Warning: Spoilers ahead

Gem, Matt and I went and saw New Moon and it turned out to be even more terrible than the first movie, which is quite an achievement. While I spent much of the first film laughing, I spent much of this one saying "Oh my goodness" in exasperation at the poisonous trash that was defecating all over our eyes. Matt sat next to me and regularly said words which I shan't repeat on the blog, but it summed up my feelings better than the ones I could express to the limits of my Christian piety.

The acting was terrible, Edward still looks like a sad, cancer patient, and the writing was atrocious ("I love you, I can't live without you, you're my everything, I'm terrible for you, you're my breath, get away from me, but I actually really need you"). The only good bit of script was when Edward quoted a chunk of Shakespeare. It had a rather jarring effect finding such quality amongst such ugliness, kinda like finding a Rembrandt in a crack house.

I know I'm sounding rather harsh. But I can't find much to redeem this film. If you're a lady Jacob Black's abs are impressive and they might redeem the film a little (as they did for Lesley). There was a squeal in the cinema from many females when he took off his shirt for the first time. He spends almost the entire film with nothing but a pair of shorts on. His clothes get destroyed when he turns into a werewolf, but somehow he has an endless supply of jeans cut-offs at his disposal for when he goes back to human form. One imagines he spends all his time when not a werewolf at Wal Mart buying jeans then going home and cutting off the legs.

But apart from Jacob's conspicuous abs (which did little for me except make me feel inferior) this film is pretty useless. I don't think any of the character's are happy for any moment of the film. They're all depressed and spend the whole time moping about lost love. It makes for infuriating watching.

And then there are the messages. Which I think are probably the most horrendous bit of the film. Because I can cope with bad films if they aren't spreading terrible lies. This film is emotional porn at its worst.

There's the total dependence of Bella and Jacob on each other. They live and breath each other, and yet when they're together they just natter at each other (Bella: Turn me into a vampire, Edward: No, I won't, I love you and wouldn't do that to you, Bella: Turn me into a vampire, Edward: No, I won't... and so it goes). They are so co-dependant that when Edward thinks Bella has died he tries to kill himself, only to be saved by Bella as she proves to him that she's still alive. And this attempted suicide, sparkling in the sun, is seen as Edward's great romantic devotion to Bella. If a guy kills himself because he can't have his girlfriend any more, it's not romantic, it's totally unhealthy. Why do people want to hold up Bella and Edward's relationship as the epitome of true love? Teenage girls don't need any more encouragement to get into unhealthy relationships.

Romeo and Juliet is held up through out the film as this archetypal love story for Bella and Edward, as if Romeo and Juliet are the pinnacle of romance. They're not. The play isn't a romance, it's tragedy! Romeo and Juliet die! It wasn't as if Shakespeare wrote it to say "Hey kid's, be like this. Woo!"

If Edward was a vampire with any courage, when he found out Bella was dead, he wouldn't kill himself, at risk of sounding terribly clichéd, he'd decide to keep living with the pain, working at healing and making something good of his life, because that's what Bella would want. Except she probably wouldn't because Bella is one of the most selfish leading ladies in cinema since Scarlet O'Hara. She spends the whole film using and manipulating Jacob because it makes her feel better about Edward being gone and then using and manipulating Edward to make her feel good and turn her into a vampire.

If you want to get all Christian about it, then Bella and Edward are in the high priesthood for the idolatry of relationship. Surely Stephanie Mayer, the Mormon, can see that elevating anything other than God to that level of obsession in your life is going to be fundamentally destructive to the soul. We may not agree on who God is, but we should probably be able to agree that romance isn't God.

But perhaps the whole divine marriage thing of the Mormons, and the elevation of humanity to divinity in the after life is part of all this. So I could see how you could allow Bella and Edward's romance to be seen as some kind of representation of true humanity's realisation. After all it was the romance of father God and mother God who made the world and birthed us. But I digress.

Aside from Bella and Edward's mess, there's a scene in the film where Bella meets the fiancée of the head werewolf. She's had half her face ripped off by her fiancée in a snap fit of rage. And there she is, the first time we meet her, serving muffins to her man's equally dangerous friends. And when he comes home, they give each other a kiss and continue as if nothing is wrong. And this should be a cause for concern in the film. But it's not. No one thinks to mention that perhaps this girl should get out of the relationship. Their not even married and the guy has torn half her face off, and they just go on as if his fit of rage just comes with the territory of being engaged to a werewolf.

The only time the issue is addressed is when Jacob says he can't hang out with Bella any more because he might do the same to her. But then he hangs around anyway because he just can't stay away from her and he's selfish. And she keeps wanting him close anyway because he's her best friend. So we overlook the potential for incredible violence being perpetrated against these women if it's for the sake of relationship.

It's all just so terribly sick. And I think I react so strongly to it because it's so popular and so obsessed over by so many women and girls. It's just sending so many bad messages. If this is what girls are obsessing over, what will they take with them into their future relationships?

All that said though, I'm not going to go on a crusade to rid the world of Twilight. And if it gives us an opportunity to assess how healthy relationship should be done, then I'll take it. So maybe we should just look for those openings, to somehow point out that finding your Jacob or your Edward isn't actually going to be all it's cracked up to be and hopefully in turn, we can help people to see who might be better at protecting and selflessly loving these women who want good love so much.

Overheard in the Westfield Food Court on Saturday:

"...the Pope is the top guy, he runs the Catholic Church so he's obviously he's going to be Catholic."

I am currently toying with the idea of tweeting.

I do generally find Twitter dull. Or if someone has something good say, infuriatingly short.

I think I shall shoot for exceedingly dull. I wanna make it an art form.

I found out the other day that I am now officially a member of my new Baptist church. Hurrah! Now I can vote in the Christocracy (like a democracy, except Jesus votes through the real Christians and Satan votes through the fake ones and you see who wins).

Personally, I'm very excited to be a member. I had to be interviewed and everything. Although I never had to be dunked. I only got sprinkled as a child by the man in a dress, and they let me be a member anyway. These Baptists are soft, for which I am thankful. I think they might read out my name at the Church AGM on Sunday week. I'm sure I'll cry because it'll be very moving. I hope we all hold hands and sing "Welcome to the Family".

I'm wondering if I am still a member of the Anglican church? I think I might be. I think getting confirmed makes me an Anglican for life.

I'm hoping to maintain my Anglicanism. I want to be able to vote as an Anglican too. Not that voting means anything when you're an Anglican because the Anglican Church is a Autocracy. The Senior Minister just does whatever he wants but it's recommended he has Jesus as his senior advisor. Or Calvin if he's in Sydney. Or Elton John, if he/she is in the USA.

Anyway, I'm happy to now be officially a Baptist and an Anglican. I think I shall call myself a Banglican. I shall dance like a Baptist but drink like an Anglican, and everyone will just think I'm your typical Aussie bloke.

Banglicans, represent!

Over the past few days I've decided to make more use of my Google Reader. I have started to follow people and the blog posts they share, and I've started sharing blog posts that I like.

I think I like it because I read peoples blogs and think "Gosh, I wish I blogged that." Now with Google Reader I kinda can. Google tells me I have 5 people following my shared, but I wouldn't be surprised if I actually have none.

I'm slowly putting in you folk from Blog Feed so I can share your posts if I like them with all five of my avid followers.

Feel free to follow me if you want. I'm here or you can just search for thomaswench. That'll work too.

Now wasn't that exciting?

I spent this weekend in Tumbarumba with Soul in the Bush.

Soul in the Bush (I think technically it's meant to be SoulintheBush, but that's not that easy to read) is a ministry of Soul Survivor NSW/ACT where they send teams out to various country towns around NSW to serve the church there in whatever way the church wants.

So I was invited to join Beth, Tanya and James on a trip out to Tumbarumba to serve the church there. On Friday night we met 4 of the members of the Anglican church who were hosting us. They were most friendly and very happy to have us there.

On Saturday morning I was off to do some gardening pulling out weeds for an old lady with MS, then it was lunch with one of the families from Church. In the afternoon we helped run a kids afternoon, which was followed by a barbie for dinner and a youth night that night.

Sunday we ran half the church service, doing music, a testimony and giving the sermon. Then we drove home.

When I left home I had $14 in my bank account and $3 in my wallet so I wasn't entirely sure how it was all going work. When I got home I'd gotten to eat three meals a day, had all my accommodation paid for, and the petrol to get me there, and I only ended up scabbing one Coke off a team member during the whole trip. God's provision was generous and so were his people.

I did enjoy spending a few days with Beth, Tanya and James. We all stayed in a cabin together in the caravan park, so I feel like I got to have plenty of fun together. I enjoyed hanging out in the boys end of the cabin with James (the girls took the bedroom and because we're good Christians us boys didn't go in once). He was quite happy partake in poo jokes so I knew I had a good mission companion.

