What story are you telling? from Rhetorik Creative on Vimeo.

Check out his book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: http://amzn.com/1400202981

http://www.examiner.com/x-42872-San-Antonio-College-Life-Examiner

I’ll be spending more time writing for this site and school, so don’t expect too much from me on here.

Thanks for reading!

We were singing a song, and the lyrics were:

Forever I am changed by Your love.

That one part of the verse made me think, I have in fact been forever changed because of His love. I would not be who I am today if Jesus had never loved me the way He does. What would I be like now if I had never gone to that summer camp that year and heard the Lord speak and change my life? I know I wouldn’t be the Cory I am today.

I am so thankful for who I am. And more than that, I’m thankful for the work that the Lord has done to make me who I am. His love, mercy, patience, and power have all molded my life into what it is today.

I read Psalm 40 today, and fell in love with the way David spoke to and about God.

²He also brought me up out of
a horrible pit,
out of the miry clay,
and set my feet upon a rock,
and established my steps.
³ He has put a new song in my
mouth–
Praise to our God;
many will see it and fear,
and will trust in the Lord.
⁴Blessed is that man who makes the
Lord his trust,
and does not respect the proud, nor
such as turn aside to lies.
⁵Many, O Lord my God, are Your
wonderful works
which You have done;
and Your thoughts toward us
cannot be recounted to You in order;
if I would declare and speak of them,
they are more than can be
numbered.

My God saved me from the darkness and helplessness of life and put a new song in my mouth and a wonderful outlook on life. Thank you Lord for Your provision! You are God above my life. I give my worries to You, because I know you will provide or what is best.

One of the university’s student groups, Atheist Agenda, has started a campaign where students can trade in their Bible, Koran, Torah, etc. for porn. Yep, everyone else thought it was crazy too. The goal of their publicity stunt was to inform the student body that all of these holy books treat women in ways similar to the way porn does. It’s a stretch, but they feel that every holy book is oppressive to women. They have done this event for a couple of years now, and make headline news each time. So this year when I found out about it I told myself I would avoid that area of campus altogether. I also decided that I wanted to pray over that situation in hopes that the Lord would prevent people from showing up, prevent people from causing a scene, and most of all prevent people from misrepresenting the name of Christ.When I say misrepresent the name of Christ I mean specifically that they wouldn’t yell from loud speakers that Jesus saves, and these people are going to hell, and that porn is a sin and blah blah blah with condemnation in heart and love in the backseat. Why did I not want these things to happen? Because even though the Bible is in no way equivalent to porn, God’s message of love cannot be tainted by hate and expected to have a positive outcome. Nowhere in the Bible does God call us to ridicule and debate with nonbelievers over petty things. He does say to rebuke fellow believers and help keep them in line, but not nonbelievers.

So I prayed, and trusted that people wouldn’t do stupid things. Well, people let the anger get the best of them and they began a huge mess of a “debate.” People confessing the name of the Lord ran around screaming “Jesus saves!” and others shouted at the atheists to tell them they were wrong and bad people. “Christians” made signs and booed and all sorts of mean things. Wonderful, they did just as the atheists were hoping. They have now proved that the “Christians” are just as we see on television- judgmental, self-righteous, and mean. You know what ruins this for me? No where in this picture of Christians is love expressed. No where in here is Jesus represented as a savior who cares and weeps for those who are lost. Christ is completely outside of this picture! There was a large group of students praying at the event, but I would even challenge that as a boastful action. In the Bible we are told not to pray on the street corners so that others can see how amazing we are, but that we are to pray in solitude so that our attention and heart are focused on God. I feel that the wisest thing that people could have done was avoid being present at this event, and take that time to pray elsewhere on the campus or at home. Because then you don’t draw attention to the atheists’ event or yourself.

Some may read this and say, well that’s a passive way to handle the situation. I would agree and say that that’s the best way around this. There is no point in debating with them over this. The only way to prevent this from happening again is to pray that God will take care of it, because so long as people get a rise out of it and others bring in a holy book to the table, the atheists will be there ready to pass out their smut.

Now don’t get me wrong, this whole situation weighs heavy on my heart. In no way do I feel that my Bible is even close to comparable to porn. I wish the atheists wouldn’t host such events. However, they have every legal right to do that.

To wrap it up, next time you feel angry because someone has done something like this, don’t let that be reason for you to blow up and become “super-christian.” If you begin to shout God loves to the atheists, remember 1 Peter where we’re told to “always be ready to share the reason for the hope that is within you. Do so with gentleness and respect.” Those last words are the key to changing lives.

