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classicalRyan
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Name: classicalRyan
Interests: Becoming the man described in James 3:13 with the wisdom described in verse 17: "Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you? let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom. The wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy."
Occupation: Dustsmith
Message: message me
Website: visit my website
Member Since:
10/3/2004
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| “True adventurers have never been plentiful. They who are set down in print as such have been mostly business men with newly invented methods. They have been out after the things they wanted—golden fleeces, holy grails, lady loves, treasure, crowns and fame. The true adventurer goes forth aimless and uncalculating to meet and greet unknown fate. A fine example was the Prodigal Son--when he started back home.”
That paragraph from The Green Door by O. Henry captures the essence of the Christian Adventure. Life is designed to require faith and the life of faith is an Adventure. For some years now I have felt called by God to go to China and learn the Chinese language and I think, “Won’t living in China be an adventure!” However, China is not the Christian Adventure. The Adventure is feeling and following the call of God when it looks impossible. It is desperately caring about the success of a situation when it is shadowed by certain failure in human terms. It is diving whole-heartedly into vague visions of the future when there is no earthly way that it will all work out. It is stepping into the Jordan River in hopes that God will dry it out. The Christian Adventure cannot be separated from prayer: kneeling in the darkness night after night and begging God for direction, begging Him for faith, begging for peace and confidence and contentment and joy.
The Christian Adventure is being willing to calmly follow God into crushing trials because He has promised to never leave me and to work everything together for my good. It is passionately living under the will of Divine Benevolence. Do I have to go to China for adventure? No, I am living the Adventure now. And it just might be that the Adventure will lead me to China. God knows.
I rest my unknown future on Christ who died for me. That is True Adventure and I am a True Adventurer! | | |
| Reflections upon a memory fail as a strict measure of the past. Some memories tend to dim while others are being distorted through age and perception. Many memories simply slip into forgotten corners whence they are sometimes revived through odd happenstances. What follows is a summary of my own incomplete but genuine recollections upon my journey through 2008.
I began the year as cheerfully as I ended 2007. One started as the other stopped in as smooth a transition as is normally expected between the two. I remember my first thoughts of 2008 revolved around bed and sleep. This year began like most others at the unearthly hour of midnight. Of course, I stay up until 12am and later on a regular basis throughout the year, but very few such nightly vigils are preceded by such enthusiastic revelry. I began the year happy, tired, and free. I also had several large issues weighing much lighter on my mind than a nervous person would ever allow.
For instance, my future: the entire, unfathomable mass of it lay in stretched before me like an invisible question mark. I was recently self-unemployed since my company had some financial troubles and released one-ninth of the entire workforce. I was the lucky one.
While in Arizona I prayed about an opportunity at romance. It really was a good opportunity, it just lacked the romance. They say that a successful courtship is one in which God’s will is successful. You would have trouble calling that a courtship, but I rest happily with the result knowing that God’s leading was honored. As I understand, the young lady is doing well and living strong for the Lord. I will say no more on this subject since it would be in poor taste. Since it happened that this all turned out about the time of my self-unemployment, I felt Arizona held much less charm for me. I gathered the few valuable possessions that were small enough to fit in the car and left Arizona for my hometown in Georgia.
Thus financially and emotionally free, I looked out upon 2008 with a bright eye which saw no clues as to my future direction. God did not leave me like this long. Two wonderful employment opportunities hit at about the same time. I was working a trial week with a local environmental engineer and we both liked the arrangement and I enjoyed the hefty pay when I received a summons to mold young minds. When the call is given; when the call is received; and most importantly, when the call is intensely desired; I respond. Verity Institute, my beloved alma mater, requested my services as a guest instructor. How it all came to be was quite interesting, but it makes a poor story so I will skip it.
This explains why I started reading massive books on Financial Accounting with such zeal. I hold that there is no better person to teach people about money than one who has very little of it. That statement is of questionable accuracy but it is precisely the situation I found before me. The class was, in all honesty, a bit rough, but the students fared alright in the end.
The winters in the Midwest are a little more dramatic than the ones in Georgia. Having spent the last few winters in Michigan and Arizona, I like a good layer of snow. It was perfect for snowball fights and sledding and the ski trip to Michigan. Even the thaw time provided good fun with some 6am boating in Taylor’s Pond in unsafe temperatures.
Spring brought with it a lovely rest over Holy week. Cameron Houser visited with me and my family in Georgia for the break. The highlight of the trip was definitely hiking up Stone Mountain, first with the Verity ’07 class reunion-goers and then the next day with the Verity ’08 and ’09 folks.
During the spring at Verity I spent almost all my time teaching the Harmony classes to the Verity music students. I would teach from a chair all day and then go down to the student lounge where I could tutor from a couch. It was a long, tiring, and perfectly delightful time. I thoroughly enjoy teaching music theory. All the students passed the final exam with good scores. Praise God!