I also loved seeing the country folk and meeting a bunch of people who love God and love serving him in their community. They were so thankful to us for being there, I felt so blessed to be able to be a blessing.

When we ran the youth night we had some of the local hooligans turn up. They didn't feel like playing my wide game, they just wanted to look tough and throw water bombs. Then the local drug dealer turned up and they just wanted to impress him. Happily though, the hooligans and the drug dealer, and all the other youth, heard that God lavishes his love on them and thinks their valuable, so it was certainly worth having them along.

I prayed for a few guys who may never have been prayed for out loud before. They said I could do it and then giggled when I did but I still felt privileged to get to do it.

Running half the church service yesterday for Tumba Anglican meant that it became one of the longest church services in the world outside of Africa. We had a children's story, a testimony, communion, new music, old music, announcements and a sermon. It took us and hour and fifty minutes to get through the whole service. I did the sermon on Colossians 1:15-23, it was a rehash of an old one. While I love preaching new stuff, I also enjoy doing old stuff because you can pick your best sermons and do them better. And it takes about an hour or two to prepare rather than 15-20 hours. Still if I had to pick between old ones rehashed or new ones, I'd pick new ones.

Finally I did quite enjoy the road tripping. 'Cause road tripping is almost always fun, and it was fun this time.

I had a good weekend.

Today at my painting work I got given white painter pants. I'm very excited. I think I've finally made it.

I got this email from a job interview I went to a week ago to be a photographic assistant for Santa photos:

Hi Tom

Thanks for your email. Sorry for not getting back to you sooner. As you saw we had a lot of applicants at this stage we have given the positions to some of the more experienced people. We enjoyed meeting you – good luck with your music.

Regards

I'm really glad they took the time to get to know me. I might write back and tell them the new album is coming along great.

There's a cricket in our dining room. It makes the whole room sound an awkward silence.

Warning: long and probably dull account of consumer woe ahead

I am a member of Audible.com. It's an audiobook website. They charge me $16-$20 a month (depending on the exchange rate) to download one audiobook a month.

Unfortunately I slowed down in my audiobook listening. It was because I bought a 22-hour history of the American Civil War, and I struggled to get through it, so I didn't buy new books till I finished that one. But I never finished it, and the credits just stacked up.

Anyway, being on the poorer side this year, I thought, I should cancel my membership, but every time I went to cancel my membership they'd say "If you cancel you'll lose all your credits." And I thought, "I paid for them, I don't want to lose them."

So I thought up a cunning plan. My debit card expired last month. So I decided to keep money out of my account around billing time last month, and then the credit card would expire, and I wouldn't have to keep buying credits, I wouldn't have to cancel my membership, and I could use my remaining credits to buy books, and then cancel.

Well the plan worked until money went into my account about a week after the billing day, and bam, they took it. "Fair enough" I thought, "I am still a member." But my card expired so they weren't going be doing that again.

Then I checked my bank account today, and they still took money out, with my expired card! I don't know how that's possible!

So I just went and bought 6 audiobooks with my credits, and they'll just sit there till I download them. Then I went to cancel my membership.

I clicked the tiny, hidden link "Cancel my membership". They asked why, I said I was too poor. Then on the next screen they said "We're sorry to see you go, please accept $20 credit from us to thank you for being a member." So I took it. I thought it was just a parting gift, and when I came back, I could use it if I wanted it. But no, turns out, when you click that you're opting out of cancelling your membership. Sneaky buggers. So I was still a member.

I went back to try and cancel my membership again, quite happy to sacrifice my $20 credit, and there was nothing to click anymore, it had changed to an international phone number to call to cancel my membership. Sneaky, sneaky buggers.

So now I have $20 credit, an expired debit card, 6 books waiting to be downloaded and a continuing membership to Audible.com.

I will sort things out one day, but first I should go get dressed.

I have to fill out a form for a good conservative, Christian organisation and one of the questions is "List your 5 most influential books, outside the Bible?"

I thought that was a good question, so I thought I'd answer it here:

1. Evangelical Truth - John Stott



I never knew what an evangelical was before I read this book. It was on my pre-reading list for Youthworks. It's the only non-compulsory pre-reading I've ever done I think.

Anyway I read this book about evangelicals and Stott described a Christian that was me. I loved the Jesus and fervently believed the Bible. After growing up in a rather liberal church, I had never know my brand of Christianity had a name, or that it was popular. But then I read this book and realised I was an evangelical. I suspect the feeling was somewhat similar to the feeling mutants get when they realise they're not alone and they get accepted into Professor X's academy. Someone had defined me and it felt good.

Ever since reading that book I've been excited about loving and believing the Bible, and excited that there are plenty of people out there who feel the same as me. And I think I've loved the Bible more, and teaching the Bible more, because I realised it's not so strange to love the Bible.

2. Making Movies - Sidney Lumet



This was given to me for Christmas one year by my sister. I think I was 14. Up until that point my obsession with film and television production was leading me to want to be an actor. But then I read this book and I realised that actors had to be in touch with their feelings, and that sounded terrible.

But directing on the other hand meant that you got to play with cameras, lights, lens, set design, story, acting, editing, everything really. The entire film production process was open to you. Directing was where it was at.

And the life that Lumet described, seemed like the best life ever. I love film making, and this whole book was about a whole life of film making. I wanted that.

And so I decided to be a film director on the strength of this book.

I subsequently discovered what a famous and fantastic director Sidney Lumet is. I think that could be my favourite non-fiction book ever.

3. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis de Bernieres



This is my favourite book ever.

I read this after Jo lent it to me. I don't know what I was expecting. Jo just said it was good.

It was amazing. And the film is has nothing on the book.

I do love love stories. But the love stories I love the most are the ones about the hardness of love, and the unfulfilled longings and messiness of love. And this book is all that.

De Berniares' style of mixing real life with mild fantasy, his wonderful use of words, his hyper-real characters, it all just makes me so happy.

Reading this book felt like magic the whole time I read it. It gave me that feeling in my gut I get when I hear an amazing guitar solo, or see a spectacular scene in a film. I don't quite now how to describe it, but it's like the happiness is too intense for just the usual outlets, it has to employ organs usually reserved for other functions to express how profound the joy is. It's like I feel heavier and lighter as the same time. It's pretty darn special.

I know I've quoted this before, but just the first line of this book fills me with joy:

"He took the old man over to the window, threw open its shutters, and an explosion of midday heat and light instantaneously threw the room into an effulgent dazzle, as though some importunate and unduly luminous angel had mistakenly picked that place for an epiphany."

I couldn't really quantify the influence this book has had on my life. But I know it's made me love words more and appreciate love more. The book has stayed with me, its story has become part of my story and every fiction book I read gets compared to this book.

4. The Trivialization of God - Donald McCullogh



I picked up this book for $5 at Koorong. I think I was 18. I got it because Mum had been lent it by one of her friends and I liked the front cover.

The whole book is about how big God is. God is not a god you can fit into your own schemes and agendas. He doesn't exist to support your cause. God is his own person, he rules the world, and he's terrifying in his magnificence and power.

This book taught me how scary and terrible God is. It made me appreciate what it means that a person would die to look into the face of God. God is not my buddy. He's a consuming fire.

I think my respect and awe of God grew ten-fold as a result of this book. And I better understood the grace shown to us in Jesus so that we can approach this magnificent and awesome God without being destroyed, this God whose amazing power is bent on love.

5. Don't Just Stand There, Pray Something - Ronald Dunn



I think I was in year 10 or 11 when I read this. It was also Jo's. I don't actually remember much about this book but it had two lasting effects on me. It made me pray more and it inspired me to have regular quiet times.

The book told me to have a daily quiet time and when I did it to systematically work my way through books of the Bible. So I did. Ever since reading that book I've been having daily (or almost daily) quiet times. And because of reading this book and working my way through books of the Bible I read the whole Bible. I reckon I've read the whole Bible a number of times now, and this book inspired me to do it. That's pretty influential I'd say.


And they are my five. 3 out of 5 of these books I got from my sister. That's pretty cool. Thanks Jo. You changed my life.

What are your five? Or if the Bible is not a most influential book in your life, what are your six?

I watched the first four episodes of Skins last night. I'd been thinking about watching the show for over a year, since some of the crew in my small group told me to watch it. They loved it.

I wasn't feeling overly excited about the show, I thought it might just be a depressing show about sex, drugs and teenagers, designed to shock and titillate rather than say anything worthwhile. I was prepared to not watch much.

But the show isn't half-bad. It's kinda like a naughties, TV series of Trainspotting but less depressing. Each episode focuses on one of the characters in the group. It's teenagers dealing with eating disorders, falling in love, dysfunctional families, making dumb decisions. Pretty typical teenage stuff, if not a bit heightened in frequency and density for television.

And while there is a lot of talk in the show about sex and drugs, they seem to be just aspects of the character's lives, rather than the focus of the stories, or just devices to get people to watch. The show doesn't feel exploitative or deliberately provocative at all.

