It’s not often that I respond to these info things, but since the Schnitzel gave me this one, I couldn’t resist.
1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? I have to say that I go bags on occasion, because I am a horrible wrapper, but I do prefer the paper.
2. Real tree or artificial? Real tree fo sho! My brother & I used to sleep under the tree pretty much all of December! I just love the smell!
3. When do you put up your tree? We gave it a shot this week, but we’re missing the base (I am sad to say it is artificial). In future, I’ll get in early!
4. When do you take the tree down? If it’s real, then make it last. If it is a fakie, then as soon as you can be bothered packing up the decorations.
5. Do you like eggnog? I don’t know how often I have had it, but I’ll give anything a try
6. Favourite gift received as a child? Gosh, I don’t know. The boardgame “Cricket” was pretty fun. I don’t remember too many of my childhood gifts.
7. Do you have a Nativity scene? Nup.
8. Hardest person to buy for? My parents. They seem pretty well set up.
9. Easiest person to buy for? I don’t know. I think everyone is a challenge. But when you see the perfect gift, you see the perfect gift!
10. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? I remember receiving a pen that looked like it might have been given as a cheap promotional freeby to the person who gave it to me.
11. Mail or email Christmas cards? I’m about personal contact. Cards are nice, but I never get around to them.
12. Favorite Christmas movie? When Summer came to the North Pole. Really, anything by Rankin & Bass kicks Ass
13. When do you start shopping for Christmas?We knocked off most of our shopping in November, but I am still doing little bits & pieces now!
14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Nah. I think I would worry too much about being caught.
15. Favorite things to eat at Christmas? Gosh, everything is good at our house!
16. Clear lights or colored on the tree? Coloured, pulsing..
17. Favorite Christmas song? “O Holy Night”, particularly the Brian Setzer version. Otherwise “Christmas in Hollis” by Run DMC
18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? I’ll be heading to my parents place, but I’ll get there on the night of the 23rd.
19. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer? I I could start with Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Comet, vixen, & Rudolph, but I suspect I’d end up naming the dwarves from the Hobbit instead.
20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Whatever’s there. I got given some lovely ornaments from a family at Church. I can’t remember which they gave me, but I do remember it was cool. I’ll use what they gave me!
21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? Morning, for the family, then around lunch for everyone else.
22. Most annoying thing about this time of year? I guess the fact that people like to attach a big myth/lie to the most important of truths. Surely it can only serve to cheapen the meaning of Christmas.
23. What is the “corniest” family tradition you do, or miss doing? For years my Aunt and I would mock-fight over our shared-favourite Chocolate from the box of “Quality Street” chocs that my Grandma would always bring.
24. Ugliest Christmas Decoration ever invented?Snow in a can. I ruined a lovely smelling Christmas tree one year, but essentially spray-painting it.
25. Which looks the best, theme trees or homey trees? What the hecki?
26. What does Christmas mean to you? An all-powerful God humbling himself to save a sinful people.
I don’t suppose Chels, J-Moff, and my big sister Amy want to be “Dobbed in”?

Just a couple of pictures. Just letting you know I’m still here (and looking forward to having my own internet at home).

Fun times on the “Bucks Night” for “The Raj”. I’ll tell some stories about the manequin some time…

And here he is getting married…

I like this seed pod picture & I don’t know why…

For those college people who have been waiting, there are some pics from the Graduate’s retreat here.

This is the crazy look you get when you are free from classes…. or the look you get when they have all-you-can-eat prosciutto at the graduates retreat. Dan & I were similarly enthusiastic about that one!
So, it has been a week since I finished up at college and have rediscovered reading for pleasure. So far I’ve read “Band of Brothers”, the book that my favourite TV series was based on. It was worthwhile reading, even though I knew the story intimately, having watched the series about a zillion times. I’m also part way through “The Flying Scotsman”, a biography of Eric Liddell, the man they made “Chariots of Fire” about. I’m definitely a fan of Eric’s. One of the greatest sportsmen ever, and an inspirational Christian too! I’m also thinking that I’ll start “Becoming Conversant with the Emergent Church” (Don Carson) soon, as a prep for next year.
I’ve also discovered working for an income! I’ve had a couple of days working for Anglicare again with the “Toys’n’Tucker” appeal. The first day I did a bit of ferrying in a station wagon, but today we got to pick up our vans. Big 1.8 tonne mammas! It certainly was fun today getting used to my van & trying to park it properly when doing pickups in the middle of Cronulla, then the middle of the Sydney CBD! That was a challenge!
Over the weekend, I enjoyed the pleasures of grad-celebrations and Bucks nights. Friday was college dinner, Sunday was grad ceremony. Saturday was Dave Kerridge’s bucks, which involved Summer Hill Pub, Enfield Park, Absinthe, A shop Manequin & A police officer. Of course, this sounds very questionable, but I can assure you that it was all above board. Nice to have a bunch of guys together goofing around in a good-natured way, and I particularly liked praying together with the guys for Kerridge at the end of the night.
Otherwise, not too much to tell. We have a new Prime Minister, but I’ll leave discussion of such a matter to those people more politically astute than myself. Oh, as promised, please find some more pictures. These are from the Sculptures by the sea exhibition.