Summer break happened fast. I spent a lot of time playing soccer out front with Andrew and Ben. I also did a lot of studying. That is one of those things about people who like to learn, any weather is good for studying. Rainy, foggy, sweltering, windy, freezing, humid, you name it, they say, “This is a perfect day to just curl up with a good book and go to sleep!” I somewhat agree, but it is also a good day to play soccer, so people just have to learn how to split up their time. I look at myself when I say this.
I finished up the summer with a nice vacation to Mexico where I had some fun with my good amigo Josh Rodriguez. We built him a powerful Windows machine so he could do high-quality recording and composing on it. It is a nice computer. We went to the Museum of Mexican History and some grottos found by a monk and got pulled over by a cop for driving in the middle lane of a highway that had no lanes. That lecture cost us about $12 US so I plan to remember it, but we did learn a really neat shortcut from him, one with no cops on it, so it turned out to be a fair trade. Of course, I got the entire thing second hand from JRod since foreign countries still have a tendency to speak foreign languages, especially during official government business proceedings along the turnpike. The Rodriguez family is about the most friendly, fun, and hospitable group of people you could hope to visit. Also, they have a delicious taquito place just around the corner from their house.
In mid-July I returned to Verity as an official staffer with all the privileges responsibilities thereof: one of those being the privilege of working for Dr. McCray. I will say this, that the Verity work environment is almost unimaginable in its pleasantness. Doing something I really enjoy with people I enjoy doing it with is a grand situation. I am the reigning and undisputed Vice President of Intelligence, although my official title is Curriculum Development Assistant. I work for the Curriculum Development Coordinator, Charity Larson.
We in Curriculum Development are the heart of Verity. Not only do we do we tell students what to study and how to study, we also explain the subjects, compile and create useful resources on the subject, and control vast stores of authoritative books, videos, and CDs on almost every academic discipline. Finally, we administrate the massive files on all verification results coming out of Kristina “KJ” Zaloum’s rigorous scholastic examinations. Our job lies at the very center of Verity’s core reason; as I said before, the beating heart of the program. This is why Charity, KJ and I are closely protected by the thick concrete wall of the second floor. Those pretty faces which inhabit the furnished rooms below provide a pleasant façade to the earnest toil being wrought magnificently along the study corridors above. We three are the throbbing heart, full of verve and vigor and vitality.
Near the end of July a select contingent of Verity staffers and my sister, Sarah (Clarke), were deployed to a homeschooler conference in Atlanta (Georgia). We were charged with representing Verity (Institute) to people who had not heard of us. As it turned out, I spent most of the time scouting out good curriculum ideas at special sessions and spying on current college marketing strategies by asking tough questions to the representatives in their color-coded booths. Then I stuffed the brochures in a little white baggie to give to Chéri (Anderson). It was a rather fun expedition in all, made even nicer by the graciousness of the Dalrymple family opening their home to us both nights we were in Atlanta.
The summer term at Verity passed beneath the looming arrival of the 2010 class and the in-depth orientation we needed to give them. Of course, we were working under bad conditions: time was passing as fast as usual. Between park night, birthday parties, weekly lunches out with Sarah, a tennis tournament, and a day trip to the amazing Creation Museum in Kentucky, all the work got done and the Verity staff celebrated by taking a trip to see the Squire Boone Caverns in Kentucky. Squire was his name, not a title. He was Daniel’s brother and in the caverns we saw the new burial place of his seventeen recovered bones. I assume he had more, but maybe he was part jellyfish. They identified the partial skeleton by the (non-lethal) hatchet hole in his skull. I always say it is useful to have something recognizable with you at all times for other folk’s convenience. For instance, I have a face.
At this point in the story I took a short break to Georgia where I spent a week with my family at Tugaloo State Park. You may think that you are noticing a trend with this Georgia thing, in which case, you are right. Partly from coincidence, partly because it is home, I spent a good bit of the year in Georgia. Tugaloo was a nice place and one day we climbed Curahee.
The Verity 2010 class students had arrived for a week of spiritual introspection while I was lounging and hiking with my family. They returned to the Indianapolis campus about the same time I did and we together launched into an intense week of Biblical worldview training, explanations of the Verity system, and some good study ideas. Few people realize the importance of understanding the processes by which learning happens. Frankly, the osmosis joke is getting pretty tired. Biology students are apt to dream about having the material seep into their brain during night from a book under the pillow. Personally, I shudder to think of my skull being able to just absorb whatever happens to be lying close by: that ability sounds rank with disease and pollution. Also, I think they are forgetting that osmosis happens with water and a semi-permeable membrane. Unless you want to sleep with a book made entirely of water, assuming that is possible, then I motion that we let that joke die. Then week was not entirely spent on such important issues, I also made to the Indianapolis Symphony to see Joshua Bell play his violin.