The first month of the year brought forth the inauguration of the United States of America’s first African-American President, Barrack Obama.

That day was a huge moment in our nation’s history. It was a national symbol to show just how far our nation has come in terms of civil rights. People from all over the world flooded into the Washington Mall to see Barrack Obama give his inaugural address. With his passion and commitment to Change Obama was elected the nation’s 44th president.

In February, scientists noticed that a Russian and an American satellites crashed over the nation of Siberia sending debris in every direction.

Sounds like the beginning of a SiFi thriller. I think this was the cause of global warming this year. (Sike…)

The beginning of March 2009 was when the ICC (International Criminal Court) charged Sudan president with war crimes and crimes against  humanity for all of the troubles his country was known for, especially in the city of Darfur.

This was probably one of the most talked about subjects amongst college students of this decade. Everywhere on campuses across the nation students wore shirts saying “Save Darfur.” These same college students gave money and time to help raise awareness and fight against the Darfur government that was raising kids to fight in wars.

April was when the first big concerns about the ever popular H1N1 (aka. Swine Flu) virus became world wide.

The Swine Flu ruined not only high school proms and graduations, but it also ruined the world news broadcasts. Every night for at least 5 months all we heard about was the H1N1. We’d learn about it’s spreading to house cats and it’s jumping from the US to Mexico and how soccer games were canceled because of it. Then, once we thought it was over BAM! the news was again overwhelmed, but this time with concerns about the vaccine and its distribution and effects. I’m betting that 2010 will welcome in the Bovine Flu.

Korea made its marks this year with its nuclear tests it launched in May, which were more than frowned upon by the UN as well as every other country in the world.

Kim Jong Il is going crazy. What was he thinking this year with all of the nuclear tests? Is he just trying to piss off every other country and thus commit suicide like the president of South Korea?

In June, following along with the political problems of this year, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was reelected as the president of Iran.

Another topic that zoomed through college campuses. So many students were outraged by the unfair turn of events that lead to the reelection of the corrupt president. This prompted many people changing their Twitter and Facebook pictures to a shade of green to show their support of the other candidate.

July hosted the longest total solar eclipse of this century.

Though it was best seen over Asia, the eclipse lasted about 6 and a half minutes.

Kim Jong Il made news again in August when he released two American journalists who had been arrested for entering the country illegally.

What amazed me about this story was that Bill Clinton was  able to talk Kim Jong Il into letting these two women go. How’d that work? Did he just go over there and threaten him with Chuck Norris like actions? Did he slip him a little something something? How in the world did he manage to convince the craziest person in the world to do something like that? Beats me…

Ah September…you brought us the G-20 Summit in Philly. This is where Qadhafi embarrassed himself.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/98399/saturday-night-live-un-address-open  <– This says it all.

Olympic October. October was the month when the Olympic Committee named Rio De Janeiro the home of the 2016 Summer Olympics.

President Obama and Oprah Winfrey spent a lot of their time and money pushing for the Windy City to be the home for the 2016 Olympics. Many people were pretty upset about Chicago not winning, but many more were happy that Rio won.

November was the month when NASA discovered some significant amount of water on the Moon.

This is something SiFi novels and movies have fed on for years and years. Now, we actually have discovered the water and who knows what will happen next in lunar science.

And finally, December. December was the month when President Obama announced his plan for bringing home troops from Afghanistan, which involves sending more in order to bring back everyone within 19 months.

Another controversial topic coming from the president who promised change. A lot of people don’t understand why he has to send more to begin the withdrawal. I don’t care how it’s going to be done, but I am glad that he is doing something about it.

Deaths of 2009:

Michael Jackson
Farrah Fawcett
John Updike
Patrick Swayze
Dom DeLuise
Les Paul
Ted Kennedy
Norman Borlaug
Robert McNamara
Walter Cronkite

This obviously only covers a few of the major events of the year. There were many more major and minor events all across the world that made 2009 the year that it was. There was a lot to be had this year and decade. Many expectations were met, many were not. Now all we have is to look forward to what 2010 has in store for us.

The study I have raises some really great questions and makes me think past simple answers, causing me to learn and understand.

In this chapter of the study, one of the questions- more of a command actually- was to take John 3:16-17 and replace the word “world” with the name of someone you’re praying for- a lost person. So  I did, and this is what I got.

16 “For God so loved Ben that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. 17 For God did not send His Son to Ben to condemn Ben, but that Ben through Him might be saved.”

I love it. It’s a new way for me to pray for this guy who the Lord has put on my heart.

