Thinking on the analogy of God as a potter and we are the clay:
Each action in our life, each step we take allows the potter to sculpt us towards or away from his eternal designs. The more we cooperate with His Hand shaping us (through grace and those around us). How we deal with situations is shaping us for eternity. Here on earth I believe we are most fulfilled engaging in activities that we are good at and that glorify God. The way we let God shape us will make us the vessel that best fits us. And in heaven after we have been shaped and baked here on earth, we will be in the best form to serve him, shape to be good at what we will do in heaven and never bored with what we are doing for we are good at it and have been shaped for it. However if we fight the Potter, we will end up as broken shards unfulfilled and failing to serve our intended purpose.
So here and now serve the Lord and let His Hands shape you into what you are best suited for for all eternity.
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Free giveaway from gamer blog.
If you are into mini games, go check out http://thechaosmanifesto.blogspot.com/2011/10/100-post-by-me-and-give-away-from-me.html?spref=bl , he is trying to up his followers and giveaway stuff, always nice to see free stuff on the interwebs.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Baby Joren is Here
Baby Joren Eugene Grimstad (baby #6) arrived on 6/27 @ 5:49pm, he weighed in at 11lbs, 14oz and was 23 inches long a big boy. Momma and baby are doing great.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Perfection
We are not perfect, but we are called to be Christ-like.
This is the conundrum of being Christian:
We are all sinners, Christ forgives us and calls us to do better, and loves us no matter what. However, we cannot settle for where we are at. So we must acknowledge our sinfulness accept that we fall but not give into staying fallen. It is a battle between extremes: IF we strive for perfection on our own we will fail and dispair, if we settle for ourselves being fallen and not strive for more then we have given up. We are called to a middle road of accepting our frailties and faults and Having God fill us with his perfection, for we are not enough, and cannot expect to be enough on our own. But how do we find the middle road of accepting both our faults and God's grace.
This is the conundrum of being Christian:
We are all sinners, Christ forgives us and calls us to do better, and loves us no matter what. However, we cannot settle for where we are at. So we must acknowledge our sinfulness accept that we fall but not give into staying fallen. It is a battle between extremes: IF we strive for perfection on our own we will fail and dispair, if we settle for ourselves being fallen and not strive for more then we have given up. We are called to a middle road of accepting our frailties and faults and Having God fill us with his perfection, for we are not enough, and cannot expect to be enough on our own. But how do we find the middle road of accepting both our faults and God's grace.
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Latest new teams painted AND ELFBALL DEMO
Elfball Demo @ area51 gaming store in grapevine texas June 4 @ 11:00am to 3:00pm
Here are my newly painted teams:
These first guys are my Impact! Razorbacks, they were a gift from some good friends ;), I like the makeup of the team, but they were suprizingly tough to paint. Got them knocked out in 3 nights, pretty quick and dirty painting. I am happy with the results.
Here are my newly painted teams:
These first guys are my Impact! Razorbacks, they were a gift from some good friends ;), I like the makeup of the team, but they were suprizingly tough to paint. Got them knocked out in 3 nights, pretty quick and dirty painting. I am happy with the results.
These Guys below are my Gnolls, the first team I bought for Elfball and one of my first purchases from Impact! miniatures ever. Really happy to finally have them painted, what is even cooler though is that my wife painted them for me (I just put the static grass on the bases and numberd them). Can't wait to play with this team. Tangible love and getting to show how cool my wife is while playing Elfball, can't beat that!
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Couple of other painted teams
Here are two more of my painted teams. The lizardman team is the first I ever painted completely and the Night elves are a bit of a rush job but fun anyway.
Thursday, April 21, 2011
My Painted Teams
Past few months I have started paintin more, here are a couple of the teams I have "finished" so far.
Above: The Al'Stars, my human team in the DFW Blood bowl league, these guys are Impact! Desert Dogs and a Reaper "Naseer, Genie".
These are my Elfball Gnomes(Also Impact!), probably my favorite team as far as models and stuff. I play well with them, just wish they had a little more speed...
And in honor of Impact and just because I like em, here is a shot of my new hats :)
Monday, February 28, 2011
Failure
This week I feel like a failure in all that I do. I am not good enough, I cannot do it right. I make decisions that are incorrect, I handle situations poorly and life is a challenge that I am not up to. The stress of failure makes it worse. It seems almost as if it is a cycle. But one cannot give in for failure is to stop trying.
