Weak Like Peter’s blog

Beatitude: Relearning Jesus through Truth, Contradiction, and a Folded Dollar Bill

Matthew Paul Turner

Good quote from a book I'm reading which goes along with the idea of our church Journey. 

"I know now not to think of my faith in Jesus as a destination. The magic I experience in Jesus doesn't happen when I'm living a destination faith.  Whenever I feel like I have arrived in my faith, Jesus quickly pushes me back onto the journey.  He continues to push me.  And he pushes hard." 

I feel alot like that right now.  I'm not going to lie, I am tired of the "journey" right now.  But Jesus is pushing me back into the fray.  I'm ok with that though.

"You're blessed when you've worked up a good appetite for God."  Jesus in Matthew 5:6  (The Message)  

Refrence my Destiny post. 
We are the SEC Champions, and hopefully soon to be National Championship.  A few oddities of this years match-up and how they and the stars line up and foretell our victory. 

1) This is the University of Florida's 100 year anniversary. 

2) This is the tenth anniversary of our first and last football National Championship. 

3) Our championship game that year was against Florida St. who we had lost to in our last game of our regular                season.  Just like Michigan-OSU did this year. 

4) Our basketball team won the National Championship earlier this year. 

These are sign of hopefully our victory on Jan. 8th.  We'll see I guess.  Go Gators!

Go Gators

I took this IQ test before and scored a 126.  So here is my results this time. I must of had a bad day this time.  Im still up there with Ben Franklin according to the picture.  Boy that makes me feel good.

This number is based on a scientific formula that compares how many questions you answered correctly on the Classic IQ Test relative to others.

Your Intellectual Type is Inventive Inquisitor. You have the unusual distinction of being equally good at math and verbal skills. This means you are a creative thinker and are uniquely good at teaching others through experiences. You are also a great improviser and very good at handling change. 

I took this test from the website Tickle.  i found out about it from a neighborhood friend Tony. You can view it HERE, and take the test yourself for free from his post.  Here are my results:

Your Unconscious Mind Is Most Driven by Peace.

You have a deeply-rooted desire to make peace in the world. Whether through subtle interactions with loved ones, or through getting involved in social causes, it is important to you to be able to influence the world in a positive way. You have a deep respect for humankind.

You care about the future of the world, even beyond your own involvement in it, and you inspire others to feel the same way. Your innate drive toward peace guides you in daily life towards decisions that are respectful toward yourself and others. Your psyche is very rich; the more you learn about it, the more you will understand who you really are.

Explains why I do alot of things.  Kinda interesting stuff. 

Early this morning, I along with the rest of the core group, handed out cups of free coffee to people going into stores to shop.   There were lots of people (as can be imagined on 'Black Thursday') and most where I was stationed wanted the hot cups of coffee.  We had a table set up at the front of the store draped by paper with our Journey logo on it.  We were serving Starbucks' Christmas Blend.  Many thanks to all the people who made this happen, it truly would not have been possible without them.  A funny thing happened the entire time as I was there was people would ask if we were opening a new store (thinking we were with Starbucks.)  We would then point to our logo and explain that we were a new church starting up in the area, and for them to check us out when we open.  There was no verbal explaining of the gospel, there were no tracts of pamphlets given out.  Just the name of our church and the fact that we were Christians.  Many said thank you, occasionally a few commented on the fact that this was a nice thing to do, and several church-goers gave words of encouragement to us as they sipped on their coffee.  We helped several people to their cars with their merchandise, which was a welcomed act of kindness as opposed to someone snatching them and running off with them.  But this is what my mind was consumed with, that most of these people would have done just fine without our free coffee.  Granted they would have had to dealt with the cold without the comfort of their cups.  They would have had to put of their cravings of caffeine for a few hours until they could spair a second from their busy schedule of shopping to swing by Starbucks of Dunkin' Doughnuts.  They could have possibly gone on with the day without ever thinking about how nice it would be to have a cup of Starbucks coffee to sip on as they shopped.  But they didnt have to.  They could enjoy their caffeine high and their shopping high together, at the same time.  They could sip on something warm for their insides while the outside of their bodies stood shivering in the cold chill of the early, predawn morning.  As I stood there at our table, I thought about what was going through these peoples minds.  Some might have thought "What did these so-called 'Christians' do to that coffee, they must have put some hypnotic drug in it."  Still others surely thought "Well thats nice of Sears to offer free coffee to us this year, thats an improvement from last year."  Perhaps some said "Thats so nice and thoughtful of these people to come out and offer us free coffee while we shop, good for them"  While others thought "Yea, a cup of coffee would be nice while I shop, that is so nice of these nice people."  But my thoughts were'nt so much stuck on them.  My mind was captive to those others who thought other ideas like "What compels these people to serve us free coffee?"  Or "Why would anyone wake up at three in the morning to come and serve US coffee while we stand in lines for ourselves?"  Or those who question "What would drive these people to serve us in such a normal everyday activity as shopping?"  Those were the people I was thinking about.  Those were the ones who I wondered what was going on in their heads.  Jesus taught that when we serve even the weakest or smallest person, we are actully serving Him.  We as Christians are called to share the Gospel.  We are called to bring Heaven to Earth today.  We are called to show the love of Christ.  We are called to show life to its fullest.  Did you catch the word in those last two sentences, show.  We must show the Gospel with the everyday activities of our lives.  One of my favorite quotes of all time (one which I rarely live up to) is from St. Francis of Assisi.  He is quoted as saying "Preach the Gospel at all times and when necessary use words."  We must live out the Gospel at all times, we must show it with our actions.  We must live out the love of Christ.  Christ wants to shine His love through us.  And so as the night is winding down, I ask myself the question, "Did those people today see the love of Christ, did they see Christ in us?"  So as I am getting ready for bed, I have now come to the answer of my question.  Yes, yes they saw Christ. 

