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Super Bowl Post

By Ryan, February 3, 2008

If you watched the greatest Super Bowl ever, then you saw the amazing helmet catch by David Tyree. It was completely obvious that Tyree did the work to make the catch... Eli Manning did not run down the field and catch it for him. Manning did, however, give him the opportunity to make the play.

People tend to think that when we ask God for help, He’ll just do our work for us. But that’s not how God rolls. If you pray for patience, you won’t roll out of bed the next morning and say, “Wow! I feel patient!” Most likely, God will give you a chance to be patient. Note that this could mean being rear-ended in the parking lot. It could mean being broken up with. Heaven forbid, it could even mean getting stuck having to wait for six months for any activity on your favorite teenage Christian blog... with no apologies whatsoever.

Think about that the next time you pray for something and don’t get it. Maybe God’s plan wasn’t to keep you from having what you want, but rather to let you go and get what you want. If you don’t think your prayers are being answered, maybe you need to look for the ball. Chances are, it’s somewhere in the air behind you, and all you have to do is grab it and hold on. And the truth is, maybe the pass isn’t being thrown your way. But always be ready, because you never know when you’ll have the chance to make a huge catch on a proverbial 3rd-and-11.

Labels: Gems, Sports

{ Posted 11:07 PM | Comments: 4 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

That’s How I Roll

By Ryan, June 26, 2007

My favorite board game in the world is undoubtedly Yahtzee. I’m not necessarily the best at it, though I usually do well. It’s a game of chance, but it requires a lot of skill. I have absolutely no control over what dice I roll. Maybe I’ll roll something bad, like a 1, 2, 4, 5 and 6. No points there. I could get something like a full house or small straight, which is quite good. If I’m really lucky, I might get five matching dice on the first throw. But no matter what I roll, there is strategy involved. Even the most pitiful rolls can be turned into a ton of points. And even if they can’t, then there’s always next time.

It works the same in life, and I’m not talking about the one created by Milton-Bradley. Nobody will get something perfect every time. Some people will never get the set of dice they want. But the dice we roll won’t be what will count when we die. It will be what we did with those dice. “Bad dice” could be something like losing a grandmother to cancer. That can be scored under either “complain about the unfairness of life” or “be grateful for my new step-grandmother.”

Everything that happens is part of God’s plan, whether it’s good or bad at first. Being upset is okay, but it is downright stupid to let obstacles get in the way of being an effective Christian.

Labels: Gems, Influences, Relationships

{ Posted 10:44 PM | Comments: 5 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

Orange Shoes

By Ryan, May 17, 2007

They started as a joke. I had trouble sleeping. I found a pair of orange Converse shoes and a Sharpie. I decorated the shoes and wore them to get reactions. Now, less than half a week later, they’re my new trademark.

A lot of the best things in life are discovered by accident... such as Post-It notes and potato chips. The thing is we often try too hard. We try too hard to be liked. We try too hard to have fun. If we could instead be who God created us to be, our lives would be so much more fun because we’d be having the fun that God created us to have.

It sounds as cliché as anything, but life is good to those who can be themselves. And being yourself is a thing that doesn’t have to be forced. I didn’t buy the orange shoes thinking, “these will make me popular... I need them.” I bought them with the idea that I like them and nobody can stop me from wearing them and coloring checkers on them with a Sharpie. See, on that same shopping trip, I also bought a pair of Vans skate shoes hoping that they would make me look cool. But that was me trying to be who everyone else was. Now that I’m wearing the shoes that are who I am, I feel a lot cooler and a lot more genuine.

In life, will you wear skate shoes or orange emo shoes?

Labels: Gems

{ Posted 11:55 PM | Comments: 0 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

Re: Fwd: Would You Run?

By Ryan, May 4, 2007

I could go on forever about things I hate about e-mails. (Guess what, CalTech! I’m still not interested in you! So stop e-mailing me!) I despise college mail, as I informed the general public in the post Nobody Cares. I fervidly loathe chainletters that tell you that you have to forward this to 37 girls before midnight and make a wish about your favorite college mascot. I detest those annoying messages with more than one “Fwd:” or “Re:” in the subject. I also happen to hate forwarded e-mails where you have to open fortyleven attached e-mails. And I passionately spit upon forwarded e-mails where the whole thing is in a PowerPoint or something that loads in the time it takes to take a nap*.

But one forwarded e-mail with an ungodly large-sized PowerPoint show caught my attention. The PowerPoint said this:

One Sunday morning during a service, a 2,000 member congregation was surprised to see two men enter, both covered from head to toe in black and carrying submachine guns. One of the men proclaimed, “Anyone willing to take a bullet for Christ, remain where you are.” Immediately, the choir fled, the deacons fled, and most of the congregation fled. Out of the 2,000 there only remained 20.
The man who had spoken took off his hood. He then looked at the preacher and said, “Okay, Pastor, I got rid of all the hypocrites... now you may begin your service. Have a nice day!” Then the two men walked out.

