Ninja's and Awesome

It has recently come to my attention that there is a woeful lack of respect for my complete repertoire of both Ninja related facts and individual Ninja skills. Why, just 2 days ago, I myself leaped into and climbed a tree that did not have one single branch within 87 feet of the ground (This number maybe the result of minor hyperbole, give or take 84 feet). How did I accomplish such a feat? With Ninja skills, that's how. 

I believe this lack of faith in Ninja Related Awesomeness and Destruction (more commonly referred to as NRAD) is far more widespread than my personal sphere of influence, which, as luck may have it, is quite girthy. I have compiled a short list of facts and NRAD that may help you more fully understand the Awesomeness of the Ninja, and by proxy, me.

According to The Official Ninja Webpage "Real Ultimate Power", (http://www.realultimatepower.net/index4.htm) here are some facts about the common Ninja.

FACT:

 1.Ninjas are mammals.

2.Ninjas fight ALL the time.
3. The purpose of the ninja is to flip out and kill people.

I, Myself, like to add the following facts: 

4: Han Solo was a Ninja.

5: Ninja's are completely capable of killing a Velociraptor with their bare hands.

6: Every Ninja is an excellent lover, yet not all excellent lovers are Ninjas. (See Greg Gorham for details)

Read this true life story by a guy named Rob who is a published author (Blog owners are publishers right?) in the Official Ninja Webpage. "I heard that there was this ninja who was eating at a diner.  And when some dude dropped a spoon the ninja killed the whole town.  My friend Mark said that he saw a ninja totally uppercut some kid just because the kid opened a window."

This harrowing tale reveals that not only are Ninjas awesome, they also are very willy nilly about killing, death, destruction, and Roller Coasters. Although, I still am having a bit of trouble confirming that last one. 

If you do a top secret NORAD Search for Ninja Facts, you will also find that Ninja's are among the most charitable givers in the world, are usually quite skilled in the art of lumber jacking, and have among their midst the likes of: Chuck Norris, Fred Astaire, Patrick Swazi, Jimmy Hendrix, and Mia Hamm.

Ninja's are fast, cool, smooth, strong, powerful, and sweet according to Real Ultimate Power, the website. I am not sure if you could fathome, a more accurate depiction of me. I am infact quite fast. Just the other evening I cooked an omelet in about 5 mins! Cool and smooth? I both found my wife and sealed the deal within 8 months. Yeah, thats right. Strong, Powerful, and Sweet are pretty much like, my most common traits. So, I think I formed a pretty iron clad case as to why I am a Ninja. 

In conclusion, Ninja's are awesome.

PS: I play the guitar.

The Bird

As I stated before, I am blogging about several topics (If you don't know what they are, you can find the list here: http://jericksond.blogspot.com/2011/01/tj-houshmandzadeh-just-lost-game-sad.html)

Flip Someone the Bird...post on my blog

Life has a way of making me feel like a tiny being. Not very powerful and just downright weak at times. It happened in Iraq when rockets were coming over the burm and people got blown up. It happened again in Djibouti when I was sent to work with a village of people with no school, hospital, or water and realized I couldn't really do much to help them. It is also happening right now. I am realizing that my Faith is more important than I thought.

We all believe in something. Some believe the point of life is to live. Others believe we are alive to seek the truth and yet others believe life is a cyclical process and that when we die, we simply return in another form to try the whole thing again. I personally believe that we live because we were created by a loving God that wanted us to find joy and redemption through grace. The point of life is to bring joy to that Creator by giving back to him.

The New Testament states that if God takes care of the sparrows, we are silly to think he won't take care of us.It also states that if Jesus Christ died in our place, how crazy is it to think that he would refuse to take care of us each day? Now, I'm not the kind of person that pretends that if you love God, everything will be good and that nothing upsetting will happen. That is pretty much not true at all. However, I am the guy that says, "It is AWESOME that I am not a bird." Seriously, how cool is that?! Birds can't talk. They eat worms, they fly into glass and die, they live in tiny tree homes, and they are often attacked by cats. That would be a crappy way to go.

I'm a human person and since I believe the Bible to be true, I can believe that God loves me and cares about my life. Thats an awesome thought. Seriously, I'm pumped that I'm not a bird! Ask yourself, is life about me, or is there a greater plan going on here? You might be surprised at the answers you find.

The Superbowl and why Church should be more like it.

As I informed all my passionate blog readers (Who am I kidding. There are 3 of you. Joni, Greg, and Amber. My mom doesn't even read this blog!) a few blogs ago, I would be blogging about the Superbowl. Now, you don't have to be a sports lover to enjoy the Superbowl, and you don't need to know a thing about sports to enjoy this blog post either. This is about something else all together.

I recently (last month) heard a fellow lamenting the fact that millions of people go out of their mind crazy about the Superbowl each year and for one Sunday a year, they get into it. There are parties, people come together to cheer for opposing teams, there is food, great commercials, and it is a generally festive occasion. I tried to logically think about the reasons the Superbowl would inspire such a robust following and why most Churches in the United States are usually met with very lackluster results on Sunday mornings. Now it all makes sense.

Each year the National Football League invests millions, perhaps billions of dollars into this one event. People pay between $2,200 -$6,900 for a ticket (http://www.gotickets.com/sports/nfl/super_bowl.php). Commercial air time for this event is the most expensive airtime that can be purchased each year. As a result, companies put out their most expensive and or best advertisements of the year during this event. Because of the massive numbers of people watching, the NFL can book pretty much any band it wants because no musician in their right mind would pass up the opportunity to play for that large an audience. The teams that are actually playing the game? Oddly, it doesn't really matter. I mean, don't get me wrong here, they are the best the NFL has in that given year. However, never once have I been asked, "Are you going to watch the Superbowl this year" , and my response been, "No, I don't really care for either team." The teams are irrelevant. The SUPERBOWL, is the key here.

To put my point more succinctly, the Superbowl is awesome because people  role out the best and brightest of their creative genius, people spare no expense in creating the best image they can, the football league puts out the best teams they possibly can, and it is an event that brings people together in support of a common theme, the Superbowl.

Now if we replace the term Superbowl, with Church, wouldn't this make a world of difference on Sunday morning?! If we gave our very best creativity and genius each week in worship to God. If we spared no expense in our attempts to reach out to those that are far from Christ, what would happen?  What if we endeavored to give our very best abilities back to God as an act of worship on Sunday? If the musicians on stage had the mentality that this is the ONE day they can't afford to give a mediocre effort, would that change the way we worshiped?

I am not saying that Church should be reduced to a sporting event or a form of entertainment. Far from that! I am espousing the idea that Church should be so huge and important to us that we cannot afford to give it anything but our best. Jesus Christ DIED for our sin so that we could be redeemed from our selves! It just seems silly to me that Sunday morning roles around and we view it as a chance to "Go to Church." The Sunday Worship Experience should be the part of the week that gets our focus, our passion, our creativity, and our emotion. I think it is maybe time for us as a generation of Christ followers to start giving God our best and stop giving him whats left.

Now how cool is Church going to be when we are all giving it our best!?