Personality/Spiritual gifts Test

I am so tired of them. I will be perfectly happy if I never have to take one ever again. I have taken one of each already this semester. the gifts test re veiled nothing new it was just like all the others, whether the result was because of what I have been doing lately or because of where I want to go is still yet to be seen. the personality test re veiled that once again I am a walking contradicting. I make decisions by gut, and yet also through an analytical system. I am Self-reliant yet work best in a well balanced Group.

Now I will admit that this personality test was correct in things that I already knew, but not everything, and I am beginning to wonder how much of these tests are scientific and how much of them are perception.

There is a story in which a man who has spent much of his time debunking mystics went into a class and passed out a paper which he claimed was created by a psychic using the the person's last name and their birth date. They each were instructed to read over the paper and then asked to raise their hand if the paper accurately described them. Everyone in the class raised their hands. The lecturer then instructed the students to pass the papers to the person in front of them and then read them again. the class was surprised to see that every paper was exactly the same. I wonder how much personality tests are the same way.

Because of my curiosity i desided to look up my sign, and my Zodiac, just to see if my personality test and spritiula gifts test showed the same result.

Becasue I was born in febuary my sign is Aquarious which means I am: friendly, humanitarian, honest, loyal, original, inventive, independent, intellectual, intractable, contrary, perverse, unpredictable, unemotional, and Detached.

I was Born in 1984 which is the year of the rat so I am: charming, hardworking, goal oriented, a perfectionist, thrifty, easily angered, ambitious, and successful.

the Results from my personality test was: you may have a strong drive to be successful and appear accomplished. you may often want to be appreciated and have your victories acknowledged. so reaching your goals, while imporaint may not be enough. you may also want success with flair and triumph with stiyle. you usually find a way to get things done, but you tend to work best when you are parto fo a well balanced team. to persuade others to join your cause you will patiently explain what you are trying to accomplishe ans why. you will rarely strong-arm people into helping you. indeed you are usually very conciderate of others. your colleagues often view you as assertive, but you tend not to provoke strong negative reactions because you do not usually come across as aggressive or insistent. in all likelihood you are a very good critical thinker, this skill melds well with your tendencey to employ direct methodes to get the results you desire.

intersting. I took about 20 minuets to take a personality test that said the same thing as the year i was born and the date i was born. these do by the way flow nicely in with what i was told my spiritual gifts were teaching, prophecy, and mercy.

The Three Graces

I have started my new classes and I want to Share something from my New Testament class. This is found in the book Honor, Patronage, Kinship, and Purity by David A deSilva.

deSilva discribes what grace was seen as in the first century which is captured by a Statue three Goddesses, the three graces who dance hand in hand in a circle, and here is what the quote is.

Some would have it appear that there is one for bestowing a benefit, one for receiving it, and a third for returning it; others hold that there are three classes of benefactors-those who receive benefits, those who return them, those who receive and return them at the same time... Why do the sisters hand in hand dance in a ring which returns upon itself? For the reason that a benefit passing in its course from hand to hand returns nevertheless to the giver; the beauty of the whole is destroyed if the course is anywhere broken and it has most beauty if it is continuous and maintains an uninterrupted succession... Their faces are cheerful, as are ordinarilythe aces of those who bestow or receive benefits. They are young because the memory of benefits ought not to grow old. They are maidens beacuse benefits are pure and holy and undefiled in the eyes of all; [their robes] are transparent because benefits desire to be seen. (Ben. 1.3.2-5)

Here is a picture of grace. first there is the gift, the gift is recived, and then the reciver gives back thier gratitude. there are three parts of grace. The giver gives a gift and the reciver is then put in debt to the giver. If the reciever wishes to show thier gratetude should, even at the receiving, begin to think about how they will return the favor. However the giver should never think about what they will receive for thier gift. And when they recive a favor for the gift they gave they should belive that they have been repaid, yet a truly grateful person should never feel that they have done enough. And thus the dance continues.

That is the Greek first century veiw of what grace is. A Dance.

I could not help think how simple this made the complex concept of Grace. how beautiful it became, so completely other, and yet tangable.

God is of course our giver, he is ofcourse the giver or our very breath, and second the giver of our salvation. we then are the reciever. we reciever the gift and to show our gratitude by our actions. this would be where James comes in when he says, "show me your faith with out works, and I will show you my faith by works." with this image we see that works are a showing of faith because it is the returning of the gift, the expression of gratitude. From the book Benefactor which is by Sophocles who deSilva quotes goes on to say, The one should consider that he has received the return of his benefit, whaile the others should know that he has not returned it; the one should release the other, while the other should feel himself bound; the one should sayu I have received, the other I still owe. (Ben 7.16.1-2) God has received our gratitude but we are never done returning because like mary who poured out the oil onto Jesus's feet we feel we can never do enough to show our gratitude.

There is another way to look at this because it is a Dance. and a Dance only works as long as all the people are moving together. My causin is a ballroom dancer and he can probably tell some great stories about when he took me dancing because I had such a hard time letting him follow. when the dancers do not move together it becomes a mess, and ugly.

God is the giver, but when we try to return the gift before we will accept it. we want to pay god before we can accept his free gift. that is legalism, that is when works become an attempt to earn what God has done. and it is a slap in the face of the giver. because Paul tells us that our works are like filthy rags when we try to pay for the gift of salvation. and when he says filthy rags he is talking about the rags women used when Aunt Floo comes to visit.

When we Try to earn our salvation we are not showing gratitude, we actually are showing ingratitude. and impuning God's honor.