Labels: Challenges, Gems

{ Posted 9:47 PM | Comments: 4 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

The Scarlet Letter

By Ryan, April 5, 2007

How do you heal a broken relationship? There are a number of valid ways. In most cases, the best way to fix a problem is to eliminate what caused it. And what I figured out in Life Groups last night was that many friendships are harmed when someone is too stubborn to apologize. Love does not mean never having to say you’re sorry. Hollywood was wrong again. What a shock.

I decided to bring on one of the biggest undertakings of my life last night. I made a list of all my friends that I was at odds with.* Then I went down the list and wrote letters to most of the people on it. I chose to write instead of speak for three reasons.

1. Writing allows you to say everything uninterrupted
2. The things that need to be said most are hard to say face-to-face
3. I have insanely awesome handwriting that I love showing off

Labels: Gems, Relationships

{ Posted 9:29 PM | Comments: 3 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

Caught In a Moment

By Ryan, February 14, 2007

This morning, I was tired. In fact, I was very tired. I looked at the clock and found comfort in the fact that it was 5:50, a full 55 minutes before I like to be up. Well, you know how it goes. 10 minutes go by. Naw, the bed is too nice and warm. Another 20 go by. You know, I have no obligation to get up yet. Lather, rinse, repeat until it’s 6:45. I’m sitting in bed listening to the radio station that my clock faithfully wakes me up to every morning, and I just don’t wanna get up. So I sit for a few more minutes. It’s 7:00 under God*. My dad sticks his shiny head through my door and tells me to get up.

Well, I’ll spoil the ending and just tell you now that I eventually got up at 7:20, leaving myself about 20 minutes to shower, dress, eat, and gather everything and go. I’ll say it plainly: I did not plan for the future very well.

Now I know you can relate to this if you’re over the age of about 10. Honestly, we all have our days where we just don’t wanna get up yet. During those 90 minutes or so that I couldn’t decide whether or not to get up, my mindset was one that I can stay in bed for one more minute and it won’t hurt anything. I was focused on “right now the bed is warm and comfortable” rather than “if I don’t get up I might make my brothers late for school.” Very short-term.

Lying in bed at 7 AM is not the only real-world instance of being focused on short-term. I, along with many friends of mine, are frequently under the mindset that God answers prayer immediately. It took me several months of prayer to discover that I don’t need a girlfriend. It took three years of prayer to find a remote answer as to why I live in Texas and not in Oklahoma. And if that isn’t enough, I heard a testimony from a world-famous violin player who prayed for a Bible... for 25 years. Look, if God can wait a quarter of a century to give someone His very own Word, He doesn’t have any obligation to answer every other prayer right away.

So don’t worry too much about the here and now, because it may turn out that what we want isn’t what God wants for us. It’s still okay to ask, but don’t be impatient. Impatience causes depression. Trust me.

This post was inspired by a post on Casual Fridays.

Labels: Challenges, Gems, Influences

{ Posted 9:29 PM | Comments: 4 | Link: http://thepeoplebrand.com/blog/2007/02/02/what-about-the-next-day/ | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

Printer Malfunction

By Ryan, February 3, 2007

My mom likes to keep things that remind her of milestones in my life. She has my learner’s permit, and she’s also a lock to hold onto my paper license when my picturized one comes in the mail this week. Miscellaneous papers that I wrote for school, awards I won for Math/Science Team competitions in middle school... the list goes on. So, today, when I made my first solo trip to fill my Malibu named Tony* with gasoline this evening, I thought I would save the receipt for her to store in her special box for me.

Only problem was, the pump I filled up at had a printer malfunction. It said on the convenient* little screen on the pump that I could go inside for a receipt. So I go inside, expecting to tell the cashier “Hey, man, I filled at Pump #1 and I need a receipt... can ya hook me up?” and the guy would be like, “Sure, boss,” and he’d give me this nice printout that looks like the receipt I would have gotten outside. Well, no. Instead, he goes, “How much gas did you put in?” So I told him it was, like, 11 gallons, and that I didn’t know for sure how many gallons exactly, but that it came out to $21 even. So this guy writes on a piece of paper in doctor handwriting “Feb 3 07 pump 1 $21.00” and something that may have been his signature... or a picture of a horse... with five legs. Yeah, a five-legged horse. That’s what it was.

