Out of the dusty shadows

Out of the dusk
Comes a dark creature forth into the light.
His eyes glitter in the half-darkness that enshrouds him,
Teeth grinning, white bones.
Tattered remains of a past unknown
Cling to his gaunt frame,
Hands reach trembling
So also thoughts racing through numb mind.
Keyboard clatters. Fingers curl about keys as friends
Grasping at a moment untaken.
The Shadow Returns

Okay, bad, cheesy intro, but it has been a long time I realize and a lot had happened. First, let me share something I was reading this evening. It's from one of the many introductory comments to John Owen's "The Death of Death in the Death of Christ"

"There are two rotten pillars on which the fabric of late Arminianism (an egg of the old Pelagianism, which we had well hoped had been long since chilled, but is sat upon and brooded by the wanton wits of our degenerate and apostate spirits) doth principally stand.

The one is, That God loveth all alike, Cain as well as Abel, Judas as the rest of the apostles.

The other is, That God giveth (nay is bound, "ex debito," so to do) both Christ, the great give of his eternal love, for all alike to work out their redemption and "vires credendi," power to believe in Christ to all alike to whom he gives the gospel; whereby that redemption may effectually be applied for their salvation, if they please to make right use of that which is so put into their power.

The former destroys the free and special grace of God, by making it /universal/; the latter gives cause to man of glorying in himself rather than in God,-- God concurring no farther to the salvation of a believer than a reprobate. Christ died for both alike;--God giving power of accepting Christ to both alike, men themselves determining the whole matter by their free-will; Christ making both savable, themselves make them to be saved."

Part of what Owen addresses in the book is this idea of universalism, or hypothetical universalism, that God died to make salvation /possible/ for all, but they have to come to him in order to seal the deal. This view, as the above author points out, makes it to appear that God loves everyone equally alike, he basically had his son die just as much for the reprobate as the elect, it is them that makes the deciding factor. Opposed to this, the Bible teaches that God "loved" Jacob but "hated" Esau, they did not make themselves to differ, God made them differ because he first poured out his love upon them! Noah was a righteous man, blameless (Gen 6:9). Why? Look at the preceding verse, because Noah found favour in the eyes of God. Noah did not find favour /because/ he was righteous, but he was righteous /because/ he found favour. This idea is repeated over and over in the Scriptures.

So let's see, I'll try to cover as much ground as I can here because I want to go to bed/read tonight (tired) and break it up into categories:

Work:
Has been going well. We had run into some problems with the coiled loop antenna that I was trying to implement. It had been designed by my predecessor but never tested. When we got it all developed and implemented, it didn't work! I spent a week researching antennas and even the potting material (we were "potting" the ear tag boards by basically molding them in polyurethane). The potting material was having a severe effect upon the antenna tuning. See, an antenna has to be tuned using a combination of capacitors and inductors. I could go into details of complex impedance and having to "tune out" the imaginary part of the impedance, but that's probably something no one but myself would really care about. Suffice it to say, that the polyurethane was making the antenna extra capacitive and meant that the antenna's range was severely limited. So I compiled all of my findings and presented them to my employer but he didn't really listen. So he called a couple of guys and found out what I had been saying was correct, which relieved me and hopefully give him a bit more confidence in what I've researched. So we're experimenting with a straight wire (which yes, would stick out the end of the cow's ear) and I've been working on building other things.

One of them was a "golden board" for the Bolus. The board manufacturer sent us the bare boards and then we'll send them to SMD who will put all of the parts on by machine, much faster than I can do for a couple hundred boards :)
However, they have an optical scanner that will look at the components and compare to a standard "golden board" to see whether they've done it right. So I was given the task of making the golden board, which I enjoyed. The tiny perfectionist work suits me, though by the end of the day my eyes feel ready to fall out of my head. Ben (my co-worker) said "wow, it looks like a machine did it) and I was pretty happy with how it turned out too. So they'll compare to that one as they make theirs to prevent further mistakes (they've goofed up a lot of builds in the past).

VBS:

Also went very well. I wrote a script or narrative for a skit based on Pilgrim's Progress, but with a Western (Cowboy) theme. So I would narrate it and the actors would pantomime it out on stage. I was very glad to find out that it worked well in Enid too, because that means that it's easily adapted to different actors and different sets and a different narrator. I tried to make it "reusable" as much as I could, or easily "ported" from one place to another. Bruce seems to think it could be used by others too so I've contemplated putting together a package with hints, tips, and instructions along with the lessons he prepared to play off of the skit and maybe offer it to other RP churches or other churches in the area. It's very low-budget, enjoyable, easy, and hopefully spiritually profitable as well. The characters from Pilgrim's Progress afford so much good material for questions and discussion.