Throughout the fall I worked hard and played soccer and involved myself in the many activities happing around the school. The road trip to Chicago to drop off the music students with Dr. Kincaid was fun. Josh Ingersoll, my roommate and the music program advisor, and I had the unique opportunity of standing above the center of a four-lane highway. Not every day do I get to sip a McDonalds sweet tea and watch semis filled with who knows what whiz beneath me. In fact, it has only happened once. My family came up to Indy on a visit one weekend. I had fun giving them a tour of Verity and Monument Circle. There is nothing like sitting on the steps of the monument while eating an ice cream from the Chocolate Café and watching the motorcycles ride the circle. I am not saying that it is the pinnacle of human experience; it just stands unique as an evening’s entertainment.
The last month and a half of the fall term was dead serious for me. I prepared for the Humanities and English Composition classes I was teaching. Then I taught them. The study of Humanities is a very important since it contains the sum of human artistic expression throughout the ages. Of course, my class was somewhat narrower, focusing only on western traditions and highlighting only the most important masters and masterpieces. Still, a conversant knowledge of the arts and literature is vital for any cultured person, if they want to be cultured. Similarly crucial for all educated people is the ability to frame thoughts clearly and attractively in text. A well-written person is indispensable for many good jobs, and is certainly more effective in persuasion both now and beyond the grave than someone whose letters suffer in content, organization, grammar, and creativity.
Finishing the school year with that flourish of activity, I made my way back to Georgia for the holidays, or precisely those days between November 17th and January 3rd. It is a strange marvel of the human body that it can embrace fatigue and excitement and toil piled endlessly after each other for weeks on end with scarcely a whimper. But give that same body one days rest following the marathon and it will respond with all manner of illness and coughing and nasal issues that can last for up to a fortnight without remedy. Especially if that body is the one I wear. I recovered shortly after Thanksgiving.
I filled my holiday break with reading, studying, shopping, and visits to and from friends. The Reckner family made a weekend visit in November and we played airsoft and some Verity folks that live across the line in Alabama stayed overnight in December and we played paintball. The entire family went north to Kentucky for Christmas with the Reckners. We kept our tradition of having a large country dance on Christmas Eve and broke the tradition of throwing up all day Christmas. It was a beautiful time and there was only one engagement. Actually, it was the only one we were expecting, but it was nice. I enjoyed seeing Bryce Reckner again and this spring I look forward to meeting Bryce II.
As I closed the chapter on 2008, I quietly thanked God for His faithfulness and grace to me. A year which started out completely blank and unknown quickly unfolded into a marvelously pleasant journey. I began the year searching for His will and I never had a doubt as to His leading. Those who seek Him will surely find Him. He does not hide from His children. There was never a question that He did not answer, never a fear that He did not calm, and never a trial that He did not give more grace.
Of course, the future is still uncertain. I am currently unsure of where the path leads beginning in June. Currently, the several options I am considering are so good I wish I could do them all. I guess that is one of those things about stuff like that, if I knew what was going to happen I would just write the 2009 year in review now. But I do not, so I will keep trust God.
Books in Review
You may have noticed have the light dry style of my year in review. That was partially due to the recent influence of Wodehouse as you can see from my following reading list from 2008. This is probably the shortest yearly reading list I’ve ever had, but it should grow a little as I remember various volumes which slip my mind now.
Bible – God
Cross Examination of Jesus Christ – Randy Singer
Dave Barry Slept Here: A Sort Of History of the United States – Dave Barry
Dave Barry’s Last Travel Guide You’ll Ever Need – Dave Barry
The Fair Tax Book – John Linder
The King’s Stilts – Dr. Seuss
Living Abroad in China – Stuart and Barbara Strother
The Man Who Knew Too Much – G. K. Chesterton
The Man with Two Left Feet – P. G. Wodehouse
Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens
The Poison Plot – Lily Bea Jenkins
Principles of Management – John Ogilvie
Psmith in the City – P. G. Wodehouse
Understanding Business – Nichols and McHugh
What Every American Needs to Know About the Qur’an – William Federer
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| I'm loving the fall here in Indiana. I can finally understand the scenes so richly described in my favorite poem by Indianapolis' own "Hoosier Poet." I print below the entire text.
When the Frost is on the Punkin
James Whitcomb Riley
WHEN the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock,
And you hear the kyouck and gobble of the struttin' turkey-cock,
And the clackin' of the guineys, and the cluckin' of the hens,
And the rooster's hallylooyer as he tiptoes on the fence;
O, it's then the time a feller is a-feelin' at his best,
With the risin' sun to greet him from a night of peaceful rest,
As he leaves the house, bareheaded, and goes out to feed the stock,
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.