I’m sure that Mom won’t mind not having this memory of my first gas trip, but it’s amazing that something as small as a printer malfunction can lead to sacrificing something like a priceless memory. Okay, so a piece of weirdly smooth paper that thanks me for buying my gas from Albertson’s and tells me to try their groceries* is relatively trivial, but sometimes small things lead to big disasters. Like one sarcastic comment can ruin a person’s week. Last year, I was having a bad day when some little midget freshman asked me where I got my shirt... which said “COLORADO” in size, like, a thousand font. Agitated that someone would ask such a doofie question, and trying to maintain my reputation as a comedian, I responded by saying Hawaii with the Napoleon Dynamite voice and facial expressions. Well, that was enough to put the little 14-year-old* through the roof. He made the intelligent choice to punch me in the back of the head right in front of the assisstant principal, earning him a week of suspension.

Okay, what he did was wrong and can’t be blamed completely on me, but I could have avoided it by just doing what Jesus would have done. Then everyone could see me not doing the easy thing (laughing at an idiotic question) but rather doing the hard thing (helping this kid with his social skills). I often say that I don’t have enough opportunities to show God. So do a lot of us. But in reality, we get chances all the time. We just tend to let them go by because we weren’t thinking about our choices.

Labels: Gems, Relationships

{ Posted 9:10 PM | Comments: 0 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

Language or Taking Things for Granted

By Justin, January 23, 2007

We take many of the things in our lives for granted, and most of the time we don’t even realize that we’re doing it. Like that nice car you got, or the newest XBox or Playstation, or whatever game that came out, or the house you live in... You take for granted all those toys you got for Christmas... Did you know that most kids don’t even get a penny worth? You take for granted the books you have, the clothes you have, and even the food you get. Did you know that most kids only get maybe 1/10 of what you get? We take advantage of these things without thinking of their meaning in our lives or what it would be like without them.

OK, now how do I tie this in with language...hmm...oh right. We even take the language, or what we say for granted also... Ok, wait... “How do we do that?”

How often do we think about the words we speak, the way they sound or even what they really mean? Just like we use the things in our life without thinking about them, we use words without thinking. We have phrases that we say that really don’t sound nice at all, when we stop to think about it.

In conclusion, I think we need to slow down. Let’s think about the things that God has blessed us with and appreciate them more. And, let’s stop to think about the words we say too and make sure that what we say is really what we want other people to hear from us and what we want to hear from others.

Labels: Gems, Relationships

{ Posted 7:44 PM | Comments: 15 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

Chuck Norris, Puritans, and OSU

By Ryan, September 16, 2006

You might be a huge Chuck Norris fan if your fantasy football team is named the Delta Force. You might be a little too much of a Chuck Norris fan if all you want for Christmas is the first season of Walker, Texas Ranger on DVD. You’re probably way too much of a Chuck Norris fan if you feel that your time on the bus is best spent telling Chuck Norris jokes to your friend. And telling your bus driver to “have a Chuck Norris weekend” is extreme for the extreme.

Augh, all of that applies to me... and I’m proud of it.

Many “facts” about Chuck Norris portray him as a deity, while others portray him as someone who’s always ticked off. Although they’re just jokes, is it possible that this is how people see God? In English the other day, we read a writing from a Puritan preacher who said that the mouth of hell is gaping wide open ready to devour us, and the only thing keeping us from falling in is the mere pleasure of God.

Now, Puritans will be Puritans, but really... if fellow Christians (from 400 years ago) believed that God is constantly angry at us like Terrell Owens at Donovan McNabb, then what’s to stop non-Christians from believing the same? The image of church to non-churchgoers is getting worse and worse. Even I wouldn’t be a Christian if I was raised to believe that God was out to get me. Nor would I enjoy church if all it was was hymn after hymn after hymn! I mean, our old worship director put a Texas twang on “Victory In Jesus,” which wasn’t bad at all, and we also sing “Solid Rock” occasionally. But other than that, it’s all contemporary. And how about us, the church people? What do we make church look like to others? A kid once decided not to like me because of my OSU hat. I asked him why, and he said that it was because of something unkind that another person did to him while wearing an OSU shirt. I don’t blame that kid one bit for hating Oklahoma State!

In a nutshell, I think that there is much that needs to be done in order to reach the unsaved among us. And, as many times as you’ve probably heard this cliché, it starts with us. Those WWJD bracelets are already past their season, but still... think about that before you act, because we might be the only Jesus someone will ever see. I know that it doesn’t mean as much to someone who hasn’t had their favorite college shunned by a 10-year-old from Arlington, but you gotta hear me out on this!

I think that my “nutshell” paragraph may have been longer than my first three, but oh well.

Labels: Gems, Influences

{ Posted 12:08 AM | Comments: 1 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

Why???Why??Why?

By Justin, August 4, 2006

Why???Why??Why? Well, I am not exactly sure why I am up this late, but I guess I just felt the urge to let you know what I am thinking.

Lots of people think about many different things like, what they are going to wear tomorrow (which I am not thinking about, cause tomorrow is a long time away), the next car they want, the next game that’s going to come out, school supplies, the internet, soccer or sports in general, and pretty much everything else the world has to offer... But, have you ever thought about what God has to offer???