Sunday School:

I was also filling in for Liz in Sunday School this past week which I thought went very well. I only had two students this week because many people were out of town though. And I probably had the two quietest but even they were talking a bit. We studied 1 Sam 23 and 24 about Saul trying to kill David. We didn't have time to sing Psalm 54 (which David wrote at that time when everyone seemed to be against him) but we did look at a map and a picture I'd found. I also found I had more than ample material to talk about from having read Henry's commentary on those not many weeks ago, so I definitely didn't feel there was a lack of things to talk about or point out from the passage. I tried to ask questions to get them to think about the Christian life and apply it to their own lives. For example: when David consults the Ephod and God speaks to David, I said "Now God doesn't talk to us in a voice or through an ephod (a gold vest or chestplate that the priest wore) but he does talk to us in other ways and we can talk to him. Can you think of ways God talks to us?
Answers from the two girls included:
Prayer
The Bible
and other suggestions I gave included the Pastor, teachers, parents and others whom God uses to instruct and direct us. I enjoyed it very much.

This fall I am (D.V.) going to teach a class on Pilgrim's Progress to some of the young youth. I am really looking forward to that. I shall definitely not have a lack of material and I really want to lead them in some questions about various things. I've enjoyed hearing Abigail or Dani talk (like last night in Enid) about various things, which belies a depth to their thinking which is beyond those of their age, but at the same time, as I was talking to Jonathan, I feel like sometimes young children have knowledge like cookie dough dropped into their brains, but they lack the wisdom to use it. If the right questions are asked, they can make the connections themselves but if you were to ask right off to explain the way of salvation or even the doctrine of election or something like that, it's something they've heard but not thought through for themselves, so they might not really understand it yet. Those trails through their minds need to be blazed, the food that they have eaten all their lives needs to be used to build muscles, through the exercise of those muscles. I really hope to help in any way I can there. Of course I'll be teaching, but I don't want to just lecture, I want them to be thinking through and studying and giving me answers to my questions. So I'm looking forward to that.

Well is that enough for one night? I'm rather tired, been working since early this morning. My father and brother came up to help pour concrete. They arrived yesterday and spent the day with me in church and even went to Enid, but today, after and during digging the footings, we had quite a downpour of rain and we couldn't do much more because of the mud. We'll have to wait until it dries out so we can drive the tractor back there. I was grateful they came up, though sorry it wasted a day of work for them. I went in at about 11:20 (having stopped by the Assessor's Office to fill out some paperwork) and worked until about nearly 6:00.

Things have been going very well, but very busy. A typical day starts out early in the morning, eating breakfast, reading, singing, memorizing (if there is time for all three) and making a lunch. Then I head out at 7:40 and go to work, usually staying until after five and working through lunch time (one hand on the keyboard while the other has a sandwich) and then come home, eat dinner and then start in on customer service, calling back and responding to questions and problems, correcting accounts, etc. Then answering personal e-mail received throughout the day (maybe) and then it seems it's jut about 10:30 already. I don't know where the evenings go.

Oh, Jonathan and I went to see Ratatouille (pronounced Rat-a-TOO-ee) on Friday night and I really liked it. The voices and character development were very good. At first I thought the hair-control was a bit weird, but it suited someone like Linguini and afterward I reflected that it was clever. The high point for me was actually the villain/critic that everyone was afraid of: Anton Ego!!!!! It seemed to me that just about every thing associated with him was perfect, from the huge portrait on the wall of his study, to his old, old type-writer to his thin, wind-blown physique to his very words. Favourite line? Probably either his dialogue about ordering perspective or his response to "And you're a bit thin for someone who likes food" which was (in sinister tones):
"I don't like food, I love it, and if I don't love it, I don't SWALLOW!"

The philosophy was pretty bad and I was surprised because I could see how many parts could be scary for small children (guns, down the storm celler, dead rats etc.) but all in all, the character development and voice acting really won for me. I liked it a lot, not as good as Incredibles or Monster's Inc. though ;)

Interesting things I found out while looking at the actors for the movie:
The voice of the short mexican cook was Ian Holmes who played Bilbo in The Lord of the Rings.
There is going to be a new National Treasure movie apparently. I hope it's as action-packed and clean and clever as the other one!

And that, it all for tonight.
Feet clanking to bed
Chains to hold a person until the dawn
Freedom awakens and a new day rises.

O_O