first car

so i'm going to get my very own car. it's my grandparents' old car. a 1996 ford taurus. they got a new one and decided to let me have it.

i think it's a great first car. it belonged to at least one other person before my grandparents... it doesn't look like it's falling apart, but it's definitely been in an accident or two. its dirty. it's scratched. it's got 120 thousand miles or so. and... it's purple. plenty of character :)

anyways, the thing is i need a name for the car a purple, first car needs a name.

i feel like there's basically 3 paths. you've got cool names, goofy names, and names that make fun of the car. all 3 are fair game. and fyi, it's a boy. vote on one of the ideas below or offer another name idea.

donatello
purple people eater
barney
dino
eggplant
grape
grape juice
raisin

world cup

the world cup is finally here!
after 4 years of waiting we just have 24 hours to go.

i'm pretty pumped.
i don't know why exactly, but it's just... really neat.

i love how you can put a soccer ball between two people who can't speak one word of the other person's language and they know exactly what to do. i love how it can quell political unrest in honduras. it's like the olympics... except for sport that everyone actually really cares about more than once every couple years. :)

i think the world cup is a fuzzy picture of heaven... all these excited people coming together from so many different places for the same thing.
the main difference being that God unites rather than a game. (God will do an even better job i think)

anyways...
last time around was probably the best summer ever. it seems like every day was filled with soccer games and lemonade or altaer stuff. we made our own soccer goal out of spare pvc we found and mowed half of the elementary school's field next door so that we'd have a place close to home to play at. :) such sweet memories...

i guess we're all a bit busy growing up and working and whatnot nowadays... but i think watching the games will be no less exciting than it was back then.

a bunch of us made brackets for the tournament. mine is below.






















after much thinking i decided to go crazy and make the united states go all the way to 3rd. it will happen one day so i figured why not this time. :)
i will most likely get destroyed for this... but it's a risk i'm willing to take. if it doesn't work so well... meh. and if it does, i'm probably the only one who guessed we'd go so far. :)

for all of you american soccer naysayers... we do have a good team. certainly we don't compare to teams like brazil or germany every day... unlike most countries, most of our best athletes get pulled in a number of other directions. historically, soccer hasn't been part of our culture (it's growing i think though). it's not that we just suck at it... our attention and effort is just more divided. which is a good thing... football will never leave nor should it. (i think i'd be willing to trade baseball or basketball for soccer though. :) sorry if that hurts your feelings)

but...
we are better than most countries. for your information, we beat spain (ranked #2) recently and had a good lead on brazil (ranked #1) before choking last year. it is possible for us to do well in the world cup. so don't turn your back on the team and think "silly americans, they can't play soccer". we're a decent team and we're getting better. if i hear that you're supporting another country like pastor tim's kids, i will personally come hunt you down. :) and you better watch every american game you possibly can (and cheer) until they win or lose!

lens of truth

last night we read the 2nd half of luke and one thing stuck out to me over and over again...

i think Jesus must have been really frustrated by how blind people could be. we run around with such a simple mind that's set on the world and we miss out on so much truth (both the good and the bad).

last week i was talking to a few people about screwtape letters and erin mentioned how creepy it is... because it's pretty accurate to the truth- a truth that we are ignorant of most of the time.

and on the other hand there's... the story of the woman at the well, for example. she's thirsty for the living water that Jesus talks about, but doesn't realize that it's right on front of her!

so... partly in honor of "zelda" posts 2 summers ago...
and mainly because it's a perfect metaphor...
i was very much reminded of the lens of truth.
just think about it! :)

we need to equip them more often. i do at least.

i'm too lazy/busy at the moment to explain this to non-zelda fans. so if you're confused and don't want to be then just comment here or ask on facebook.

finally, below are a few (of many) random quotes from the chapters we read that made me think about all this:

"you hypocrites! doesn't each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? then should not this woman, a daughter of abraham, whom satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the sabbath day from what bound her?" then he asked them, "if one of you has a son or an ox that falls into a well on the sabbath day, will you not immediately pull him out?" and they had nothing to say.

"if your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him. if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times comes back to you and says, 'i repent,' forgive him."
the apostles said to the Lord, "increase our faith!"
he replied, "if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, 'be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it will obey you.

"The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, 'here it is,' or 'there it is,' because the kingdom of God is within you."

Jesus called the children to him and said, "let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it."

he saw through their duplicity and said to them, "show me a denarius. Whose portrait and inscription are on it?"
"caesar's," they replied.
he said to them, "then give to caesar what is caesar's, and to God what is God's.