What God has to offer is far greater than anything the world has to offer, far more amazing than anything you will ever see in your life, far more lasting than anything you will ever think about.

Have you ever had a hard time being accepted, because of what you have done in the past? Or what you look like? Or how you act? Have you ever wished for a friend that won’t care about any of it?

Have you ever loved anyone so much that you would die for them? Think about it! I mean die for them? Wouldn’t you want to have someone love you so much that he/she would die for you?

Isn’t that what Jesus did? God loves you so much that he sent his only son, Jesus Christ, to die for you, and not only that, Jesus could have stopped at any time, but he didn’t. Do you know why? Because He loves you so much, that he died on a cross with nails hammered through his hands and feet. Now, to have that everlasting love, you have to accept what he did for you and ask for him to come and live in your heart, not just live in it, but own it. When you truly believe and decide to live for Him alone, your life will start to change, and you will feel so much better about your self. God hates sin, but he loves sinners... We are ALL SINNERS, but He loves us anyway... He loves us anyway, what a great feeling... God doesn’t care how we look, or what we have done in the past, no matter what you have done, if you accept him into you heart, He will accept you. I can guarantee it. He WILL accept you.

Labels: Gems, Relationships

{ Posted 3:51 AM | Comments: 9 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

A Tale of Two Baseball Teams

By Ryan, July 11, 2006

It was the best of teams, it was the worst of teams. It was the 2-time Texas League Champions, it was the Colorado League’s 3-time last place team. It was my hometown Frisco Roughriders, it was my birthtown Tulsa Drillers. And they play each other tomorrow... or should I say later today?

Tulsa Drillers (6-12) @ Frisco Roughriders (7-11)
Tuesday, July 11th 7:00 PM

“Root for both and really confuse the people around you. Have fun.”

Labels: Challenges, Gems, Relationships

{ Posted 12:15 AM | Comments: 9 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

Good Fun

By Ryan, May 28, 2006

Great day in sports today. Just as I predicted in the last post, I went to church. I somehow ended up with the job of unofficial door greeter. We came back home and started watching the stuff for the Indy 500. Some of my other cousins are here to eat lunch and watch the race with us. Tonight, my belovéd Dallas Mavericks face the Phoenix Suns that I despise so much for stealing Steve Nash. The series is tied at 1-1. I didn’t always care about basketball; in fact, I never really followed the Mavs until earlier in the season. And yet, my “Mavs Fever” has rubbed off on my parents. My dad, who would never have given a care before, was searching for a station where we could listen to Game 2 on the way here. My mom asked me who won Game 7 when the Mavs were playing the Spurs. They even joined me in watching the Round 1 series between the Suns and Lakers, and groaned whenever the Lakers lost and cheered with me when they won. I guess I have quite an influence on my parents.

I just find it odd that it’s so easy to join people in some silly sports obsession that comes once a year for each sport, and yet nobody joins each other in Bible study groups outside of church. I tried to form one once last year, but it never caught on. My church up here in Tulsa makes a big point out of outreach. I think that everyone should do something of that nature.

Leave a comment on this post; I want to hear how/if other people agree with this. And, for those that do, we could maybe start an online study group?

Something to think on; and now, I must join my family in watching their race.

Labels: Challenges, Gems, Influences, Relationships, Sports

{ Posted 12:10 PM | Comments: 0 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

Roses Are Red

By Ryan, January 14, 2006

There’s more to life than girls. Look back on your past week and that becomes perfectly clear. You often never realize what you’re really doing until you see what the effect is.

Let’s look back on my week, for example. In fact, there are actually some good examples from last night, when I went to a lock-in with Boy Scout troop 216. When I went rock climbing, I felt like I was just going through the motions and whatnot. But after doing some ballaying, I saw that lots of younger Webelos were watching me and following my examples. Several 5^th graders that otherwise wouldn’t have understood the concepts of it figured it out by watching me. As “whatever” as that sounds, it helped them get their merit badges for climbing. One more merit badge was added to their Boy Scout “transcript,” which is one less they have to take to reach Eagle rank. Of course they owe it to more than just me, though.

Bees go out doing their own little thing, too... cross-pollinating flowers. They don’t necessarily realize that they are helping with nature, but they are. But, when you look at the big picture, aren’t we all?

So take a few moments to look at the roses you cross-pollinated unknowingly.
I know, that ending sounds nothing like me, but I saw a post on my uncle’s blog and had to put it here.

Labels: Challenges, Gems, Influences, Relationships

{ Posted 9:38 PM | Comments: 0 | Link: http://www.thestaigers.com/blog/ViewItem.asp?Entry=50 | E-Mail Post | Edit Post | Top }

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