What's really cool is that the show's writers have an average age of 21. So it's written by people who know what it's like to live the reality of these characters. The age of the writers does explain some of the humour and surreal characters that pop up through out the show. Every now and again it's gets a little HSC Drama. But it's never too much to be anything more than a mild distraction.

So I'm a fan. I'm not sure how quickly I'll work my way through the show but I reckon I'll at least get through the first season.

This shows why you should always pick up your Hornsby and Upper North Shore Advocate off your driveway quickly. After 5 weeks it becomes somewhat unreadable.

The other thing that happened at work was that I noticed that all the cleaners were wearing pants, nice shirts and waistcoats (or should they be called wastecoats, heh heh). I mentioned this to one of the other ushers and he agreed that the cleaners looked good. Better than us in fact. I want to wear a waistcoat.

When one of the cleaners walked past we told him he looked good in his fancy clothes.

I said "You're looking better than us, we should swap jobs."

As soon as I'd said it I felt bad because I realised that I was implying that because we were ushers we should look better than the cleaners. I don't really think there should be class distinctions between jobs, especially in the same work place.

So I tried to make up for my rudeness by telling the guy that he looked good. I hope he wasn't too offended.

I hope we ushers get waistcoats.

I worked yesterday ushering at a conference. It was a conference for sales people of a big brand, pyramid scheme. It wasn't all that interesting. Most of the talk was about how if you do the right thing in the company you can retire within a few years.

There was one person telling people how to be good at sales. He said most people were bad because they were worried about what other people thought of them. Like if I push my crappy product on you, you'll probably think I'm a tool. He didn't put it quite like that, but that was the implication. In fact the speakers often mentioned the fact that people tend to dislike the sales people of this brand. It was a source of pride that people dislike them. Kinda like when Christians get together and say "The world will hate us, but we have the truth. Rah rah rah!"

Anyway, the speaker was saying, to be a good sales person you have to not worry about what people think of you. People don't think about you as much as you think they do. He said "I want you to ask yourself, how many times today have you thought about your spouse? Your children? Your best friend? Your friends? Your neighbours? Your acquaintances? Not once. You haven't thought about them at all, because you're too busy thinking about yourself. And in fact they haven't thought about you because they're too busy thinking about themselves. People are essentially selfish. It's alright that's just how we are."

His application for this enlightening piece of information was that you should be as brash as you want in selling stuff, because no-body is thinking about you, so don't worry about what people think of you.

It was rather inspiring stuff.

If you look to the left you'll notice that this is post 250 of 2009. That's 9 more posts than were done in the whole of 2008. This will be the first full year of blogging where my number of posts has increased from the year before. That's what's underemployment will do for you I say.

So the old choking up exited the cinema and happened live on stage in front of a couple of hundred people last night.

I was at Impact, the final concert for Breakthru' Artz as they wrap up 10 years of ministry. Helen asked be to do the task of speaking for two minutes about the year 2005 and its significance for Breakthru' Artz. I think I ended by saying something like, "I think the greatest miracle for Breakthru' Artz is that God used it to bring people to Jesus. Thanks Helen." And it was somewhere in that last bit that I choked up and felt like I was about to cry. Right there, with the spot light on my face, and hundreds of people looking at me. I had no idea it was about to happen. I hadn't be feeling emotional about things at all and then suddenly there I was choking up like a mother and son reunion scene in a Hollywood film.

I couldn't work out if I was getting emotional about Breakthru ending or about people becoming Christians. I wasn't sure if it was a happy sad or a sad sad. Either way is fine. Whatever it is I'm totally getting in touch with my emotions. Or perhaps more precisely my emotions are getting in touch with me.

I thought of a line the other day to keep up my sleeve. You know, one to use on a lady.

I thought it'd be awesome to say "Can I be your Arthur Miller?" I figured it was both cultured, self-deprecating (depending on what you think of Arthur Miller) and highly complimentary to the girl.

But then I heard this song today by Megan Washington where she used the line:

You'll be my Arthur Miller and I'll be your Marilyn Monroe.

I was a little crushed because the girl could very possibly be a Megan Washington fan and think I was just stealing the line. And if she thought that I could just as easily have used any old line. I could have said "Hey baby, that dress looks good on you, but it'd look even better on my floor (obviously after we've courted and then got engaged and then married and before you leaving your dress on the floor starts to annoy me because you never pick up your freaking clothes)" and it would have made no difference.

I guess I'll just have use it on deaf girls. I wonder how you say "Arthur Miller" in sign language.

I had my first night of Youth Group at my new church. I'm just a lowly leader. As the newest leader, I could be the lowliest. It was pretty great. I do love youth ministry, and tonight I wasn't in-charge of anything. I was just there. I wasn't a guest. Just a leader. I haven't been just a leader since 2001.

The youth group is quite different from my old one. It's a little odd wandering around not knowing what is going on. Every now and again I felt the need to be a youth minister and tell people what to do. But I have to resist. No one likes the new guy who turns up and things he runs the show.

Still it was good to be back hanging out with teenagers again. I have missed them. And at the moment, having had a nine month break and not having to be in charge, I'm feeling full of energy and totally un-jaded. Woo!

Tomorrow night I'm going to a big do for the old church. So I should see a bunch of my old youth too. That's exciting. They're pretty awesome.

I had a beer with Dicker today. We sat in a pub in the city and drank Kilkenny. Mike (Dicker) got the beers. He bought us a pint each. I drank the whole thing and didn't fall off my stool once. I was so proud of myself. Last time I had a whole pint in one go Helen had to drive us home cause I was making Dad jokes. I didn't let on how proud I was of myself though. That would be un-manly. It's poor form to show that you get mildly inebriated after just one beer.

When we got our beer Mike said it was the "milk and honey of beers". I thought that sounded rather nice, but when I drank it didn't taste at all like milk and honey. I was most disappointed even if it was good beer. It occurs to me had I wanted milk and honey I could have just asked for some milk and honey. I'm sure they could make some. I could have drunk a pint of that. Though I probably would have been in worse shape after that than the beer. "Milk was a bad choice."

I saw this poster the other night when out with the Bennetts:



Seeing as that looks like such a winner I've decided to run my own event for people with special needs. I'm going to call it:

Retardance Party
Get downs on the dance floor

I worked with John the Painter again today. I came home with paint on me. That's a win!

It's all here.

I think I'm turning into a bit of a sook. I tend to get choked up watching movies a lot these days. It seems to happen most in scenes involving husbands and wives and parents and their children. I got a lump in my throat in Up when the old man's wife couldn't have kids and then again when she died. I think I got a little teary in Mao's Last Dancer last night when the guy was reunited with his parents. I even got all emotional when Ellen Page's character reconciled with her parents in Whip It. (Speaking of those movies, I should write my reviews of them.)

What's happening to me? I used to be a rock. Now I'm turning into a blubbering mess. Perhaps I'm learning to express emotion in film so that one day I'll deal with it in real life. I hope not.

I think it may be because I spend so much of my time thinking about marriage and love and husbands and wives and kids and parents, that when I see emotional stuff on film it affects me. I often get annoyed when I see bad marriages on film. I think "Damn it, I want to be married so I can do a better job" and when parents are mean to their kids I think "Give me a kid, I'd love them better than that." I have the luxury of being childless and single so I can arrogantly judge movie characters from my idealistic inexperience.

Anyway, I'm not entirely sure why I'm getting emotional in films now, when I used to just be able to watch in an entertained but detached way. Maybe I'm going through a quarter-life crisis, or man-opause. Maybe my hormone cycle is changing and I'm growing a heart. Who knows? Whatever that case I hope it just stays in the cinema. I can cry in the dark there and no one will know. If I start crying about real life, who knows what will happen to my credibility as an insensitive male? No one will ever trust me in an emergency, I'll be stuck in a life raft with the women and children.

Happily it should just stay in the cinema, because it still takes a lot of emotional music to get me feeling emotional. So until an orchestra starts following me around scoring my life, I should be able to just keep the tears in the dark.

It makes me angry when the only thing the Government and the Opposition can agree on is that we need to be "tough on illegal immigrants." This whole thing with the Tamil refugees getting intercepted by Indonesian authorities before they reach Australian waters is getting to me. I actually don't mind too much that Australia asked Indonesia to help. Like if there was a problem in your neighbour's backyard you might ask them to deal with it before it gets to your backyard.

But that said I don't know why we have to be so afraid of asylum seekers. We have the means to process them in a humane and dignified way, we just don't have the compassion. It's a political winner for Rudd to say "I make absolutely no apology whatsoever for taking a hard line on illegal immigration to Australia". Refugee policy should be about more than just what looks good to the electorate.