If you have a non-believer in your life, try using this format to pray for them. I think it is a neat way to use the most well known verse in the Bible to pray for an individual in need of what Christ has to offer.

Thanks Lord!

Why you ask? Well let me tell you.

So I’ve been following @donaldmilleris on twitter since I found out he had one. That’s the author Donald Miller, for those who don’t know. I’m a big fan of his books: Blue Like Jazz, Through Painted Desserts, and To Own a Dragon among others. I love his books because they are real stories about real people that don’t require subjective interpretation to understand/appreciate. His writing is very conversational, meaning that he doesn’t use words you would expect to see on the GRE or LSAT. Instead he uses words that average people can relate to and understand. To borrow from the movie Almost Famous, he’s real.

That being said, Donald Miller is coming out with a new book called A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. It’s going to be on shelves shortly, like less than a week. However, he has been hiding copies of the manuscript with a cover letter, his phone number, and autograph around the states. Each day on twitter he would post the location of these manuscripts and people would have to go find them. I have been waiting and waiting for one to be in San Antonio! There was Dallas, Houston, Abilene, Austin, but no San Antonio. But then! Today he said he was having a grand finale of like 13 being given away all at once. So I checked twitter between classes and BAM! One in San Antonio! Even better, it was like two exits down from UTSA where I go to school! Problem! I had a class I had to go to like 10 minutes from then, so I couldn’t go. But as soon as class was over I bolted for my roommates car, that he willing let me borrow, and headed toward the location.

Mind you, this is now about two hours after I noticed the post on twitter. My thoughts were, “Well he hasn’t updated twitter saying it was found, and I don’t know if anyone else from San Antonio is following him on twitter…” Psh, it’s a town of a couple million…someone else has to be following him.

Either way, I sped over to this place, jumped out of the car, and ran inside…to the wrong building. Then I ran into the right one, but to no avail…someone had been there (probably within 10 minutes of the twitter post) and picked up the manuscript. Sigh… Oh well, as a consolation I got a free audio copy of his book Blue Like Jazz.

So I drove with caution and patience back to school dropped the roommates car back off at the dorms and headed back to campus to catch my final class that started in about 30 minutes.

Had I been able to skip class, I could have had the coolest day of my life. Not to say today sucked, because it was awesome in that I even had the opportunity to get this manuscript.

Thanks Don for picking San Antonio to hide one of those bad boys!

This year, I’m planning to run in the Guadalupe County Fair’s 5K run. I don’t care if I’m first or last, but just that I finish. I started training yesterday by running just about 1.66 miles. Today I played racquetball for an hour and then ran a mile immediately afterward.

After both days, I feel great; not winded at all. Tomorrow I have work from 8-5 and then a meeting from 5-6 and then a Bible study from 7-9, so I don’t really have any time to work out, but Friday I will pick up again.

I’m real excited about working toward this goal. I’ll try to keep my blog updated as to how each day or week goes as well as with the results of the 5K itself.

Here is my two cents on this subject. Since when has the idea of being able to get a job and live life due to doing well in school become not enough to encourage students? When did passing all of your classes become less important than video games and Nike Shoes? Where did these students get the idea that they can not work in school and still expect to be a Michael Jordan or a Julia Roberts?

I think once those questions are answered, then this school system can determine what they NEED to do, not what they can do, to solve this educational problem. When parents finally see, and take the initiative to change, their students lifestyles to focus on what is required of them in school, then things can change without having to dangle governmental money in front of their faces.

What I think needs to be done is that these kids need to see, on a daily basis, what will become of them if they don’t do well in school. They need to be aware of how important it is now days to have a minimum of a high school diploma, and be reminded of that every time they walk in the classroom.

A lot of the kids who aren’t doing well, or have a lower comprehension rate, are the result of family negligence. That is sad to me. Families don’t pay enough attention to their kids to help give them a foot-hole to do well in school. Instead, these kids are more focused on the social aspect of school and making an impression on those they spend their free time with. How about instead of being popular because you got a Play Station 3 for your birthday, you’re popular because you earned scholarship money for college because of your hard work in class. How many NFL players are drafted into the league with no high school diploma or only a GED?

Our nation needs to focus on primary education and what changes need to be made so that our posterity can succeed. We don’t need to entice them with monetary gain, but instead a way to provide for their family and the ability to be what they want to be. Schools should never have only 8% of their students on par with the required material. Never. People all over the world try so hard to do well in school so that they can come study HERE! People sacrifice so much to be able to come to the United States so that they can be what they have always dreamt, but somehow our nation is full of so many students who just want to get through whats required in any way they can, even if it is by the seat of their pants.