Nuked Aussies

Best blog post title ever? Possibly.

I was at a cafe with my Aussie friend Sarah this afternoon and she was investigating my iPhone 4 and looking at all the apps it has and the games and whatever and she came across Nukesweeper – basically minesweeper for your iphone. You’ve probably played it before.

If you not, you can play here.

Now I played minesweeper for ages on my computer as a kid. And it was only very recently, like the last few years or so, that I was clued in, or was told, or somehow became enlightened to the meaning of the numbers. I would just tap around randomly and never ever win because I didn’t understand the meaning of the numbers, and that I was supposed to use those numbers and a bit of logic to work out what the mine field looked like.

But as soon as I found out, the game totally changed for me! There was actually a point.

I knew the secret on how to win.

And then this afternoon – at this cafe with my mate, I got to share that knowledge with her. And the game made more sense to her now. She knew the logic and she could win.

How long did I live life just randomly tapping away not realising that there is a “meaning to all the numbers”?

A while.

How fantastic did it feel when someone told me “the meaning of the numbers”

and the light-bulb went on above my head

and I knew how to win the game of life?

Felt pretty good to be honest.

And how awesome is it that I have a job (and strictly speaking we ALL have a job) to share “the meaning of the numbers” to my friends, family, coworkers, fellow bus passengers, and the guy in the Subway line behind me?

Pretty awesome.

Cos there is a point to life.

And there is a way to win.

And once you know “the way”, it doesn’t seem so confusing any more.

Thoughts? Comments? Math-related questions?

I hate it when people don’t finish sen…

Huge apologies to both of you reading this that I haven’t posted anything in two months. That is seriously slack blogging.

The thing is though, I’m a thinker. A deep thinker. I would call myself a “too-deep-thinker” because I think about everything waaaay to much. I’ll hypothesise, analyse, organise, prioritise, and a bunch of other “-ise” because I am not satisfied until I reach a conclusion.

You wanna know the funny thing?

I never get there.

It’s like the more I think about something, the more I need to think about it, because I discover options. Variables. Tangents. Directions that my mind will wander off too. I will play out scenes in my head over and over changing how it goes slightly each time to see what happens if I say this instead, or if I wear this hat. I know it sounds kinda stupid but I hope you get what I mean.

Anyways – that’s how my mind approaches everything! Methodically. Start a task, do not rest until said task is complete. But before that, I think of a task, and do not even start the task until I’m certain I know exactly how it’s going to all play out. I like to know what I’m going to buy before I buy it, what I’m going to say before I say it (or more importantly in recent cases what will be said BACK TO ME after I say it, but that is a whole other thing)… you get the idea.

So this is why I haven’t posted anything. I have a thought. Something sparks. And I think about it for ages. And ages.

And ages.

And because I never come up with a conclusion for this thought, I never blog it. I want to be able to give you (both of my readers) an intro (a personal quirky anecdote about what episode of Star Trek: Voyager I was watching when I had this thought), a middle (the thought and my musings on it), and a conclusion (3-7 easy steps to apply said thought/musings to your everyday life – with optional humourous or ‘Rob-Bell-like’ outro).

And I can’t do that with my thoughts. Because the only conclusion I ever come to is actually just the start of a whole new train of musings and ponderings and mind-tangents.

But people say I should blog anyways. So here it is.

My attempt.

So read it if you want. Just, don’t expect to be left satisfied or with that ‘all-wrapped-up’ feeling. Because I NEVER GET THERE. I even put ‘never’ in bold and underlined it so you believe me.

And I tell you what – posting thoughts of mine that aren’t finished. It’s gonna be hard for me. It’s gonna be new. Because I usually only share the ‘complete’ thoughts I have.

I hope you bear with me. As I try to post my unfinished thoughts as unfinished blogs.

And just to prove it. I’m not even going to finish thi…

Dan.

Plinky

Oh man. Two posts in two days. What’s going on! Maybe I saw the most awesome picture in the universe.

That just happened.

No, in an effort to really get into this blogging thing and make sure that I blog at least every couple of days – I found this site called Plinky.

If you want to get inspired to start a blog of your own, or want to know what my blog topic of the day might end up being, then this is a website to check out. Basically everyday, Plinky gives you a ‘prompt’. A question or statement to get those creative juices flowing so you have something to write about.