One of the reasons I was excited by a Labor Government was because I thought they might have a better immigration policy. And in fact, they have made some good improvements to the visa system and the use of detention centres. But why can't we say "If you care enough about your safety, and your family's safety, to spend weeks and months travelling across the world, in unsafe transport with dodgy rip-off merchants to get to Australia because you believe Australia will protect you and your family, then we will give you the time of day to investigate your case and process you application of asylum." It makes me sad that Australia wants to be seen as a country that takes a "hard line". Why can't we be a country with a soft heart?

I'll give the last words to Alex the Tamil spokesperson on the refugee boat in Indonesia who I enjoyed listening to tonight: "First of all I would like to say thank you to Mr Kevin Rudd because he has accepted many refugees in the past, and those refugees can be any one of our brothers or sisters who have found refuge and found safety in Australia.

"And we are thankful to him, but the other thing we would like to tell Mr Rudd is the fact that there are still many more Sri Lankans who need help.

"For you to share intelligence and make sure that this boat does not reach Australian waters - it was very difficult for us to accept because we came until the last point believing that Australia will accept us into their country."

I've finally gotten to fulfil my long term dream of being a tradie. On Thursday and Friday last week and on Monday and Tuesday this week I got asked by a friend who's a painter to do some work for him stripping wallpaper of the walls of a unit.

It was good fun. I was working with another guy called Mitch. John, the painter, let us into the unit on Thursday morning, bright and early at 7am, taught us how to strip wall paper properly, and then left us to it. He told us we should be able to get the unit done in the next two days.

Mitch and I set to work. Mitch was better at it than me. It took me a while to get the hang of it (like a whole day). At one point I was feeling inadequate about my stripping abilities and was about to pipe up and say "I'm not sure anyone would pay me for my wallpaper stripping abilities" until I remember that someone was paying me.

Despite my lack of skills I enjoyed doing something that was physical with very tangible results you can see. I like that at the end of each day I felt tired from many hours of scrubbing walls and scraping paper. I felt like I was living the tradesman dream. Plus Jesus was a tradesman which makes me feel extra pleased about the work.

By the end of my first day Mitch and I had done three walls of the lounge room. It didn't look like we were going to get the unit done in two days. In fact by the end of the second day we still hadn't finished the first room. John emailed me asking for the account details and mentioned that he was very pleased with the thoroughness of our work. What a nice boss.

In the end after four days we still didn't get everything done, even after getting a hand for a while.

Still I guess I wasn't too terrible because I have some more work with them next Tuesday. On Tuesday I'm planning on wearing stubbies and get a bit of butt crack happening. I wanna be a real tradie.

"Nothing's changed. We still don't have a deep concern for the welfare of our families and friends, we still don't change our diaries to reflect the people who should matter most to us. And our diaries are still the people who have said "Yes" to Jesus ages ago. We are frightened and we are like rabbits in the headlights when it comes to intentionally sharing the Gospel. Dear friends it's time to come out of the closet with a deep trust in God and prayerfully arrange your diary to be with the people who are like sheep without a shepherd just like our Master said. Will you come out of the closet?" - Geldo, just then.

I'm not normally one to care about other people's hair styles, but there are some that are really disturbing me at the moment. When did the Lads get together and decide rats tails are hot and the shaved head with bleached mullet is attractive?

Ladies, would you date a man with hair like that?

On the other hand I may just be not up with what's fashionable right now. I should probably make a start on that mullet.

I went to a World Vision event today where Tim Costello, Fuzz and Carolyn Kitto, and Brian McLaren spoke about the way the church can be relevantly engaging with the world.

I went because I wanted to see Brian McLaren. Probably because I'm a stickler for theological controversy. I knew that McLaren gets a bit of bashing from the conservative Christian crowd for his thoughts on scripture and his leadership within the emerging church. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. I knew he was in Australia and I wasn't going get the chance to see him as I wasn't going to Stump. So I decided to go to this.

For a while before I forgot what the day was about. Seeing as it was a World Vision event I started to worry that I was going to spend the day being told to sponsor children, give money to World Vision, and get in small groups and discuss the Millennium Development goals. And while all of those are good things, I'm little bored by them.

However when I turned up they told me the day was about helping the church to engage relevantly with the world. They didn't even say "engage relevantly with the world so everyone can give more money to World Vision." I actually felt like it is probably some of the best work that World Vision can be doing in the west for long term change. They are educating people, church leaders in particular, at a fundamental level about why the church needs to shift its focus to the great issues of justice and compassion facing the world today. When you shift people's understanding and attitudes rather than just their money you'll achieve a lot more long term gain.

Tim Costello started off the day by giving an excellent overview of the need for the Church to express it's faith through dealing with the emergencies facing the world today. He showed us the historical underpinnings for Australia's relationship with the church and the churches relationship with society. I enjoyed it a lot.

Fuzz and Carolyn talked about the need for the church to have a missional focus.

And Brian talked about the need for the church to stop focusing on itself and start focusing on the world.

My experience of McLaren is not that he's a raging heretic, false prophet, spawn of Satan. He said a lot of stuff I really liked. He talked about the need for institutions to protect the gains of previous movements and movements to make the gains not being made by institutions. In other words he seemed to be saying the established church is needed to preserve the gains of the reformers of the past. And the emerging church need to make gains to be preserved by established church. So the emergers and reformers make gains in their movements and cement those gains in the the institutions who protect them. The church is always moving forward then with movements leapfrogging the the establishment.

People seemed to hear this as a call to abandon the institutional church and surge on ahead because they're too busy protecting the past. But I heard it as saying both parts of the church are need each other and the best situation is when the whole church can be working together to surge ahead to be growing and adapting to the ever changing contexts it exists in. I liked his optimism for the church.

He had a lot of criticism for the traditional view of salvation being "believe in Jesus, go to heaven." He said salvation isn't about agreeing with a set of doctrines and then getting eternal life, but he related salvation back to Abraham's call in Genesis 12, saying that salvation about being blessed to be a blessing. He wanted to emphasise that our faith is not just to secure us eternal life, or God's blessing, but to transform us to be people who bring God's kingdom to earth now.

I really liked his emphasis on the need for our faith to be outworked in our loving interaction with the world. We need to be people who are caught up in God's preference for justice and mercy. Like James says faith without deeds is dead. We definitely need to get the focus of salvation off being some scheme devised to meet our needs of eternal security.

I did feel however that he seemed to overemphasise the idea that the primary reason for our faith is to transform the world. The impression I got was that he was discounting the eternal nature of salvation to focus on the immediate implications. We need to affirm that God saves us to bless the world without forgetting that there is however more to it than just this world right now. I would want say that while we have a responsibility to be bringing the values of the Kingdom to bare on our communities, society and world right now, that's not the end point of the kingdom. Salvation is not ultimately about our happiness but God's glory. God saves us for his glory. When we are changed and transform the world, he is glorified. When the poor are helped he is glorified. And when his Kingdom comes he is glorified. At some point God will finish the Kingdom work that he started in Christ when Christ comes back and establishes God's just rule for eternity. We are called to be transforming the world now, but in the knowledge and hope that God is going to wholly transform this world in the future.

Another of McLaren's things was that we need to understand the narratives of the Old Testament to properly understand the life of Jesus. The narratives being those of Genesis (creation and reconciliation), Exodus (liberation and formation), and the Peaceable Kingdom (justice and mercy). I really liked the importance he placed on viewing Jesus in light of the stories that have come before. Jesus wasn't just some guy who arrived in Israel in 0 AD as an isolated event in the history of the world. He was the Jewish messiah, the culmination of years of God's self-revelation of his people through the great narratives of his redeeming work, he is the climax of God's story of his work with the world. I think that reading of the OT makes our understanding Jesus' life and work even richer. This is a pretty similar idea to what NT Wright is pushing when he talks about Jesus. I want to keep thinking about that.

So if I can sum up my McLaren thoughts, from everything I saw and heard yesterday he's not a dangerous heretic set to destroy the world as we know it. I know I disagree with him on a number of issues. His view of the Bible is less conservative than mine. (I reckon he and my Mum would get on.) I think he's got lot's of good stuff to say, and he has a lot to helpfully challenge the church on. If he continues to run around the world telling Christians to be blessed to be a blessing, I can't complain about that. Go McLaren.

On Sunday I preached at my church for the first time. I had a good time.

The man with an eye patch who I once pondered if he was a pirate turned out to be a swashbuckling Baptist minister who interviewed me so that the congregation would know who I am. He didn't stab me with his cutlass, just jab me with some denominational proddings about my confirmation. I'm not sure my flaky Anglican affirmations of faith were deemed an adequate substitution for a hearty believer baptism. But he is a gracious man, and welcoming, so I was forced down no planks into the baptismal pool and was allowed to preach. I like him a lot.

The other week I introduced him to Gem and he said "Oh I could tell you a few stories about Tom", at which point Gem replied "I think I could tell a few of my own." I was most pleased that he would feel like he knows me well enough to tell stories about, despite the fact that before that we had shaken hands and said "G'day" only twice. I was also pretty sure that any stories Gem has about me would top his stories seeing as "He's said "G'day" on multiple occasions" isn't much of a story. He was probably just saying he could tell stories about me to affirm our congregational connection. I think that's pretty friendly.

