Joseph's Other Journey

I’ve been reading the story of Joseph (from the Old Testament) and one thing I’ve never noticed is how much he changes throughout his life. His story spans 13 chapters so I can’t write the whole thing down (I could but no one, myself included, would want that), but I will summarize. We first meet Joseph in Genesis Ch. 37 as a cocky and overly bold teenager; he then is sold into slavery and for the first time reading it you wonder “Why is this in here? What could God do with this kid?” Well, God works in amazing ways, and the first glimpse of hope we get is when Joseph refuses Potiphar’s wife’s advancements which sends him to jail (for more see Genesis chapter 39). Then the Pharaoh’s cupbearer and baker were jailed and had strange dreams that Joseph was able to interpret, still his cocky self, he didn’t credit God and instead looked to the baker to put a good word in for him. Unfortunately the baker forgot costing Joseph a full two years. Then the Pharaoh has a strange dream and the baker says “Hey Pharaoh, I remember this kid in jail who told me my dream and was right! Why not go to him?” So Pharaoh does and this is the response he gets from Joseph “I cannot do it… but God will give Pharaoh the answer He desires.” Genesis 41: 16. Wow, first we get a picture of Joseph walking around as a kid claiming he will be better than his entire family, then he interprets someone else’s dream but takes the credit and then tells Pharaoh that only God can do it.. Joseph fully realizes that it was all God’s plan when he tells his brothers (in a dramatic meeting in Ch. 45) that “But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth to save your lives by a great deliverance. So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God” 45: 7-8. Essentially this “Hey guys, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking here and this is it, God was in charge all along, it was not you but Him and if it weren’t for all that happened we wouldn’t be here.” Playing off the earlier theme, it took time for Joseph to fully understand God’s plan and to do it he needed to get away, he needed to escape success and lose what he had in his comfy home as daddy’s favorite to take on the leadership role God had in mind. God couldn’t use Joseph at the age of 17, but after time and trials Joseph was fully ready, God does work on us too, He lets trials in our way so that we may grow to know Him and live the lives He mapped out that are truly amazing.

Going The Extra Mile

I was thinking about how today is Ash Wednesday and while I didn’t get ashes on my forehead today I did do some thinking about Lent. While giving something up for Lent is good, I believe there is something we can do in addition. Matthew 4:1 says “Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted.” This was right after Jesus was baptized and right before his ministry, instead of jumping off that spiritual high, he had to dip down low and go through trials and grow, and in order to do that Jesus had to go away, leave society and be alone for a while. In the fast-paced world we live in where we barley have time to eat three decent meals it can be tough to have a growing relationship with God. I mean growing, not stopping at a comfortable spot that “works for us”, and in order to do that we too need to get away. While I don’t have forty days to spend (let alone one day) I do have a smaller time frame each day to dedicate to God. I have a good chunk of time in the morning, and at night. I have time in the afternoons when I am done with my work. There is a ton of time we have each day in which we can step behind a closed door for a few minutes and pray or read a few verses of the Bible. This Lent I am going to try to dedicate forty minutes (yes forty minutes) each day to God. I know it sounds long, but when you think about it that’s ten minutes in the morning, two ten minute breaks, and ten minutes before I go to bed. Jesus knew before He set out that He needed to grow, He knew things had to change spiritually and mentally. Think, when we take that next step in our relationship with God and really make the effort to know Him, He uses us in amazing ways.

New Toys!

Ever wanted to see a post back in the archives but had no time to look it up? Well if you can type in a key word in the "Blog Search" tool, then you get a list of all posts pertaining to that word. Enjoy!

Too Underrated

One player on the Red Sox who I think deserves a lot more credit is J.D. Drew. A lot of people hate him; they say he is un-clutch, that he doesn’t care, that he isn’t worth the money. I think they are wrong. Drew is the only Sox player to have homered in the past three post seasons, he is very consistent, and has gotten better every year. Not only that but he has an extremely high OBP, I think he’s either second or third on the current team. While he doesn’t have a ton of RBI’s his ability to get on base, set other people up, and be a smart base runner helps the Sox out a ton. He also is a very good defender who I think would get a gold glove if only he would play defense with a little more flair. If you still disagree with me then fine, but remember with Drew you get a guaranteed average of around .280, 20+ homeruns, 60+ RBI’s and an OBP of around .380 or more. Added to that only 1 or 2 errors on the season - I think that’s a pretty good player.

2010 Red Sox

I know I make bad predictions but here are a few of mine for the Red Sox in 2010.

1) Two words to describe the Sox vs. Yankees: Arms Race. This conflict will not end in peace (despite how the 80’s turned out). The Sox have really revamped their pitching staff to consist of an elite core of three aces and two potential aces. Despite what they said last year about “too much pitching” this year we have too much GOOD pitching, at the moment there are 6 starters who are ready to go and log in innings and wins, no counting on some has-beens this year.

2) Hitting: It is going to be tough this year to get the monster homerun numbers we’ve been used to, but when you think about it there are some average-good bats in the order, Ellsbury, Pedroia, Youkilis, Drew, Ortiz, and Martinez. Cameron and Beltre should be helped by Fenway’s cozy left field, and Scutaro will hopefully have another good year. The real key is for Ellsbury to hit a groove, Pedroia to shorten his swing, and for Papi to return to his 2004 form (or at least 2007).