At school this week I blew an evaluation of the effectiveness of a grant at school because I choose to do a required benchmark in lieu of an engaging lesson despite an email telling me to do otherwise. I thought I was making a decision based on what the ad building wanted. I also had a test that I had to give to get to the magical 3 quota per district policy. I choose incorrectly and received a bad evaluation that let my school and principal down. I felt awful for I had prepared 5 of my six classes lessons for this, but they came in my unprepared one and I didn't realize I could opt out despite an email that I missed. Very frustrating, then I got a call that same day that felt like a reprimand for it, that I probably deserved but I was not equipped to handle yet. New like that comes better in an email or face to face, I feel powerless on the phone to things like that and it reminded me of when I sold cars and was reprimanded (repeated) by my previous boss. I then choose to exacerbate the situation by feeling slighted and needing to be heard, and was once again shown the errors I had made, may God open my hard head to the lessons he has for me.
Then I have fallen down on trying to keep up with the house. It is a mess and we had been doing better about cleaning, the mess overwhelms and then because I have been lazy about some of my grading I am behind on that and tomorrow is the deadline so I need to get to work on grading but I want to clean and I need to vent about my failures to move forward.
I also am reminded lately of past failures in my marriage, we need to get out new budget in order and that reminds me of my poor money handling and deceptiveness about it. I want to protect my wife from all evils, but it so hard when you realize that you are the one who has done those evils. She is also having a hard time lately, lots of stress,a messy house, a husband who "got in trouble" at work. I feel like I am failing in so many regards lately.
But I remind myself, I need to move forward in Christ. I cannot get all better at once, I need to move incrementally step by step. Tonight...Catch up on grading be ready for the six weeks that started today. Tomorrow clean...Bunny cage...House...and make great prep for my lessons this week in school. I must just remind myself I am human, I make mistakes, I fall, But I ask God to help and I move forward. I need to be the Husband God calls me to be, the father He calls me to be, the Example to others He calls me to be, the Teacher he calls me to be. Focus on him and all else will fall in line.
I have fallen but Christ is there to take my hand and help me up. "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, Have Mercy on me, a sinner."
At school this week I blew an evaluation of the effectiveness of a grant at school because I choose to do a required benchmark in lieu of an engaging lesson despite an email telling me to do otherwise. I thought I was making a decision based on what the ad building wanted. I also had a test that I had to give to get to the magical 3 quota per district policy. I choose incorrectly and received a bad evaluation that let my school and principal down. I felt awful for I had prepared 5 of my six classes lessons for this, but they came in my unprepared one and I didn't realize I could opt out despite an email that I missed. Very frustrating, then I got a call that same day that felt like a reprimand for it, that I probably deserved but I was not equipped to handle yet. New like that comes better in an email or face to face, I feel powerless on the phone to things like that and it reminded me of when I sold cars and was reprimanded (repeated) by my previous boss. I then choose to exacerbate the situation by feeling slighted and needing to be heard, and was once again shown the errors I had made, may God open my hard head to the lessons he has for me.
Then I have fallen down on trying to keep up with the house. It is a mess and we had been doing better about cleaning, the mess overwhelms and then because I have been lazy about some of my grading I am behind on that and tomorrow is the deadline so I need to get to work on grading but I want to clean and I need to vent about my failures to move forward.
I also am reminded lately of past failures in my marriage, we need to get out new budget in order and that reminds me of my poor money handling and deceptiveness about it. I want to protect my wife from all evils, but it so hard when you realize that you are the one who has done those evils. She is also having a hard time lately, lots of stress,a messy house, a husband who "got in trouble" at work. I feel like I am failing in so many regards lately.
But I remind myself, I need to move forward in Christ. I cannot get all better at once, I need to move incrementally step by step. Tonight...Catch up on grading be ready for the six weeks that started today. Tomorrow clean...Bunny cage...House...and make great prep for my lessons this week in school. I must just remind myself I am human, I make mistakes, I fall, But I ask God to help and I move forward. I need to be the Husband God calls me to be, the father He calls me to be, the Example to others He calls me to be, the Teacher he calls me to be. Focus on him and all else will fall in line.
I have fallen but Christ is there to take my hand and help me up. "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, Have Mercy on me, a sinner."
Friday, February 18, 2011
In Memorial
My good friend Rob passed away this week unexpectedly. All in God's time, I pray for the mercy of God upon him in his final journey. Rob was always in a very upbeat positive mood when I saw him. He loved coming to my house to play games, talk with me and see/hug my children. I will miss him greatly. We had been trying to get together since the new year for gaming and spiritual talks, I really enjoyed this time with him. I hope we can continue these games and talks in heaven, he still owes me a game.