I really hope he doesn't mind the pirate references. If he does next time I'll go the evil genius route.

The preach itself went well. I felt ok about it. It was good to be preaching again. I especially loved being able to preach to a group I know (at least know better than almost every other group I've preached to this year, the whole right hand side of the church I haven't really met). It's a real blessing getting preach to your home church. I really find it satisfying because you know where to pitch it. You don't find you're just fumbling around in the dark hoping your application is relevant. Still the topic I was preaching on (God's love and suffering) is a pretty universal one.

After church a guy patted me on bum to say "Good job". It was the first time preaching has got me congratulated like a footballer. It was like I'd just scored a try. I think that's the only time straight men are allowed pat other straight men on the bum. Still perhaps we should institute more bum pats for preachers to make preaching more manly. There could be a few blokey blokes standing on stage with the preacher and every time they make a good point the blokes could grunt and say "Good-one preach!" and pat the preacher on the bum. I think it'd make men feel like church is more like a sporting match and make them want to come more. Perhaps also if church had cheerleaders too.

Speaking of blokeiness, I got to watch the NRL Grand Final on Sunday too. I was pretty cut that I wasn't going get to watch it. The first year I wasn't at Black Stump and I wasn't employed by the church, and I was preaching and I was going to miss it.

But happily, it was organised that we'd all watch a taped version after church and none of us would know the score. And we could fast-forward the ads and the half-time jabber when everyone goes to the toilet.

It worked very well, and I was very happy to be watching. I was keen for the Eels to dominate because they are, I guess, my default favourite team after Norths folded. I also think Storm don't deserve to win because they're from Melbourne and people in Melbourne don't even care about the NRL. It's the worst kind of insult for Melbourne to think our game sucks and still beat us at it.

Alas, the Eels were rather disappointing. The Storm outclassed them with very methodical football. It wasn't showy, just precise and it got the job done. At least that's my analysis and I watch about three games a year, so I should know.

I was so sad for the Eels. I think I felt depressed for at least a minute twenty after the game ended. Then I went and did a wee.

That was fantastic hail storm today. So much hail. There's hail still on the ground now, 3 and a half hours later.

I was driving home at the time. It was the most fun I've had driving in a long time. Rain, ice, low visibility, and I powered on in the trusty Pulsar. It was almost an adventure.

Facebook is giving me a bad day.

This morning I found my Facebook account had been hacked:



So I went through and changed my password. And I changed a few of my other more sensitive passwords in case I have a virus that has logged my keystrokes or something. And I scanned my computer for viruses but found nothing.

Tonight I came home and found I couldn't log into Gmail or Facebook. I think because I made my passwords too hard to remember. So I had to reset them. But it's hard to do that because they send the password reset to your email and your email is in Gmail and you can't get into Gmail. Argh!

Then when I finally get onto Facebook I see that two of my friends have been status hacked as well.



So perhaps the problem is with Facebook and not with me. Or maybe this virus is just going really well. Or maybe Sam and Mathan really did lose 8 1/2 pounds and are really excited to tell everyone. Stranger things have happened.

Whatever the case I'm sick of typing stupid passwords.


I'm not entirely sure what the ethics of sticking up pictures of people's hacked Facebook statuses are. If you want me to take it down Sam, I will. I'm pretty Mathan doesn't read my blog. But Mathan, if you do, let me know and I'll take it down for you too.

I'm not one for getting too excited about the internet (Woo Bing!) but I did just watch a one hour presentation on Google Wave. It looks pretty impressive. If this thing takes off it's gonna change how we relate on the web. It seems to put all the best bits of the net into one place so you can share it with everyone. I'm rather excited.

It looks to me like it'll be the usual problem with the internet enhanced. More information, more communication, more time wasted.

Google is going to own the world.

Contrary to popular belief, New Zealand didn't sell their entire air force to Australia. They still have an air force, they just sold their fighters to various people around the world. They have still have transport planes however, some helicopters and some snazzy trainers.

So should anyone ever invade New Zealand, New Zealand won't able to fight them from the sky, but they will be able to move things about with skill. But it's not all bad for New Zealand if they get invaded their navy has two combat ships which should keep any invading force busy for a while.

For those who are wondering, this is the entire New Zealand Air Force:

2 Boeing 757, 5 C-130H Hercules, 6 P3-K Orions, 14 Bell UH-1H Iroquois, 5 Bell 47G Sioux, 13 Aerospace CT-4E Airtrainer, and 5 Beech King Air B200. (From here)

Them: Do you have a girlfriend?
Me: No
Them: How old are you?
Me: 26
Them: Don't worry, you've got time.

I feel like I have this conversation, or variations on it, around once a week with well meaning middle-aged (or old) women. I wonder what they'll be saying when I'm forty?

Them: Well at least you get to watch plenty of TV.

I'm preaching on Romans 8 in church next Sunday. I'm excited because it's my first time preaching at my new church. The passage Romans 8:28-39 which it very cool. It's like preaching one of the Bible's greatest hits.

I'm looking forward to spending this week writing the sermon. Though I'm sure I'll be up late on Saturday night writing as usual.

The two service leaders have both asked me if I want anything for next week. I told both I wanted fireworks to go off and then I appear on stage. They both said no. Then I said I wanted to come down from the ceiling on wires like that guy came in with the cup at the Grand Final yesterday. They said this was a possibility. I'm hoping they rig it up for me.

I'm going to spend the week trying to work out what outfit to wear when I preach. I need to look hot but not too hot. Like not sexy. Holy hot.

I'm also going to try and figure out what jokes are going work on the new crowd. They're a mixed bunch, with a very broad age range. You've gotta know your crowd otherwise you'll just bomb.

At some point I may also consider what God wants to say through the passage. But that will be secondary to the fireworks, clothes and jokes. You've got to make sure the main thing is the main thing.

Yesterday was my worst day at work so far. It wasn't that bad, just my worst so far.

I turned up at 5:10pm and went to the staff entrance which was closed and the security person who checks you off gone. I asked an usher who was standing outside smoking where the staff entrance went. He said it had moved to a new door. But it hadn't. It had been closed because the shift that I thought started at 5:30 started at 5:00. I convinced one of the ticket people to let me in through their door. They didn't recognise me. No one really recognises me when I'm not in uniform there. I'm a nobody.

I rushed in, got changed. Saw a supervisor and apologised for being late. He didn't seem to care. That was good. He briefed me on the event, and told me there were relocations. Everyone had been moved from the top tier of seating to the middle tier. Although only to sections 8, 10 and 12. I was working sections 9, 10 and 11.

Unfortunately the performers (a symphony orchestra playing hit music from video games and anime) took a long time to get through sound check. So by the time we got to open the arena doors, I forgot I was meant to be putting the relocates in section 10 and started putting them in section 11. It was only about 20 minutes after opening, when a bunch of people with tickets for section 11 turned up and I found I'd put people in their seats that I realised I'd been doing it wrong. So I then had to move all the people I'd put in section 11 across to section 10. And then suddenly everyone thought that it'd be a good idea to move to empty seats that looked better. So I had to keep moving people back to where they should be. It was rather a mess.

But once the show started things calmed down. The only incident I had to attend to was a man in full US Army combat fatigues who was taking photos with an SLR camera. I told him to put it away because you're only allowed little digital cameras. He gave me a greasy and stopped taking photos.

My favourite bit of the night was when the compere, while interviewing one of the visiting conductors from overseas who express a wish to see a koala, said "I'm sure you can find somewhere to touch a koala." That and when they played the Astro-Boy theme.

At the end of the night I was given the job of standing in a deserted area of the venue to in case any lost famous Japanese composers wandered by trying to get out. My job was to send them backstage. No one came by for half an hour, and then I was allowed to go home. I enjoyed that half-hour. I'm pretty sure I didn't stuff up once.

So there you go. Worst shift so far but not really that bad at all.

"But now she seemed different to me. I became aware of her special powers. How she seemed to pull light and gravity to the place where she stood. I noticed as I never had before, the way her toes pointed slightly inward. The dirt on her bare knees. The way her coat fit neatly across her narrow shoulders. As if my eyes had been given magnifying powers, I saw her more closely yet. The black beauty mark, like a fleck of ink above her lip. The pink, translucent shell of her ear. The blond down on her cheeks. Inch by inch she revealed herself to me. I half expected that in another moment I'd able to make out the cells in her skin as if under a microscope, and a thought crossed my mind that had to do with the familiar worry that maybe I'd inherited too much from my father. But it didn't last long, because at the same time I was becoming conscious of her body, I was becoming aware for my own. The sensation almost knocked the breath out of me. A tingling feeling caught fire in my nerves and spread. The whole thing must have happened in less that thirty seconds. And yet. When it was over, I'd been initiated into the mystery that stands at the beginning of the end of childhood. It was years before I'd spent all the joy and pain born in me in that less than half a minute." - Nicole Krauss - The History of Love

So today was a rather enjoyable day.