"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, what ever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me."  Jesus in Matt. 25:40 

"By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."  Jesus in John 13:35. 

"just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."  Jesus in Matt. 20:28 

"I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full"  Jesus in John 10:10 

"Thank you guys so much, this is a really nice thing to do. Thanks."  woman shopper who saw Christ' love.    

The book about O.J. Simpson has .....blah blah blah.  I am so sick of this crap about O.J. and his book and "confession."  He's a sick man, and we all know it, so let's move on.  

Rosie O'Donnell was recently quoted as having said "Radical Christianity is just as threatening as radical Islam in a country like the United States."  Although i do not know of the context of her quote, it still is a pretty strong comment.  And I happen to agree with her words, although i think she might have misused the terms that she used.  Radical Christians are not so much, in my opinion, the people who bomb abortion centers or who launch crusades.  I think they are people like Paul and Peter, Martin Luther, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer.  They are people who sacrifice everything for the sake of Christ, they willingly take up their cross and follow him.  But back to the quote.  I agree with her idea. There is no difference from someone blowing up an abortion center or a courthouse.  American lives are being taken by terroist, plain and simple.  What are your opinions? 

Glenn Beck will have a special tommorrow. Its about the extreme terrorist ultimate plots for the future. He has been championing everyone to watch it. Its at 7pm and 9pm.  Check out his website for more info. Im going to watch it, and i encourage everyone else to do it as well.  

Who knows where the idea of "Separation of Church and State" came from?  Where do you all fall, Separation or
Unity?  Where is your stance.  Do you have one?  Why if you do?  Just wanting to get some feedback, some good ideas for all of us to think about.  

Too many weird things have happened in the past couple of days to be mere coincidence. Rutger of all people beat # three Loiusville.  Texas loses to K-state (what?)  Auburn gets blown out at Jordan-O'Hare Stadium by three touchdowns to this years SEC disipiontment Georgia.  Cal loses.  The USC-Oregon game is still being played, we'll see how that one turns out. If USC loses that one, then we are in the drivers seat to the Championship.  To top it all off, we win in the Swamp (keeping Meyer's home perfection in tact,) By a two blocked kicks from the same guy! I have'nt seen a Florida finish like that since Auburn beat us back in 97 (i think) when we were number 1 in the nation, and they were unranked, and Duval(?) kicked the game winning FG in the final 2 seconds of the game.  All of this is just working out two well for it not to work out for us.  The Normal Gators would have lost that game today, not that they were good, but that our luck would not allow for us to have two crucial blocked kicks like we did.  I hate to jinks us, but this all just makes me wonder.  Of coarse we do have the spoilers of spoilers still to play, FSU.  they always play us hard. And Arkansas, wow, they looke good tonight.  So ill give everyone the run down in the BCS in case you dont know:

1 - OSU - plays Mich next week
2 - Mich - see above
3 - Louisville - lost to Rutgers, BCS dreams out
4 - that us, you know the story
5- Texas, they are only .2 of a point behind us, but they lost their second game, bye bye longhorns
6 - Auburn - they also lost their second. Sorry
7- USC - playing Org tonight, but even if they win t/n, they still face UCLA and Notre Dame. One of those will give them a second lose if Org doesnt.
8- Cal - lost second today against lowly Arizonia. Out
9 - Notre Dame - will sweep until they play USC.  But their early loss to Mich will keep them out, because Mich will get another shot before them.
10- West Virgina - realisticlly out already, but they can keep them in just for novelty. 
 
The black horse - #11 Arkansas. They pounded Tenn t/n, and looked good doing it.  If they win against us (FLA) in the SEC champ. expect them to come close to beating out the OSU/Mich loser for the BCS Champ bid. 

This is why i love College Football.  Rutgers, Moss blocking kicks, OSU/Mich game.  Amazing.  God did his best work when he planted in man's heart and mind the idea of football.  Go God.  (and Gators too!)