They's something kindo' harty-like about the atmusfere
When the heat of summer's over and the coolin' fall is here—
Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossoms on the trees,
And the mumble of the hummin'-birds and buzzin' of the bees;
But the air's so appetizin'; and the landscape through the haze
Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days
Is a pictur' that no painter has the colorin' to mock—
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.
The husky, rusty russel of the tossels of the corn,
And the raspin' of the tangled leaves as golden as the morn;
The stubble in the furries—kindo' lonesome-like, but still
A-preachin' sermuns to us of the barns they growed to fill;
The strawstack in the medder, and the reaper in the shed;
The hosses in theyr stalls below—the clover overhead!—
O, it sets my hart a-clickin' like the tickin' of a clock,
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.
Then your apples all is gethered, and the ones a feller keeps
Is poured around the cellar-floor in red and yaller heaps;
And your cider-makin's over, and your wimmern-folks is through
With theyr mince and apple-butter, and theyr souse and sausage too!...
I don't know how to tell it—but ef such a thing could be
As the angels wantin' boardin', and they'd call around on me—
I'd want to 'commodate 'em—all the whole-indurin' flock—
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.
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| Religious people are often called people of faith and participate in faith-based activities. In a culture that uses faith so prominently and interchangeably with religion, I think many people are unaware of the Christian concept of faith. Christians must define their faith in order to reach their world.
Faith is often confused with belief. Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary gives one definition of faith as “firm belief in something for which there is no proof” and another as “sincerity of intentions.” While it includes other and better definitions, these two demonstrate the perceived weakness of faith in our society.
In a scientific and rational culture, proof and objectivity are regarded as prerequisites for trust in anything of importance. However, these same principles are deemed unimportant in matters of postmodern spirituality where everyone must find their own truth. Faith is simply a belief that the believer holds for comfort, tradition’s sake, or some moral expedient: anything but because it is really true.
I disagree. Hebrews 11:1 defines “faith [as] the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Substance and evidence are not terms used to describe a mental handicap. If anything, they are meant to convey a confidence beyond any human will power. Mortimer J. Adler sums it up nicely when he writes, “You must always keep in mind that an article of faith is not something that the faithful ‘assume.’ Faith, for those who have it, is the most certain form of knowledge, not a tentative opinion.” A Christian’s faith transcends belief and rests in solid sureness.
Furthermore, faith is described as the substance of a Christian’s hope: heaven. Popularly, hope is often used to express a wish or optimism, but a Christian’s hope is no mere whim if it has a present substance. Heaven and eternal life already exist and Christians currently possess them through the very faith in Christ which is the evidence of these things not seen.
Christianity is not another wish upon a star. I do not stake my life upon Christ because it makes me feel good. I have faith is Christ because He’s true. Faith is my solid assurance in a definite guarantee. As if I would trust my life upon a lie.
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| This is a hilarious bit of joke code I found.
/* Source Code Windows 2000 */
#include "win31.h"
#include "win95.h"
#include "win98.h"
#include "workst~1.h"
#include "evenmore.h"
#include "oldstuff.h"
#include "billrulz.h"
#include "mindsweeper.h"
#include "backdoor.h"
#define INSTALL = HARD
char make_prog_look_big(16000000);
void main()
{
while(!CRASHED)
{
display_copyright_message();
display_bill_rules_message();
do_nothing_loop();
if (first_time_installation)
{
make_100_megabyte_swapfile();
do_nothing_loop();
totally_screw_up_HPFS_file_system();
search_and_destroy_the_rest_of-OS2();
make_futile_attempt_to_damage_Linux();
disable_Netscape();
disable_RealPlayer();
disable_Lotus_Products();
hang_system();
} //if
write_something(anything);
display_copyright_message();
do_nothing_loop();
do_some_stuff();
if (still_not_crashed)
{
display_copyright_message();
do_nothing_loop();
basically_run_windows_31();
do_nothing_loop();
} // if
} //while
if (detect_cache())
disable_cache();
if (fast_cpu())
{
set_wait_states(lots);
set_mouse(speed,very_slow);
set_mouse(action,jumpy);
set_mouse(reaction,sometimes);
} //if
/* printf("Welcome to Windows 3.1"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows 3.11"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows 95"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows NT 3.0"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows 98"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows NT 4.0"); */
printf("Welcome to Windows 2000");
if (system_ok())
crash(to_dos_prompt)
else
system_memory = open("a:\swp0001.swp",O_CREATE);
while(something)
{
sleep(5);
get_user_input();
sleep(5);
act_on_user_input();
sleep(5);
} // while
create_general_protection_fault();
} // main
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