Nathan was coming over so I got excited. I got so excited that went on a housework/gardening frenzy.

Originally, as per Nathan's suggestion, I made my list of things to do it like this:

Things to Ninja Do:

1. Eat my breakfast with no lights on
2. Do the washing up without touching the ground
3. Clean the bathroom without being seen
4. Bring in your washing, like a ninja
5. Sweep the balcony without making a noise
6. Mow the lawn with a ninja sword
7. Read Romans commentaries upside down

I even planned on doing it all, like a ninja. And I was going to take photos and stick it up here on the blog. You would all have been impressed.

I did number one easy. But number two, not so much. I was going to do the washing up sitting on a stool so I didn't have to touch the ground. Ingenious. However it was too uncomfortable and I was too far away from the sink so I gave up on ninja housework and just did the rest like a normal person.

When Nathan came I had been dozing on the couch pretending to read about Romans 8. I hadn't mown the lawn.

Nathan (I've mentioned him 4 times now. Lucky he's not a girl or you'd think I'd have a crush on him. He's married so I'm not allowed to have a crush on him, even if he was a girl.) and I watched Bender's Game and ate wedges. The movie was not very good. There were funny jokes but it was just like 4 mediocre Futurama episodes stuck together. I think I slept through some of it.

When Nathan left I got into mowing the lawn. Actually I got out the mower then sat on the front lawn and pulled out weeds while Mark Driscoll shouted at me. I took over an hour and only managed to do a third of the lawn. I don't know if that's normal. I think we may have an abundance of weeds. Still I do love gardening. I have no idea about plants and stuff. But looking after the garden feels good. I think it feels similar to the feeling you get when you chop down a tree. Only chopping down a tree feels better because it's a lot more manly.

Tonight I tagged along with my church's youth group to Alive. I'm not part of the youth group, but I wanted to go to Alive, so I was allowed to tag along so I didn't just look like a creepy random guy there.

It was an odd experience. My old youth group was there, and it's the first time I've seen the youth group since I left. I was happy to see them. Especially happy to see young people there I didn't recognise. That's what I like to see.

Seeing as it was a big Christian event on the North Shore, I spent all night seeing people I know. There were people there from all three churches I've attended, people from camps I've spoken on, conferences I've been to, colleges I've attended, and people who I know but I don't know where from. It was pretty intense.

I sat in the meeting tonight and missed being a youth minister. I missed having the young people to look after. And the many moments of silliness. And the chance to disciple young people in Jesus. As my life is shaping up I probably will never be a youth minister again. That's sad. I did love it. But there will still be teenagers around, and I'll keep doing ministry with them. I'll keep doing camps, and youth group, and church. And I'll still do ministry. But things will never be how they were and I'll miss that.

However the future is coming (isn't it always?), and I'm excited about that.

Like tomorrow. Tomorrow I'm going to do more weeding.

And that was today. I thought you all might want one of those "Day in the life" blog posts. And if you didn't, I don't care.

Oh and after Alive I went to Maccas with my church crew. Just in case you were wondering.

I have a meeting with one of my Pastors in 20 minutes. Since going to church as a civilian this year I've always gotten excited when I get to go have coffee with my Pastor. I think because I've never had a Pastor who wants to go out and have a coffee with me. In the last church if a minister wanted to have coffee with me it was because they were my boss. And in the church before that, well, no one ever took anyone out for coffee, especially not as part of ministry.

So now I get excited. I tell people "I'm having coffee with my pastor" just because I like saying it. I feel like I'm name dropping. I'm not just an employee any more, I'm a congregant, I have needs!

I look forward to the day when a Pastor takes me out to coffee and tells me to stop sinning, then I'll know I've really made it as a civilian. I can't wait.

The Jesus: All About Life campaign has a website where you can upload a picture where you thank Jesus for things. It's pretty special.

Lesley, Jem and I went to see (500) Days of Summer this afternoon to celebrate Lesley's 40th birthday.

It's good. It is a refreshing take on love from Hollywood. It seems pitched at the late-Gen X/early-Gen Y crew. The ones who are jaded, and self-aware, and pop-culture savvy. And the ones who believe in love because they've believed the Hollywood story that true love is out there, you just have to find the one.

There was lots of good film making. Inventive ways to tell a conventional story. Good mixing of reality and character's imagination. There was a wonderful scene where the main character's (Tom's) expectations of an upcoming party were played along side the reality as it happened. It was for me, so real. I'm always making up stories about how things are going to go, how they might go, and how I'd like them to go, especially when it comes to girls, and it never happens that way I plan, want or expect. Reality is too good at throwing unforeseen dimensions into the mix.

Usually at the end of films about love they make me want to be in love. Especially films with good sound tracks and quirky female leads like Garden State. But this film, I'm not so sure. It had the sound track and the quirky female lead. Admittedly, it's not a love story, just a film about love. But it was optimistic enough that it wasn't trying to turn you off trying to find your true love. But the film didn't leave me feeling like that. It left me feeling like I had watched something real. Perhaps not real in that relationships happen in quite the way the film portrayed, but the film certainly had an emotional authenticity that resonated with me.

It did leave me thinking "Who would bother having a relationship?" Tom, the main character said at one point "Loneliness is underrated" which totally made sense to me. Maybe I'm just coming from a perspective where relationships are all effort and no pay off, but if there is anything all my many years of unrequited love and singleness have taught me, it's that being alone doesn't kill you. And in fact, as long as there's no-one you want to be with, being alone is perfectly enjoyable. That said, I've seen enough good relationships, watched enough movies, read enough books and had enough crushes to know that I probably am missing out on something. But whatever it is, it's elusive and I'm happy, so I shan't stress too much.

At least I shan't stress until I watch Garden State again. Bloody Natalie Portman!

"If I'm calling at two in the morning it only means one thing, baby!" - Black Eyed Peas

When people call me at 2am I'm usually pretty confident that it doesn't "only mean one thing, baby."

I stuck up the sermon I did at CrossWay Church when I preached in there in June.

If you're interested, you can get it here.

So you may have noticed that I've started using tags on my posts. I'm now going back through my archives adding tags to my posts. I'm also going back to the early days of the blog and adding titles to the posts so they display correctly. As there are over 3,500 posts to deal with I expect to be doing this for the next three years.

Joy.

For all those of you who were worried about my self-esteem, I talked to the guy who was in charge of hiring for the position. He said they interviewed two people who knew the organisation better than me first, and one of them had everything they needed, which makes sense. But he said my application was good. He didn't mention my awesome customer service skills.

I got nervous on this phone call too (like when I withdrew from the application process on the other job). But this time I didn't sound like I was going to cry, I think I sounded angry. Which I didn't mean to at all. I hope the man doesn't think I hate him.

So there you go. Matt was right. Much ado about nothing. Or nothing for me at least.

Thanks for letting me mope.

I got rejected for a job today. That's not really anything new.

However this was the first job all year I've applied for which I actually thought I had a really good chance of getting, at very least getting an interview. It was to be a Youth Ministry advisor-type two days a week for a denomination. I thought a job like that would allow me to maybe spend another three days a week doing the secular work I'd been wanting to do this year and I could still do youth ministry stuff.

But alas, they sent me an email today saying I was unsuccessful.

I rang the number they gave me to find out why I got turned down, but the guy didn't answer so I left a voice mail.

So I'm not sure why I didn't get an interview. I did notice that on the resume I sent them, while I had updated the details of my employment to make it more church friendly, I had forgotten to change my "Key Strengths" from my last application. So my very top key strength was "Excellent Customer Service". That was a little embarrassing. I'm pretty sure most denominations aren't looking for Youth Ministry Advisors who have excellent customer service. Plus it looks pretty bad that the person applying has put in so little effort into their application that they didn't even bother tailoring their key strengths to the role.

Now that I think about it, the day I wrote I was excellent at customer service I must have been feeling pretty cocky, because I wouldn't even list customer service in my top 20 strengths. I'd probably list it somewhere around the same place as "Pretty Good at Handball" and "Has all 10 fingers and toes".

If I got rejected for something other than my "key strengths", I don't know what it was. I felt like I addressed all the key criteria for the role. I thought my cover letter was pretty freaking awesome. I figured I'd at least get an interview.

It turns out to get rejected for this job without even getting an interview, that hurt. Every other job I haven't really worried about. Every other job I've known I probably haven't been that qualified for. But this one, well, Youth Ministry is what I do. If there is anything I should be qualified for and good at it's youth ministry. And so for someone to say "Nope, you're not even good enough for an interview", I've taken it a little personally.

But, as I said when I applied, it's up to God. I just figured if God didn't want me to have the job, he'd close things down after the interview. Not before, that's pretty harsh.