3) Defense: There is no doubt that the defense is a lot better, there are currently 4 Gold Gloves (not counting V-Tek), and Ellsbury and Drew should be on consideration for one. Also, just thinking in terms of shortstop the Sox lost a good chunk of games due to the combination of Green and Lugo, erase those errors in Scutaro and that is an extra 5 wins – can anyone say 100-62?

Hopefully if all these things fall into place, the Sox will be much better this year and be able to compete with the Yankees.

Money = Evil?!

Many of my friends and family know that I am very interested in economics, whether it be from a historical or current perspective I find in fascinating to study the economic systems of our country and the world. I have my own ideas about money from a worldly perspective about what works and what doesn’t. The trouble is that in the materialistic society we live in it is very hard to reconcile these views. A few weeks ago I and a group of friends were talking about the Bible’s view on money and here is my take. First off, the Bible never, ever, says that money is evil (despite the popular saying), it does however say that “the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.” 1 Timothy 6: 10. A few notes, first it says the love of money, money itself is not evil just like baseball, the Red Sox, or school work (despite my constant hopes for the last one). But loving those things any more than we love God is evil and becomes evil. If I put baseball before God then it will become my idol which is wrong. Also, the article that is often overlooked, “a”, it says “a” as in it is one of many, as in there are other roots of evil. This goes back to the fact that if anything in our lives becomes more important than God it has the potential to be evil, no matter what it is. Then there is the rest of the verse, “Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” When our work takes over our life and our drive to make more money is what feeds us me miss out on a lot from what God has to offer. Let’s say someone works 80 hours a week. A quick calculation, 80 hours a week is about 11 hours a day that leaves 13 for sleeping (assuming 6 hours) eating (2 hours) and commuting (3 hours) which leaves us with a grand total of 2 hours for free time with the family and for ourselves. That leaves no time for God and a ton that you’d miss out of life. Money is not a bad thing, it is not inherently evil; it is not the cause for all our problems. It is a thing, and like all things when it consumes our lives and takes over it replaces God which is something nothing, no matter what it is, should do.

Wait, Why Am I Doing This?

I don’t exactly know why this popped into my mind (but then again I can’t always tell why anything does), but yesterday I was reminded of the story about when Jesus went to visit Mary and Martha. Jesus was stopping to visit Mary and Martha while passing through a village so Martha planned out this big party while Mary sat by Jesus the whole time. Martha was cooking up a storm (and judging by her response failing) and yelled to Jesus “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself?” To which Jesus replied “You are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better…” As a cook I can relate to Martha, when the pressure is on to do well and cook a big dinner for a lot of people things can get stressful, if I get nervous about cooking for my family then imagine cooking for Jesus! But the interesting thing is it says Martha was “distracted”, how many times do I cook and end up being so distracted that I forget why I am cooking, or how about forgetting about cooking, how many times do we get so wrapped up in the action of doing something that we end up missing the whole point of doing it? Martha was cooking for Jesus, she was throwing a party for Jesus, but in making all these preparations she forgot about Jesus and set her whole focus on running the show. Imagine if you threw a birthday party and spent the whole time baking the cake and getting dinner on the table while your friend twiddled their thumbs; that would stink wouldn’t it? The whole point of everything really is to do it for Jesus, it doesn’t matter how perfectly or imperfectly we do it, but we must remember why we are doing what we are doing.

Can You Spot the Difference?

I’ve been meaning to write a post very similar to this one a long while back but never did. I was sitting in church and the pastor said something very interesting about how the temple was operated and I thought “Hey that would make a great post” but I recently found a new passage of scripture and thought “Hey, why not make it a little more original instead of verbatim of what my pastor said.” I recently started re-reading the Bible from the beginning and am in the middle of the story of Abraham. Abraham was a great guy, he was wealthy and for all I know perfectly content where he was, but he knew that there was more to life and he took a giant leap of faith and followed God. While he did falter along the way (hey, he’s human) his faith was “credited to him as righteousness”. While Abraham was a great example of faith his wife Sarah definitely had a few moments where she just simply didn’t understand fully. We can empathize for here can’t we? How many times have I “not gotten it”? The example I’m mainly thinking of is in Genesis chapter 18, verses 1-15, it’s a big passage so I’ll give you the gist. Basically Abraham and Sarah are really old and childless so God works on His own timetable and tells Abraham that his wife will miraculously give birth at an old age. Sarah overhears this and laughs to herself, but when God questions her she says “I did not laugh” but God replies “Yes, you did laugh.” There are times in life when on the outside when people are looking we make sure to act “real good”, but in private we kind of drop the ball. There have been times in my life when in the comfort of my own home I fall a bit lower of the standards that God sets than outside when under public scrutiny. And how much more is the difference between church and our weekday lives! Abraham was not perfect, but he made sure that the only difference between his weekdays and Sunday mornings was the change of clothes. While the week is half way over I challenge myself, and you, to be the same every day, to have no separation of church-you and world-you