ll have to jump to after the wedding. Jon and Ariel are off to Corsica. Anyone know where that is?

And the rest of us left behind.

Good Times!

Just been listening to an online sermon on the Carubber’s Mission website. They are in Edinburgh and are one of the few evangelical churches in that area. They have some great resources.

http://www.carrubbers.org >resources >sermons

You will have to download Real Player but it is worth it.

Just listened to a sermon by Eric John Scott called “Has Science Buried God?” He used a couple good illustrations that I want to remember. Here are some notes from the message…

Wife baked a cake and you invited friends over.

First one was a nutritionist who explains nutritional value of cake and how much weight you stand to gain by eating it.
Biochemist explains the structure of the fats and other molecules in the cake.
Chemist describes the basic elements of the cake and the chemical bonds that hold the together.
Physicist explains the fundamental particles that make up the cake.
Mathematician comes up with an elegant formula that explains the cohesion of the batter.

Now you have a profound understanding of the nature of the cake… But then you ask your friends, why is there cake? None of them have a clue… But they tell you that if you want to know why, there is one person who can answer this question. Ask your wife… who responds that it is your birthday.

The ‘why’ question cannot be answered by science.

You often hear that science has described natural mechanisms that have removed the need for belief in God…

But think of my Ford Focus – pretend that you drove a car into a remote country that had never seen a car before… They might think that it was powered by a god… maybe one named Ford… but then they begin to take the car apart and discover the working of the combustion engine etc, They find that the car is not powered by god at all but by an engine. Scientist often use this as an example of why religion has been made obsolete by science… But just because we understand how a Ford Focus works, does not negate the existence of a man name Henry Ford who designed and created the car.

Much of the science we hear today is really just materialism – a philosophy that states that all we can know about the natural world is what we gather from the senses. Questions of ‘why’ are not legit and shouldn’t be asked. Why should we not ask ‘why’? All of us ask it anyway. We can’t help but ask it! Monkeys don’t ask ‘why’ but we do. Why!!!?

I filled up my truck the other day and will be going in for counseling. Ive always taken oil for granted but I think the recent surge in prices will change that. Anyway, here are a few things I have learned recently about oil…

According to US gov’n statistics the US pumps 6 million barrels of oil from the ground each day and imports another 14 million barrels.1 Most of it is burned in one form or another while the rest is turned into synthetic products that eventually make their way into our landfills… It’s kind of ironic that this precious black liquid that we are so reliant on is all that is left of another world whose remains were compressed and trapped in rocks far beneath us! LOL, ok that is depressing, but this is even more depressing… from the National Post,

To California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s delight, Ontario joined the Western Climate Initiative (WCI) last week. FP

What is the WCI? According to the Post the WCI proposes to limit the use of fuel produced using carbon intensive methods such as those used in the oil sands. This might be ok for California which stands to protect its own industries but it isn’t any good for Canada, or Alberta. Ontario, a soon to be have-not province, is signing on too legislation that would cut off (or at least reduce) the 500,000 barrels of oil a day piped from the Alberta oil sand’s. This hurts all of us.

As I understand it, part of the WCI is the increased use of ethanol. So rather than burn bituminous oil (oil extracted from tar) found in the oil sands, Ontario will burn more corn instead. But corn is in short supply these days and could never replace conventional oil anyway. (never mind the ethics of burning food to satisfy our insatiable demand for energy) Thankfully, there is a ready solution. Ontario can increase shipments of oil from their friends in Saudi Arabia, Venezuela and Russia. Nice! McGuinty is a genius.

But what does this mean really? William Ellard states the facts clearly:

• The US consumes 25% of the world’s oil, with only 4% of its population.

• The US will send $700 billion dollars out of the country per year to buy oil.

• Projected over the next 10 years, the cost for oil imports will be $10 trillion — the greatest transfer of wealth in the history of mankind.1

This transfer of wealth is not going to our friends. Take a look at the top 10 oil exporters (wiki) (2006 statistics):

1. Saudi Arabia – 9 (million barrels of crude p/ day)
2. Russia – 7
3. Norway – 2.8
4. Iran – 2.7
5. Nigeria – 2.15
6. United Arab Emirates – 2.4
7. Kuwait – 2.3
8. Venezuela – 2.1
9. Algeria – 1.84
10. Mexico – 1.5
11. Libya – 1.5

16. Canada – 1.1

Although Canada is a relatively small player, we account for 17.1% of the US imports and are the largest supplier of petroleum to the US.2 But look at how much oil comes from unstable, undemocratic Islamic republics. I count 7 out of the the 11 (including Nigeria). Russia and Venezuela could also easily be included with the others as morally unscrupulous regimes. Are we really willing to transfer an unparalleled amount of wealth to these nations in order to meet a CO2 cap that has questionable environmental benefits in the first place?

Where does all the money go? I really don’t know… but it would be interesting to find out. Maybe someone reading this can fill me in. All I know is that at current prices Saudi Arabia’s revenue from oil exports is well over 11 trillion and is about on par with the GDP of the entire United States.3 This is the same Wahabi fundamentalist regime that supplied 15 of the 19 Sept 11 hijackers. This ought to be a cause for real concern.

It seems to me that we cannot develop our oil sands fast enough. They provide a reliable supply of oil in the short run and reduce our reliance on oil from unstable, undemocratic Islamic states. The oil can be transported by pipeline rather than by ship which offsets some of the increased energy used in extraction. And most importantly, the money spent on oil stays in our economy where the tax dollars can be used to develop alternative energy solutions and public transportation. If McGuinty and his cronies maintain their present, unrealistic course of action, our children will pay for it and will pay dearly.