So today I've felt humbled. And today I felt stupid for thinking I'd be good enough to get an interview. And today I tried to remind myself that my qualifications and experience are not where my value lies. And today I moped because I was in the mood to mope before I got rejected anyway.

I'm hoping the guy calls me back tomorrow and tells me I got rejected because I have excellent customer service. That would make me feel better about myself.

In the end the lessons for me to learn are:
1 - Read your full resume before you send it
2 - You may not be as good as you think you are
3 - If you believe it's up to God, then you actually have to let it be up to God

Beyoncé had one of the best music videos of all time.

Still you shouldn't steal the poor girl's award moment, that's just mean.

From the PM's blog:

"One in four young Australians aged between 16 and 24 have experienced mental health disorders in the previous 12 months, yet only a quarter of young people receive professional help."

Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't one in four, one quarter? So it seems to me that every young person who experiences a mental health disorder receives professional help.

I think they mean that only a quarter of the one in four (one in sixteen if I'm not mistaken) receive professional help but it's not very clear.

I've been writing this post for a few days now. I'm posting it even though I think it's still a bit of a mess. If I've ever wanted an editor for my blog, it's now. But I'm sure if you guys can't handle it, you'll just stop reading, and that won't offend me in the slightest, especially as you probably won't tell me.




I've been reading a book for a little too long now called Two Views of Women in Ministry. I've also been looking at issues of women in ministry in class at college. It means that I've spent the last month or so thinking about gender roles in the church.

I decided I wanted to make my mind up on the issue, because I've generally just coasted along happy to let everyone else worry about it, but I knew that some day I'd have to pin my colours to the mast or at very least have my colours ready to be pinned when the time came.

I haven't yet made up my mind, but I'm working on it.

What I have been thinking about is that the debate is about more that just what women can and cannot do in a church. It's about Gender Roles and Biblical Authority. I say this because the way Christians make up their mind on the issue of gender roles will reflect their view of the Bible.

Part of the reason that people get so worked up on the issue is that if people reject the complementarian perspective (women can't do everything) it seems to be flying in the face of clear biblical teaching. So rejecting complimentarianism is rejecting biblical authority. Unfortunately the debate about the issue is muddied by the implications that are suggested by some positions within the debate. It's hard to say you're an egalitarian (woman can do everything) when you might get your commitment to the Word of God questioned.

However I'm not sure that the Bible is as clear on the subject as some people say it is. I am sure though that how we go about making up our mind on the issue of gender roles in the church will clarify where were stand on the issue of biblical authority.

For instance for some it's not really a matter of biblical authority at all. For them men and women are equal so they should be able to have equal roles. If the Bible says different then the Bible is wrong. It's easy enough.

Others who feel they owe a bit of allegiance to the Bible will read 1 Tim 2:12 ("I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent") and decide that Paul was wise in some cases but misled in this one and just expressing the culture of the day. So we should interpret Paul in light of his obvious cultural prejudices and dismiss anything that doesn't allow for the equality of the sexes.

The problem I see with this that while is seems more thoughtful, it's merely just cultural arrogance, or to use C.S. Lewis' term, "chronological snobbery"; the belief that because Paul lived in another time and in another culture then he's obviously wrong when he disagrees with us. It neglects the fact that the values of gender equality, and the expressions of that equality that we take for granted now have been established only fairly recently, and they fly in the face of the majority the church's history of interpreting the Bible. To declare, without serious thought, that 1900 years of Biblical scholarship is wrong because it disagrees with your cultural values is, like I say, arrogance.

I am not saying that the end position is wrong, just the process of getting there.

However, in contrast to this, others who believe the Bible and view it as perfect inerrant, aren't willing to view the Bible as flawed so they see 1 Tim 2:12 and the response is obvious: don't let a woman be a leader, don't let a woman preach, no debate.

The problem with this is that it fails to take into account the weight of biblical evidence for authoritative women's ministry within the Bible. And where the previous view assumes cultural inferiority, this one fails to think about cultural and biblical context entirely.

All these approaches fail to take the authority and/or nature of the Bible seriously.

The only way to appropriately deal with the issue while maintaining biblical authority is to look carefully at all the biblical evidence for and against women in ministry and then make your decision based on what you think the Bible is saying. You can't base your decision on just one or two proof-texts that support your argument, you can't just make up your mind without the Bible, because this isn't an issue the Bible is silent on, and you can't just make up your mind on a cursory reading of the Bible, because the issue is too complex. It needs thought, prayer, diligence and an openness to be change your mind.

As this is such a volatile issue, and but not really that important in the scheme of things (i.e. it's not a salvation issue), I reckon most people should deliberately not make up their minds. Unless you're going to put in the effort to decide on what you actually think the Bible is saying, perhaps it's better to just sit on the fence. It's not as if your indecision is going to stop people hearing about Jesus. And if you don't make a decision it saves you getting into fights and alienating people who disagree with you and it frees you up to get on with the more important things Christ calls us too.*

If you do want to have the debate then do the work to take the Bible seriously and work out what God has to say on the issue. To take the authority of the Bible seriously will mean that those who are for allowing women to do all types of ministry need to be willing to change their view if they find that the Bible states otherwise. For those who are holding on to male only eldership in the church also need to be willing to change their mind if they find their views are inconsistent with the Bible.

Too often we are holding our views because of something other than the Bible. We use the Bible to prop up their own ideas of equality or our own chauvinist values. When we are willing to ignore the teaching of the Bible because it clashes with our own ideas of what is right and wrong, then the Bible has ceased to be authoritative in our life.

Of course the problem is that if we base our decisions on the Bible we are in danger of offending people and/or being culturally insensitive, but if we base our decisions on something other than the Bible we are in danger of allowing God's revealed truth be be of secondary importance to accepted cultural truth. It will mean that the gospel can only be truthful if it fits in with cultural norms and the gospel will never fit in with the norms of any culture.

The greatness of what God has done in the gospel will always fly in the face of culture because universal human sinfulness and helplessness, and divine wrath, favour and forgiveness will never find a comfortable fit with any group of people in any time of history. The very fact that the Gospel transforms culture means that it must always be regarded as being above culture. We need to interpret culture in light of the Gospel not the Gospel in light of culture.

When we erode the authority of the Bible, we erode the authority of the gospel and we limit the chance it has to transform culture and transform lives.**

As far as I know of all those of you who read my blog your views on gender roles and biblical authority will stretch right across the spectrum, from conservative to liberal to the people who aren't Christians and consequently don't care at all. So for some of you biblical authority is a non-issue, you've never claimed to have the Bible as a guiding authority in your life. For others you like the Bible and see it as containing truth about God but you aren't willing to view it all as authoritative and inspired. Others of you are like me and you view the Bible as the inerrant word of God, authoritative because it is God's revelation of himself to us through which he uniquely helps us to understand it by the Holy Spirit.

So being who I am and having my views on the Bible I think the most helpful thing we can do for the debate on gender roles is to continually call people to have the debate in love, tolerance and openness to be wrong. We need to assess and re-assess the biblical evidence, and base our decisions on that. If we start to allow the church to make up it's mind on issues by established prejudice or by what is culturally accepted and appropriate rather than on what the Bible teaches we erode the strength our best, most reliable source of God's revelation. It'd be rather a shame, in our rush to hold on to what we think is right to ignore our best source of wisdom on what God thinks is right.


*I understand that some will view not allowing women to do every role as an injustice against women. And to do the work of Christ will be to fight against any kind of oppression of people due to their gender, race, age, looks or anything else. As far as I can tell the Bible is clear about the equal value and importance of both male and female. Both are created in God's image, both have equal access to God and his salvation, both are gifted by God to do good works and serve. Whatever the Bible teaches it does not teach that one gender is ontologically inferior to another. The debate, if had biblically, is whether equal value is equivalent to equal access to roles within the church. If that is the case and equality is firmly established how it is expressed should not a central issue to most Christians.

**Happily, it's God's gospel and not ours of even if we do manage to erode the authority of the gospel, it's going keep marching on transforming the world regardless of what we do to stop it. But the fact that God's saving transforming work is going to go on regardless of what we do is no excuse for us to neglect to protect the purity of the gospel and the authority of the Bible. Just because God will work despite us doesn't mean that's the way he wants to do it.

I read this article in SMH. For the record I like public holidays.

I think Muslims should be allowed to not work on their public holidays. I'm happy Christians don't have to work on theirs. If the Zoroastrians want a few days off too, they should get them.

I'm all up for a pluralistic society with pro-active freedom of religion. Especially if it means we all get more days off.

I've decided that I need to keep a journal. At least a second journal to my normal prayer journal. My prayer journal is pretty dull, and a little embarrassing. I need to keep another journal full of inspirational stuff so that if I die (probably more like when I die, if I'm being realistic) it can be published and everyone will see that my inner spiritual life was amazing and Christian youth speakers can quote me for years to come.