Today, the prompt was “Share a time when the end of one thing meant the beginning of another.”

Now who would’ve thought that the day after I make a post about how giving your life to Christ means made new and being reborn and rewired – leaving your old self behind and taking on your new life as a follower of The Way – I would take a few minutes to stumble upon this website and get asked this question.

God thinks He’s soooo funny doesn’t He?

It’s like a cruel Dad joke.

But it’s with this question that some confusion can (and does) arise.

Does this mean I have to live a perfect life as soon as I become a Christian?

Or even worse – can I only become a Christian when I end living my current lifestyle?

More thoughts to come on this later.

Email Reminder

You get them all the time don’t you?

I sure do. Make sure you do this when you get to work. Can you please pick this up on your way home from work. Don’t forget to send this email. (I do actually send myself emails to to myself to email someone else – shush)

This morning I was at a cafe reading Rob Bell’s first book Velvet Elvis. I probably looked like a weirdo since I was reading it on my iPhone sitting all by myself ordering more and more moccachinos (I only had two before I started getting the shakes) for almost two solid hours. I read a lot of that book in two hours.

A lot.

In fact I finished it.

By the way – you can tell I’ve read a lot of Rob Bell recently because I start blogging.

Like.

This.

Anyways – towards the end of Velvet Elvis two major themes and this weird idea came to me (it’s a good thing I have this blog then huh).

1. The New Testament talks a lot about RE-stuff that happens when you become a follower of Christ. You’re reborn. Remade. Re-configured. Re-given to the eternal life we were originally intended to receive. You start to rethink what it means to be human. You rethink what to do with the rest of your life. You rethink how to act in various situations or when facing various decisions. You’re sense of spirit can be revived if it needs to be. Paul even goes as far to say that your old self is gone and you’re replaced by a new self and new nature. The dictionary defines the prefix “re-” as ‘again, or back’. Like you were ONCE made, configured, vived (if that’s even a word), placed and accepting Christ as your Lord and Saviour does that AGAIN in a NEW WAY or puts you BACK where you once were, and are meant to be.
2. You’re not perfect (did you know that). When God made everything even HE didn’t say it was perfect. He said it was good. Good. You’re goal for your Christian life is to be as “Christ-like” as possible. You’re meant to get better. God takes you as you are – calls you ‘good’ – and draws you, challenges you, pulls you, and lets you grow, change, move, become better. You’re kinda meant to move forward.

So what the heck was with the email thing?

Ever reply to emails? Ever get replies? I do. All the time.

Ever get ‘forwards’ from people. Whether its a conversation you should see, or something lame like dancing cats or a not-so-funny video. You see it come to your inbox and that ‘FW:’ of doom stares at you briefly before you delete it.

I pray that from now on. EVERY time I hit REPLY on an email, I’m going to remember all the re’s that have happened in my life with God. How I’ve been reborn and made new. How I can be revived. And I pray every time I get one of those annoying FWs, I’ll remember my mission. To keep growing. To get better. To move forward.

That’s a new kind of email reminder.

I dunno, what do you think??

DG

Spare time – again

I used to have a blog, but I haven’t posted on it since… well… actually I don’t remember the exact date. I don’t even remember the URL to find it, let alone the username and password to edit it. I just remember it was called “I Had Some Spare Time”. Evidentially, I haven’t had as much spare time recently.

This is a problem for me, because (as I stated in the previous blog) I’m quite a busy person – and so my excuse for not doing something like eating proper meals, socialising, or spending time with God, is always “I don’t have any spare time for that”.

The truth is, I bet if I tried, I would be able to find the spare time. And this is where this blog (and you who read it) come in.

I think about stuff – probably more than I should. And the beauty of the internet is that it’s so easy to share what I think with other people. So if you’re interested in what a 21-year-old, short, kinda nerdy, CSI-loving, Dr Pepper-drinking, sorta introverted, always questioning guy who really doesn’t have it all together is thinking about… then I officially welcome you to click the subscribe button, follow me on twitter, or stalk me at my house.

And let’s do some thinking.

On second thoughts though, don’t actually stalk me at my house. That’s kinda creepy.

DG