I have never really had to confront sudden death before in this way. I find comfort in God and knowing that he is in control, I also find comfort in my conversations with Rob and the time we had together. I am still processing this and it feels as though my life is now in a new stage, truly trying to get the fact that in God there is a season for everything and his timing is not our own. And as my wife likes to remind me of one of the best prayers, "Come Lord Jesus." For he has truly come, is truly risen, and we are living in his salvation, and he will come again. Live for the Lord Today, because the past is gone, and the future is only known unto him.
I pray for Jerri and the kids. God has plans for them and I hope they can find comfort and trust in Him who saves.
I pray, "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us sinners."
I have never really had to confront sudden death before in this way. I find comfort in God and knowing that he is in control, I also find comfort in my conversations with Rob and the time we had together. I am still processing this and it feels as though my life is now in a new stage, truly trying to get the fact that in God there is a season for everything and his timing is not our own. And as my wife likes to remind me of one of the best prayers, "Come Lord Jesus." For he has truly come, is truly risen, and we are living in his salvation, and he will come again. Live for the Lord Today, because the past is gone, and the future is only known unto him.
I pray for Jerri and the kids. God has plans for them and I hope they can find comfort and trust in Him who saves.
I pray, "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us sinners."
Saturday, February 12, 2011
The OBJECTIVE reality
In astronomy the objective is the part of a telescope that focuses light, if it is poorly made the light will not focus well. If it is a little dirty, it still focuses well and makes a good image, it is only when it is really dirty that the telescope needs cleaning.
Our Faith must be our objective, objective realities do not change and they help us focus on reality instead of the distortion we would make of it. When our faith is not formed properly, then our reality is not as God intends us to see it. A little sin, an infinite offense against God, must be cleaned off our objective, but a poorly formed one is almost worse because we then cannot focus properly on what God wants. We need to continue forming our Faith in the Truth so we can see reality and went the image gets fuzzy we need to check our alignment with God and clean the lens.
Hardcore Faith, Hardcore Hope, and Hardcore Love are the realities of God. Just because we don't feel them doesn't mean they are not true:
1. Faith is belief in God, HE is there and He cares for us. We must know that God the Father has created us in his image (an image of relationship within the trinity), That God the Son, our Brother, redeemed us and taught us to call God our Father and thus we are children of the Most High Ruler of All, and therefore are Royalty by adoption. The Holy Spirit our Guide, Comforter, and Advocate is ever present in the Heart of every baptized believer, helping animate us to do God's will, see his truth, share in His Love, and be His grace here on Earth for all of our Brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. Hope is knowing that Salvation is at hand, not that we were once saved, not that we will be saved, but that the Redeeming power of Christ is outside time and an ever-present reality. Live for the now, and the now is our salvation. Yes we will die and experience God more directly, but He is just as present now in our lives as He will be then, we are just not yet perceptive enough, or prepared for what he as prepared for us. Doubt happens, doubt is a feeling not a reality, NOT an objective. God is real and Salvation is offered to all. No matter how dark or what our fickle human emotions tell us, or the liars around us, Salvation is at hand and nothing is more powerful than God.
3. LOVE as God shows us in actions, NOT A FEELING. God, the Father, Loved us when He created us, Before Jesus had become man. Feeling and emotions are gifts from God that can console, comfort, guide, motivate and empower. But the devil has learned how to manipulate these glorious gifts to his own evil devices. Love is Action, God is action, He is a Creator, a Redeemer, a Motivator. God's love is shown through actions, we ascribe our notion of the emotion of love to Him as a way of trying to grasp at the imponderable greatness that He is. I Love my wife, yet I do not always feel love for my wife, emotions can be fleeting, but I try to always show my love. God is always showing us his love, he can not not show us love. We must love through our actions and accept love from others actions for we can only feel our emotions, we cannot truly share our emotions with others and they cannot share our emotions. We can relate, but we cannot share and experience the same exact feelings as anyone else.
Do not rely one feelings, emotions, or premonitions, Trust in God and His Truth. All the reality we need is to be found in the Bible and the Teachings of Christ Handed down to us by the Apostles. We must constantly be polishing and grinding our objective to ensure we are seeing the reality God has set before us through his Lens and not our own blinded human "sight". When we first believe we are handed our lens (our objective) to see reality as God wants us to see it, but if we do not continue in our Faith, Hope, and Love then we neglect the gift of sight God has given us and we stop growing as Christians. This is a journey, a journey of pilgrims together in relation to one another, if we are not moving forward towards God then we are being left behind. Keep marching, when the going gets tough rely on God and the helpers (your community) to help carry and motivate you. One day may we all share in the fullness of relation with God as can only explained by the Trinity, a mystery.
