Redo

I woke up an hour earlier than I planned to this morning. It was nice to know that I had gotten enough sleep and didn't have to wake up to an annoying alarm clock. Anyway, I went through and updated all my links. Took out the links that were no longer any good and added a couple of people I have found. If you're reading this and I don't have your link, let me know I'll add you.

New Book

I've started a new book. It's titled "Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense" by N.T. Wright. I'm reading it with a friend from work. I wanted to read "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis again but this one was recommended to me by Neal, someone who's opinion I highly value. I can not remember exactly what he said about the book, but I remember my impression being that this book would be easier to read for a non-Christian. Since my friend at work is not a Christian I suggested this one instead. I just finished the first chapter and I'm not exactly sure what I think. It didn't grab me the way that Lewis' writing does.

The first chapter was on justice. The fact that overwhelmingly we as humans feel that life is unfair and unjust, that we want justice but are unable to attain it; "we see a world in pain, a world out of joint, a world where things occur which we seem powerless to make right." Then he went on to talk about why we feel that life is unfair, what contributes to that. He went on to briefly explain some theories on what contributes to that feeling and focuses on the Christian theory. He says, "Comedy and tragedy both speak of things being out of order - in the one case, simply by being incongruous and therefore funny; in the other case, by things not going the way they should, and people being crushed as a result." He calls the feeling of being called to justice "the echo of a voice". And goes on to say that as a Christian God's passion for justice must become ours as well, that we should not use our belief in Christ to escape that demand because by doing so we abandon a central element of our faith. Jesus said, as you do unto the least of these so you have done unto me. (Pardon the poor paraphrase.) I don't know about you, but before this evening I had not thought of that verse as being a call to justice, a call to stand up for what is right. Wright mentioned a couple of Christians martyred for their faith and for following their faith to try and end injustice, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Oscar Romero, and Martin Luther King, Jr.

It makes me wonder, am I listening to that "echo of a voice" that I hear? How much injustice have I seen and not taken a stand against it?

Almost 42 hours

I'm sitting here unable to fall asleep. Of course it doesn't help that I currently have a computer in front of me but for some reason I do not feel tired at all. Here it is 11pm and I'm wide awake. Normally that would not be a problem but today at this exact moment I have been awake for 41.5 hours. So, what do you do to help yourself fall asleep. I would really appreciate some suggestions for tonight or tomorrow night or any other future night.