But when we recieve his gift and show our gratitude we actually increase his honor and the dance continues. We can never fully pay back God for all that he has done, but God does not keep track either so it is best to just continue to show our gratitude so that the dance continues to be beautiful.

Pators Retreat

First off thank you to Every one, I have just turned in a loan application so hopefully I can get my car.

Sence the wreck happened because I was on my way to my first pastor's retreate i thought i would write up my thoughts on that.

It was great to see alot of people I hadn't seen in like forever, encluding Dave and Kat, and Sasha. It is amazing how many bethany people are coming to the dekota district.

Our speaker was Dr. Pipper the president of OWU. and i had thought this was going to be a great speaker, which he was but not on the topic that he spoke. He was going to talk about world view which i thought was going to be my mission classes all over again because Dr. Peed loved world view. but then i thought maybe it would be about making the church relivent to the curent world veiw shift that seems to be happening, and that could be good.

however his entire talk was on how post modernity is evil and that the church must stay modern in it's mind set. that post modernity was going to under mind the church. he focused completely on the deconstructive side of Post modernism and never once reolized that there is another side taht works with the first which is the Reconstructive side. he only quoted from books that were modernist trying to refute post modernism.

the turth is that Post modernity has evolved because people reolized that Modernity doesn't work. Modernity promised that we could create our own destiny, that through the power of reason we would make the world a better place. don't get me wrong there were some good things that came out of Modernity. however it is time for a new way of thinking, one that may not be any better or worst but may be the answer Enstine was talking about when he said, "the problems of today will not be fix by those who made them." (I don't have the exact quote but taht is pretty dare close). and that is the truth, at least the catholic church has the brains to skip modernity and move on to the world view of today.

what really got me was that Dr. pipper who has done wonderful things at OWU, does not think that the post modern world view is valid. he has written it off as evil and wrong without reolizing that there is a baby hear in despreate need of some bath water. and this was evident in his statement "they hate the haters, are intalerent of the intalerant, and absolute there are no absolutes." That may be an extreme but as i have developed my own world view which includes many peaces of post modernism I have found that most post modernist are not absolute that there are no absolutes, they don't hate the haters, and are not intalerant of the intalorent. he is one more person who is trying desprately not only to hold on and validate his own world view but also force everyone else to comply with it.

I will always rember what Dr. Peed said in his world view class, "world views are not right or wrong, they just have parts that may need to change when one comes to christ." there is not christian world view, there are christian versions of world views.

Greese lightening has died

I had a very eventful day. today was the first day of pastor's retreat. and I was headed down the road, under the speed limit because well it was slick, but then I was almost missing my exit and so I turned really hard to try and cetch it wail slowing down,but either i slowed down too fast, or turned to hard, or did not slow down enough becuase I went into the ditch and was spinning. freeking out i tryed to stomp on the bracks but it wasn't the breaks i stomped on. a split second latter i was on the breaks but it was too late. My car took out a reflecter pole, a turn sign which flew onto the interstate (just barly), and the exit sign.

as soon as I am done screaming and reolize that I am not dead (but still in complete freakout mode) I trun around to see what the damage is. my back drivers side door is open, my stuff is falling out the door and one of the Poles is up in my window.

Still in complete freak out mode i reolize i have absolutly no Idea what the H E double Hockey stick I am suposed to do. then I remember Oh yeah I have a cell Phone, I should call someone. But Who? I gotta call the cops right? well do I need an actual number or should i just call 911, and I have to call Keith because he is already half way to rapid by now but he is my only chance to get down there for this Retreat, and I have to call my mom. head spinning (of course not litteraly) I think Mom, I'll call her first cause she has had experience with this type of thing she'll know exactly what i need to do. But of course it is monday and my mom is a math add so she is at work. well that is okay, I thought, I have her number. So I call the school. still freaking out i tell the phone operator that i need to talk to Gale (my mom). when my mom gets on I say, "Mom i was in a car wreck." I don't remember much else of the converstation exept mom made sure i was alright, and that no other vehical was involved. I rush out to see what the damage is and it was bad.

after seeing this i notice that three vehicles have stopped, and they all look the same. one guy gets out and he is talkin gon his cell phone. I also notice that on one Vehicles it says something funeral home. ironic no? he grabes my blinket from the car and puts it over my shoulders becasue i did not take the time to Grabe my coat before i got out of the car cause i am still in complete and total freek out mode. I over heard him say on the phone that the crash had alreading been called in and the people were on the way. So I went and sat in one of thier cars wail I waited.

I called Keith, the pastor i work under, and he said he would turn around and come and get me. So I sat and waited for the high way patrol and keith. the ambulence came, and I assured them that I was perfectly fine (feek out at this point was almost over), but they wanted me to come into the ambulence just to make sure. they took my blood pressuer and O2 levels just to be on the safe side. then after signing a waver that said i did not want to be taken to the Hospital I moved to the car that belonged to the cop who came on seen and waited for the High way patrol. (at this point the freek out was over.)

20 minuets latter the Highway patrol showed up and he took my statement, then about forty minuets latter Keith came and we moved my stuff into his car. as we were driving down the road, I now completely calmed down and done freeking out he informed me of the piliminary damage to my car, fixable but not nessisarily worth it. also he added, "I don't know how in the world you did not flip."

I took physics and I understood. when i hit that exit sign the pasinger side should have atempted to keep moving causing the car to flip. but it didn't. i lost both my back tires, which should have added to the flippage, but it didn't.

Basically from the pictures at the scene from all the factors, I should have flipped. god could have taken me home today, but he didn't.

instead the Red, blue and white trash, getto, greese lightening Beaner ride is no more and i will be looking for a new car.