Our Faith must be our objective, objective realities do not change and they help us focus on reality instead of the distortion we would make of it. When our faith is not formed properly, then our reality is not as God intends us to see it. A little sin, an infinite offense against God, must be cleaned off our objective, but a poorly formed one is almost worse because we then cannot focus properly on what God wants. We need to continue forming our Faith in the Truth so we can see reality and went the image gets fuzzy we need to check our alignment with God and clean the lens.
Hardcore Faith, Hardcore Hope, and Hardcore Love are the realities of God. Just because we don't feel them doesn't mean they are not true:
1. Faith is belief in God, HE is there and He cares for us. We must know that God the Father has created us in his image (an image of relationship within the trinity), That God the Son, our Brother, redeemed us and taught us to call God our Father and thus we are children of the Most High Ruler of All, and therefore are Royalty by adoption. The Holy Spirit our Guide, Comforter, and Advocate is ever present in the Heart of every baptized believer, helping animate us to do God's will, see his truth, share in His Love, and be His grace here on Earth for all of our Brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. Hope is knowing that Salvation is at hand, not that we were once saved, not that we will be saved, but that the Redeeming power of Christ is outside time and an ever-present reality. Live for the now, and the now is our salvation. Yes we will die and experience God more directly, but He is just as present now in our lives as He will be then, we are just not yet perceptive enough, or prepared for what he as prepared for us. Doubt happens, doubt is a feeling not a reality, NOT an objective. God is real and Salvation is offered to all. No matter how dark or what our fickle human emotions tell us, or the liars around us, Salvation is at hand and nothing is more powerful than God.
3. LOVE as God shows us in actions, NOT A FEELING. God, the Father, Loved us when He created us, Before Jesus had become man. Feeling and emotions are gifts from God that can console, comfort, guide, motivate and empower. But the devil has learned how to manipulate these glorious gifts to his own evil devices. Love is Action, God is action, He is a Creator, a Redeemer, a Motivator. God's love is shown through actions, we ascribe our notion of the emotion of love to Him as a way of trying to grasp at the imponderable greatness that He is. I Love my wife, yet I do not always feel love for my wife, emotions can be fleeting, but I try to always show my love. God is always showing us his love, he can not not show us love. We must love through our actions and accept love from others actions for we can only feel our emotions, we cannot truly share our emotions with others and they cannot share our emotions. We can relate, but we cannot share and experience the same exact feelings as anyone else.
Do not rely one feelings, emotions, or premonitions, Trust in God and His Truth. All the reality we need is to be found in the Bible and the Teachings of Christ Handed down to us by the Apostles. We must constantly be polishing and grinding our objective to ensure we are seeing the reality God has set before us through his Lens and not our own blinded human "sight". When we first believe we are handed our lens (our objective) to see reality as God wants us to see it, but if we do not continue in our Faith, Hope, and Love then we neglect the gift of sight God has given us and we stop growing as Christians. This is a journey, a journey of pilgrims together in relation to one another, if we are not moving forward towards God then we are being left behind. Keep marching, when the going gets tough rely on God and the helpers (your community) to help carry and motivate you. One day may we all share in the fullness of relation with God as can only explained by the Trinity, a mystery.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Instruments of answered prayers
As Christians created in the image and likeness of God, called to follow in Christ's example: We are called to be the instruments God uses to answer prayers, both the prayers of others and even our own prayers. May we pray for the grace necessary to fulfill the mission God sets before us and may we have the Grace and wisdom to cooperate with God's grace to answer our own prayers through His power.
Why I like Elfball
Elfball is currently my favorite game. Why I ask myself.... Well there are a few reasons: Elfball is a game that was designed to address and aviod flaws found in another game I love Blood Bowl. Elfball is balanced but has options. Every team has the same value, Every player has the same stat line, and there is no single best player in the game. Also turns and game time is quick, you don't have to wait too long for your next turn and can play 2 games at least in the time it would take to play Blood Bowl. The rules are consistent, you always roll dice equal to your stat vs their stat -2, every roll is like this (with the exception of injury). You don't start with "rerolls" but you earn momentum "rerolls" as your overkill the number of successes you need for an action.