I'll write things like "I just want to live for you Jesus" and "I now realise that it's only through embracing brokenness that God will show us his true picture of wholeness" and "I met my greatest enemy again today, you know the guy who stabbed me in the kidney last year? I saw he was being beaten up by a gang of thugs at Hornsby Station. I ran in to help. They broke my leg and made me blind in one eye. Thank you Lord that I can share in your sufferings. I hope my enemy is ok and not too scared to go to the station in the future, he could lose his job if he's afraid of the train. Jesus bless him."

I'm pretty sure that'll be a best seller at Koorong. The only problem is that I'll be dead so I won't get any of the money. Perhaps I will have to fake my death too. That way I can funnel the money from my estate into my secret account and live happily forever.

Faking my own death also means I can plan to die in the most inspirational way possible to do maximum book sales. I think I will be tortured to death in some hard-line middle eastern country's prison for refusing to renounce my faith after being arrested giving food and the gospel of Mark in Arabic comic book form to impoverished terrorist children.

If that doesn't make you buy my journal, you've got no heart.

I'll just have to make sure I mark which journal is the inspirational one clearly. It'd be terrible to go to all the trouble to fake your own inspirational death and then people read your journal and realise you were actually pretty dull:

"Thank you God that I didn't get that job. It looked crap anyway."

"Please give me grace because I didn't study for my exam again."

"Please make my hair grow fast because this haircut looks terrible. Only on my head though. My back hair is growing fast enough."

So a movie plot arrived in my head tonight. I'm sure it's at least one movie. Probably many. But I can't think of any. Except maybe the trailer for Funny People (but I haven't seen the film so I don't know if this is what happens). So if you guys know a film like this let me know what it is:

Boy meets Girl.
Boy likes Girl.
Boy and Girl are friends, and do or do not get together.
Boy and Girl break up/never got together, but Boy always loves Girl.
Boy leaves Girl's life and/or Girl meets Guy who is horrible to her, but she falls in love with him.
Girl marries Idiot Man
After a few years Girl is unhappy with Idiot Man.
Boy comes back into Girl's life.
Boy and Girl have an affair.

And then obviously they are happy till Idiot Man finds out and things go pear shaped.

So what's the film? I know there are plenty of Girl is married to Idiot, Girl has affair. But I can't think of Girl marries Idiot has affair with old nice Boy who loved her.

Any thoughts?

"It's time to get real - fat people may be happier but they're also digging their graves with a fork, and we're all paying for it." - Suzie O'Brien

I like to think of myself as a pretty broad tasted guy when it comes to my listening habits. I pride myself on the fact that I don't listen to just Hillsong and 103.2. In fact I would say I'm a snob. I look down on people who only listen to Christian stuff and judge them for their small mindedness. (Dear Reader, I'm not talking about you, I'm talking about other people.)

Looking at my iPod here are the last ten artists I have listened to:

1. John Piper (Christian Preacher)
2. John Stott (Christian Preacher)
3. Mark Meynell (Christian Preacher)
4. Tom French (Christian Preacher)*
5. Tom Waits (Non-Christian!)
6. Tim Keller (Christian Preacher)
7. Tim Hughes (Christian Worship Artist)
8. Damien Rice (Non-Christian!)
9. Brenton Brown (Christian Worship Artist)
10. Anberlin (Christian Emo)

What a shame. Further down the list is Linkin Park, Yellowcard and The Boss. But really, my iPod is just like a regular church service in my pocket. My snobbery dictates now that I should look down on myself.

It's also interesting that right now I seem to have a preference for Johns, Toms and Tims. Who would have thought?

I promise to do better next time.


* That's a little embarrassing. I forgot I listened to myself when I started the list. Had I remembered I would have saved this post till I had dropped off the end and none of you would have been any the wiser.

I just had to make a phone call and withdraw from the application process for a job. I got so nervous I'm sure the woman on the phone thought I was about to cry. It was very embarrassing.

Breaking up is hard to do.

I got a hair cut today. My hair is now short. My hairdresser was a from the land of Iraq. This was some of our conversation:

Him: What you want?
Me: Shorter, neater.
Him: What number?
Me: No number, just the scissors. Sometimes I get a four on the sides. I'm not very good with hair. I don't know what looks good.
Him: I know, you like zero.
Me: No. I don't like zero.
Him: You look good with zero.
Me: I'll have no hair. I'm not that brave. I'm losing my hair so I'll have a zero soon enough.
Him: You come to me in five years, you say "I want zero", I say "You don't need zero. Your hair is all gone." You married?
Me: No.
Him: Girlfriend?
Me: No.
Him: Headache?
Me: Sometimes.
Him: You get too many headaches from girlfriends?
Me: That's why I don't have one. *I think that's probably a lie.* Are you married?
Him: No.
Me: Do you have a girlfriend?
Him: Yes. But we need to break. She give me too many headaches. I don't like her. Two months I have not seen her, only talk on phone.
Me: That sounds like you should break up.
Him: Yes. You meet girls at work?
Me: Some, but they're mostly old.
Him: How old?
Me: 40.
Him: You like forty-year-olds?
Me: No, the people I work with are forty.
Him: The girls like forty-year-olds?
Me: Maybe. They're too old of me, they're forty.
Him: You like younger. 20 is good. Or 25 you like?
Me: 25 is a good age.
Him: Yes. 25 good age to sex.
Me: Laughs

Usually I don't like hairdresser talk, but this guy was more fun.

Dear Internet,

You've changed my life. For the most part, thank you.

Love,

Tom

Last night all my dreams were just filled with lawyers. It was wholly unsatisfying.

Sorry Victor.

I went to college this morning despite the almost overwhelming desire to wag.

On the way home I was sleepy because I'd gotten up so early. So as usual I fell asleep on the express from Strathfield to Hornsby. As I slept I vaguely heard the guard say over the loudspeaker "Next stop Hornsby" and in my sleepy state I thought to myself "No it's not, she's got it wrong" and went back to sleep.

20 minutes later I woke up and the carriage was a lot emptier. I looked out the window and noticed a lot of bush and no houses. I was way past Hornsby. Oops.

I felt a little bit dumb and tried not to obviously react in case the whole train realised I'd overslept and also thought I was dumb.

A minute or so later the train came around a corner and I suddenly got a view out over Brooklyn, over the bridges, the water, the bush, island. It was beautiful. In that moment I felt like sleeping past my station was totally worth it just for that view. It's a good looking part of the world that.

The train's first stop was Woy Woy, so I hopped off. Another train arrived to take me back to Hornsby 2 minutes later and I was right as rain.

That is until the ticket inspectors turned up in the carriage. I stressed about not having the right ticket, planned my whole explanation and was ready when he arrived. In the end all I needed to say was "I have the wrong ticket, I slept past my station" and show him my ticket and he let me off. I was disappointed I didn't get to tell him my story.

Lucky I have a blog.

Here's a question I was thinking about today that most of you probably won't answer:

If they were going to do a new adaptation of "Dune" for the cinema, who would you want to direct it?

I was thinking Ridley Scott, Danny Boyle or Neill Blomkamp. Thoughts?

I hung out with some of the boys from Church last night. We went to the RSL, talked about manly things while drinking beer and then went to a movie. We went to see Fighting. I hadn't heard of the film till I saw it on the Greater Union session board. I figured with a name like Fighting it would be hard for the film to disappoint. (Unless it was about middle aged marriage breakdown, those movies are always depressing.)

The turned out to be about a guy who gets pulled into the underground bare-knuckle fighting scene. It's obviously cashing in on the UFC (Ultimate Fighting) craze sweeping American testosterone at the moment. It's the film that Never Back Down wanted to be but wasn't.

I was actually rather impressed. There were some solid performances from the leads. And the film seemed to be aware of subtlety (at least relative to most other films in it's genre). It had a restrained feel about it. The whole time I thought it was going to bust out into training montages, slow motion punches and girls in bikinis, to keep it's teenage male target audience happy, but it didn't. It held back. I appreciated that.

The film felt like Rocky if it had been made today. It wasn't as amazing as Rocky, but it had the messiness and some of the charm of Rocky. Often times people would have conversations that were a mess. Characters would fail to articulate their feelings properly, they'd neglect to tell each other information, they'd end up fighting and misunderstanding each other. It was nice. I didn't always know why they'd get angry at each other, but then again, we often don't quite know how we end up getting angry at each other either. Someone says something, the other person hears it wrong, and your both left to wonder what went wrong. I loved the inability of the characters to articulate what they needed to say. It felt real.

And to top it all off there was fighting. In fact the fighting was probably the most disappointing part of the film. It wasn't bad, but you missed a lot of the action because the film makers were obviously going for a more accessible rating. Still I did enjoying the fighting, I just wish I could have seen more of it.

So I reckon see Fighting. It's not going to change the world. But it's a solid little performer that's brave enough to do the youth, UFC film without resorting to hot girls and inane bad guys.