Just got back from camp. I have yet to get my pictures downloaded but I will try to put up a few later on…

I have just been reading some about the Israelites failure at Mt. Sinai. They grew impatient with Moses and chose to melt down their jewelry to form a god. Though they still called this god, Jehovah, it was a reversion back to a form of worship they they would have been accustomed to in Egypt. I think it is interesting that Jehovah did later give them something legitimate to melt their jewelry into and that the Israelites gave so whole heartedly that Moses had to ask the people to stop giving. But this story of failure comes first.

Moses, as a mediator, pleads to take the punishment for the sin of the people…

Moses went back to the LORD and said, “Oh, what a great sin these people have committed! They have made themselves gods of gold. But now, please forgive their sin– but if not, then blot me out of the book you have written.” The LORD replied to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against me I will blot out of my book.

Moses asks to have his name blotted from ‘the book’. Rob and I were talking about it the other day as to what was meant by ‘the book’? This is the first reference in the Bible to a book in God’s possession.

Keil & Delitzsch have some helpful insight,

This expression founded upon the custom of writing the names of the burgesses of a town or country in a burgess-list, whereby they are recognized as natives of the country, or citizens of the city, and all the privileges of citizenship are secured to them. The book of life contains the list of the righteous and ensures to those whose names are written there, life before God, first in the earthly kingdom of God and then eternal life also, according to the knowledge of salvation, which keeps pace with the progress of divine revelation, e.g., in the New Testament, where the heirs of eternal life are found written in the book of life (Phil. 4:3; Rev. 3:5; 13:8, etc.)… an advance for which the way was already prepared by Isa. 4:3 and Dan. 12:1. To blot out of Jehovah’s book, therefore, is to cut off from fellowship with the living God, or from the kingdom of those who live before God, and to deliver over to death.

Moses request that God would blot his name from the book of the living is similar to the Apostle Paul’s pleading in Romans 9:3. Paul wishes that he might be accursed from Christ for the sake of his brothers.

I can’t think of making such a prayer and really meaning it. K&D put it well again,

It is not easy to estimate the measure of love in a Moses and a Paul; for the narrow boundary of our reasoning powers does not comprehend it, as the little child is unable to comprehend the courage of warlike heroes. Bengel as quoted by Keil and Delitzsh

These men truly and deeply cared for the people that God had placed under them. But it was Jesus who did became a ‘curse for us’. This love is truly incomprehensible but then, how much do I really consider it? Paul says that to know the love of Christ is to be filled to be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge– that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. Ephesians 3:17-21

The Economist ran a series of articles on the destructive nature of faith. Here is an excerpt-

“… when historians look back at this century they will probably see religion as the prime animating and destructive force in human affairs, guiding attitudes to political liberty and obligation, concepts of nationhood and. of course, conflicts and wars” – Phillip Jenkins as quoted in The Economist (emphasis mine)

If this is the case then I hope I am not religious! But just to make sure, I looked up the word ‘religion’ and here is the definition I found:

religiun – “conduct indicating belief in divine power”1

So now I have a confession to make. I am a religious person and, according to the Economist, “an animating and destructive force in human affairs.” But what is more, I might not only be a religious person but a religious fund… funda… fundamentalist. This according to Jon Krakauer, in his well researched expose of Mormon fundamentalism,

Like fundamentalists in other faiths…the authority that flows from their divinely inspired sentences is absolute and immutable. And it is the duty of righteous men and women to conduct their lives according to a stringently literal reading of those sentences… – ‘Jon Krakauer, Under the Banner of Heaven’

I hold to the divine inspiration of the Scriptures as have Christians through the centuries. Now I am labeled a ‘religious fundamentalist’ together with Mormon polygamist’s and Muslim terrorist’s.

“The cause of all our problems in the world right now is religious fundamentalism. Whether it’s Hindus or Muslims or Christians, it doesn’t matter. Look at all the violence in India right now, from Hindus. I mean, they’re as fundamentalist as anybody else, they just happen to be vegetarians. But they’ll kill other human beings in the name of God. It’s crazy.” Deepak Chopra in an interview with Dorit Ofek-Onen – JPost

But can we really pin conflict and war on religion? The 20th century marks the rise of secular humanism and goes on record as the bloodiest century of human existence. Both World Wars were inspired by nationalism and fascism – not religion. Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot cannot be called religious men by any stretch of the imagination!

The ‘animating force’ behind conflict and war is found at a deeper level and a little closer to home. It is in us.

Then the LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.” Now Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let’s go out to the field.” And while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him. Genesis 4:6-8

This is kind of interesting. It is the complete Isaiah scroll scanned in and animated online-

http://www.imj.org.il/shrine_center/Isaiah_Scrolling/index.html

Wow, these guys are amazing! Not sure what they’re saying but it makes me want to learn Spanish. Turns out David Broza is Jewish and more often sings in Hebrew and English…

Last seen approx. 30 hours ago in the hands of one the cutest little girls in the world! : )

This is Russia’s only wooden sky scraper. It is 13 stories high and apparently it is about ready to fall down. The story goes that a Russian contractor began building a 2 story house but in the middle of the project he was sent to jail for beating one of workers. His business fell apart but when he was released he continued building this house… and didn’t stop. He just kept adding one story onto another until he made it to 13 stories!

Needless to say the neighbor are upset as they think it is a hazard to the community. I think it would be fun to try something like this in Olds, say in Park Meadows! LOL Only in Russia!

Anyway here is a video of the building.

Taken from Industrial Market Trends blog