Also the guys behind Elfball are a really stand up crew that cares about customer service and providing a great game to all those who are interested in a balanced fun fantasy sports simulation game. And I can't speak highly enough of these guys they go out of their way for customers and care about the community of which they are a part and provide for.
The company is Impact! and I play their game as much for how much fun it is and for where it comes from and who it supports.
Game on.
PS for more information on these guys and elfball see these pages
Impact Storefront
Impact Forums
Elfball offical fan page
Elfball Wiki and tactics
Also the guys behind Elfball are a really stand up crew that cares about customer service and providing a great game to all those who are interested in a balanced fun fantasy sports simulation game. And I can't speak highly enough of these guys they go out of their way for customers and care about the community of which they are a part and provide for.
The company is Impact! and I play their game as much for how much fun it is and for where it comes from and who it supports.
Game on.
PS for more information on these guys and elfball see these pages
Impact Storefront
Impact Forums
Elfball offical fan page
Elfball Wiki and tactics
Are we called to be greater in the Eyes of God?
Adam and Eve were created in the image of God and called to be in relation to him. Yet not until they fell and Christ redeemed us were we men and women called to be children of God. This title was not bestowed on our first parents, yet they were given many other Graces to live a life in the light of God that we have lost due to their sin.
So, I wonder if because of the fall we are called to be even more than than our first parents were, for our new Father is God the father not Adam and our Brother is Christ and our Advocate is the Holy Spirit. God has done great things for us so that even though we still persist in sin, we are called to be more than Adam and Eve were originally called to in the garden.
So, I wonder if because of the fall we are called to be even more than than our first parents were, for our new Father is God the father not Adam and our Brother is Christ and our Advocate is the Holy Spirit. God has done great things for us so that even though we still persist in sin, we are called to be more than Adam and Eve were originally called to in the garden.
Introduction
So I have decided to blog... I have succumbed to yet another evil of the interwebs.
So here is about me: I am a father of many (soon to be 6) children, Husband to my beautiful wife who stays at home with them and writes in what little spare time she can find. My intrests/hobbies are theology and games, hence the ever so creative title. I have had a few theological thoughts lately that I would love some feedback on and have been undergoing a lot of great spiritual and relational growth lately. It is amazing how as we age/learn we figure out things that seems simple in youth are truly complex and evolving. I am just now starting to understand knowledge vs wisdom and head vs heart.
Aside from these deep thoughts, I do like to distract myself with games. Especially games that simulate sports with a developing team and various strategies and luck all being of equal importance. Right now my favorite game is Elfball, both because of its rules and the heart of the company that produces it and the minis for it. I also like Blood bowl (but see that company as a soul sucking, money grubbing, corporation that hasn't realized that if you want long term success you need to build repeat customers for life who will promote you rather than just tolerate you to get what they want until something better comes along) and Grind. From time to time I play puerto rico, settlers of catan, dominion, betrayal at the house on the hill and probably a few others that slip my mind right now. But I am realizing with life as it is, I don't have time to play all the games I want/like so I am choosing to play Elfball for the above state reasons and the more I play it the more I love it.
So this is me, busy Catholic husband, father, and sometime gamer.
So here is about me: I am a father of many (soon to be 6) children, Husband to my beautiful wife who stays at home with them and writes in what little spare time she can find. My intrests/hobbies are theology and games, hence the ever so creative title. I have had a few theological thoughts lately that I would love some feedback on and have been undergoing a lot of great spiritual and relational growth lately. It is amazing how as we age/learn we figure out things that seems simple in youth are truly complex and evolving. I am just now starting to understand knowledge vs wisdom and head vs heart.
Aside from these deep thoughts, I do like to distract myself with games. Especially games that simulate sports with a developing team and various strategies and luck all being of equal importance. Right now my favorite game is Elfball, both because of its rules and the heart of the company that produces it and the minis for it. I also like Blood bowl (but see that company as a soul sucking, money grubbing, corporation that hasn't realized that if you want long term success you need to build repeat customers for life who will promote you rather than just tolerate you to get what they want until something better comes along) and Grind. From time to time I play puerto rico, settlers of catan, dominion, betrayal at the house on the hill and probably a few others that slip my mind right now. But I am realizing with life as it is, I don't have time to play all the games I want/like so I am choosing to play Elfball for the above state reasons and the more I play it the more I love it.
So this is me, busy Catholic husband, father, and sometime gamer.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)