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An engadget article reveals that a group of enterprising lads have been able to crack the iphone, unlocking it for use with any GSM carrier. Looks like the only that doesn’t work is visual voicemail, which requires special server-side software to work correctly, something Apple/AT&T aren’t giving away anytime soon. Really this just opens up use of t-mobile for people here in the US. This is very good news for everyone else in the world (except Japan) as well, especially as apple starts to reveal its “exclusive” contracts with european cellular providers.

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A recent Time Magazine article discusses the unseen life of Mother Teresa as one of internal struggle. It quotes some correspondence between her and others in the faith from a book recently written–the general spirit of which is that of doubt. For much of her life it appears that she struggled to sense the comfort and peace that comes from knowing a personal God intimately, questioning at times if He was even there. All of this at the same time as she was serving God by cleaning wounds of lepers and fighting poverty one person at a time on the streets of Calcutta.

Many are pointing to such doubts about her faith as some sort of hypocrisy, when really for most REAL Christians, doubt and struggle is a normal part of the Christian life. In the book of Mark, a father who brought his child to Jesus to be healed and cleansed of an unclean spirit expressed well such doubts by exclaiming “I do believe, but help me overcome my unbelief!” Thomas doubted and as extra-biblical sources claim went on to die a martyr’s death in and around India. Saint John of the Cross’s “Dark Night of the Soul” has been studied and quoted for centuries because of it’s focus on the very same struggle and was what Pope John Paul II wrote his doctoral dissertation about. David Brainerd, a missionary to American Indians who was made famous by Jonathan Edwards’ publishing of his diaries, wrote often about his melancholy demeanor and struggle to sense the peace of God on his life. Even today REAL christians who would seek to glorify God with their life seek and struggle desperately to have some sense of intimacy and joy in knowing God–something John Piper has written a great book about called “When I Don’t Desire God”.

So it’s pretty normal to struggle. Mother Teresa wasn’t the first to do so and won’t be the last. As the Catholic Church is going through the process naming her a Saint, whatever that is, this should stand as a reminder that people who are viewed by history for doing great things for the Glory of Christ are no different than you and me–at least in that they too struggle to know God. The key as Mother Teresa has shown us, is to fight through the doubts to seek the Joy that comes from knowing and serving Christ. Struggling with doubt to seek to know God intimately means that you believe there is something that you have tasted in knowing God that is well worth fighting for–even if it takes you a lifetime.

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One of my friends who is living in an undisclosed country doing missions decided to do me the honor of making me my very own church sign in light of one of my previous posts.

You too can have your own church sign by going here. And by the way, I’m not really a Reverend, just in case you were wondering.

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Life’s twists and turns bring us in contact with so many different people, few of which we can honestly say are our true friends. True friends, the kind that would jump in front of a car for you, the kind that are there when you need them to be, and have the freedom to tell you things that you NEED to hear even when you don’t want to hear them are hard to come by.

Friendship is a selfish pursuit really–a mutual exchange of love motivated by the need to known. Jesus charged his disciples to love one another, using friendship as a way of defining love in saying that there is nothing greater than laying down your life for your friends. Who wouldn’t want friends like that?

Is that really selfish? Not if it’s mutual. If you find people that will love you with such selflessness, guess what? You’re going to in turn WANT to be the same kind of person for them. If we really love people as Jesus charged us to love people, by laying down our lives for them, imagine what kind of friends we will find ourselves with?

Jesus layed down his life for all who have and will believe and yet in his lifetime ended up with only 11 people that could be described as his true friends. Christ layed down his life for his disciples. They in turn layed down their lives for Him.

If even Jesus could be said to have 11 real friends in his lifetime, the ones he was speaking to in John 15, I consider myself lucky to be able to say I have even 3 (and you guys know who you are). Real friends are hard to come by, when you find them, be sure to show them the kind of love Christ modeled for us.

If you want better friends, start laying down your life out of love for people and you will have friends worth dying for.

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Thursday evening I spent a few minutes (several really, yes I’m a nerd) reading up on and watching some videos demonstrating the new iMac. I was impressed with the slick new design with the glossy screen and brand new slimline keyboard design.

Then friday I get a call from Darryl, one of my bosses/owners of the company I work for asking if I could setup an iMac for a new employee that is starting in September. So he shows up and asks me for a hand carrying them, yes THEM in. He snagged one for me while he was at it. It was a big surprise to me. I’ve been using my own macbook pro since about January. It’ll be quite nice not having to haul it back and forth. It will also be nice to go blind staring at the incredibly bright 20″ screen on my new 2.4ghz iMac. Thanks again Rearview.

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You ever encounter someone who seems to be a little rough around the edges? You know they’re the kind of people that whip out statements that are generally offensive and/or are easy to take personal insult to just about every time you are around them. Such statements become so common in observing their behavior that it becomes difficult for you to not think of them in a negative way. You start to wonder “how can this person really be this big of a douche bag?” Maybe you are just overly sensitive, insecure, or maybe the Almighty is having fun with you by placing this person in your life. Most likely the simple answer is, I hate to say it . . . maybe they really are a douche bag.

I think it’s safe to say that I have had some times in my life that I was this person with a chip on my shoulder–walking around biting people’s heads off–using my whits to insult people when they were too clueless to catch on (that was my favorite). But I didn’t get that way by accident. I needed some help to get me there. I apologize to those who had to experience me in this way back in the day (or yesterday for that matter). I might have been experiencing a series of events that caused me to spiral down the path of depression and self-loathing. There may have been something going on that you didn’t know about.

Painful circumstances are never an excuse to take your eye off of the ball, but sometimes you’re in so much pain that the only way you can muster the strength to be around people is to approach them with a sort of careless apathy. Instead of dealing with the pain eating away at your insides, it becomes way easier to point out people’s flaws to them. They probably have forgotten their flaws and need you to remind them of what’s wrong with them anyways right?

Next time you encounter a genuine douche bag in his/her element, stop and think about it for minute. Ask yourself, “what has happened to this person to make them this way?”, “what’s going on in this person’s life to make them act like such a douche?”. You may not have an answer, but there’s always more to their story than you know. This is a good opportunity to administer grace, forgive 7 times 70 as Jesus asks of us, and pray for healing of whatever this person is going through. Eventually, if they’re not really a douche at heart, they’ll come around.

My wife and I have been addicted to 24 and for the past several months we have been watching season after season. As of late, with my wife’s knee injury, we’ve been watching even more.

Seasons 1 and 2 were certainly the best. The plot lines from season 5 and 6 were connected, and together they come close to seasons 1 and 2. Season 3 was pretty good. Season 4 was, well . . . let’s just say it could have been a lot better.

Last night we watched the last episode of season 6. I really don’t know what I’m going to do now. I have grown far too accustomed to the “Power of Bower”. I’m already hearing bad things about the coming season 7. Supposedly 24 is going “green”. I’ll probably still watch it anyways.

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As you probably noticed the

tagline on the blog header was definitely an example of meandering. Basically it was just too long. So it’s now fixed.

I’ll probably change it, because I’m still not really happy with it. I guess no one really likes to be put in a box. More than likely it will change simply because I change. I’m not the same person I was a year ago or even a day ago.

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