Probably my fave sculpture & my fave picture from the day. I really liked the rusty colours in this.

“Attack of the Ants.” These were pretty amazing. I particularly liked that each ant, made of machine parts, actually looked like it could have run as a real engine.

“The Master at Work.” The morning was made by Joel coming along for photos too. He’s a good man & a fun guy to take snaps with.

“Scary.” This isn’t from “Sculptures by the sea” and it certainly isn’t a good picture of me, but it’s important to be humble enough to put up the occasional “ugly, but interesting” shot right?

Yay!

So this photo is from Friday.
Joel & I went to the “Sculptures by the Sea” exhibit to take some photos & check out what’s new. I’ve been there each of the last three years during exams. I think this year was pretty good!
Anyway, I am sure I will post some pictures of the sculptures themselves, but first off, there is the blood.
I am fortunate that giving blood really doesn’t bother me. My veins are easy to find (apparently). I bleed really quickly, so I don’t take up too much time. To top it all off, I’m not really queasy about needles either, so it is interesting to watch something slip into your flesh & then see your lifeblood slowly seeping out.
However, I am busy, and I am lazy, so this means that I don’t give blood nearly as often as I should.
So, back to the story. Joel and I had gone & taken photos on Friday morning. We had also enjoyed the yearly stop at a place in Bondi that has $6 big breakfasts (and I have to say, on this occasion, it tasted like it barely made the $6 value), then we headed into the city to check out a “Lomo” store. I found out the address in Elizabeth street, then we decided to walk there. Joel & I walked for about half an hour, but when we got to the right number on Elizabeth street, there was no Lomo store there…. wait for it….
But there was a blood bank!
It had just opened, it was new and shiny & we had some time to kill. I’d been meaning to give blood for months, but had not found the time to head down to Parramatta & do it. It was fun & nice to help out!
Anyway, there is a sign of God’s sovereignty in the small things. I don’t think I will use this story in my Old Testament Apocalyptic exam that I sit in less than two hours, even if it does fit with the flow of God’s revelation in Daniel as both worldwide and personal….
Instead, enjoy another picture of my arm, if you are the praying type, then pray for my exam today, and if you are of age, then get off your butt & go & give blood. For those American readers out there, this is particularly aimed @ you! You suckers can even get paid for it I believe!!!!
Peace out!
(Oh, and I just remembered. The reason for the blog title is because this is my last exam before graduation! Praise the Lord!!!!)

Don’t worry dear reader (both of you), I am not talking about my blog. I am talking about College! Here I am, again, preparing for exams (and posting the obligatory study photo). This time, the ride is proving to be a fairly smooth one. Only two exams to write, only five essays in total. I also have my ethics reading to do, but as the previous post notes, I am enjoying that a fair bit.
In other news, we took a trip up to the Central coast yesterday. It was a chance for Shona to have a look at the church, the area, meet my new boss & finally to come along to an evening service. It was good to do all of these things, but I would say that the highlight had to be a lunch-break at “The Skillion,” which is a sticky-outy (technical term) bit of land at the end of Terrigal beach. We sat and ate fish & chips & stared out over the ocean. Of course, this was all less than 20 minutes away from our parish, so you can rest assured that many days (and millions of photos) will be spent at this place in the future!
Anyway, I’ll give you another picture of some books (just for good measure) then it’s off to compare Calvin, Luther & Zwingli’s views of the eucharist! Oh, the fun never ends!

You’d expect people to enjoy what they study when they come along to Bible college. After all, we’re pretty much all mature-age students & this isn’t just a course, but a calling. That said, my Ethics subject has been particularly awesome. Our set reading was to read 200 pages of one of 5 ethics books, but I managed to talk my lecturer into letting me read Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s “Ethics.” Having suffering in Nazi Germany, been (loosely) involved in the assassination attempts on Hitler & finally Hung by the order of Hitler himself, I am sure Bonhoeffer had a practical view about ethics that most of us don’t get to experience.
At the moment, I have been reading his chapter called “Ethics as Formation” and it is just awesome. It is a real challenge to look at our nature as man & the Ethical formation of the Christian. As out modern society becomes absorbed by the idea that we can all be famous & that we will all find that niche where we can be “special”, it is great to read paragraphs like the following, that acknowledges the “warts and all” nature of man, and points toward the one super-human…

To be conformed to the one who has become human (that is, Jesus Christ) – that is what being really human means. The human being should and may be human. All super-humanity, all efforts to outgrow one’s nature as human, all struggle to be heroic or a demigod, all fall away from a person here, because they are untrue. The real human being is the object neither of contempt nor of deification, but he object of the love of God. The manifold riches of God’s creation are not violated here by a false uniformity, by forcing people to submit to an idea, a type, or a particular image of the human. The real human being is allowed to be in freedom the creature of the Creator. To be conformed with the one who became human means that we may be the human beings that we really are. Pretension, hypocrisy, compulsion, forcing oneself to be something different, better, more ideal than one is- all are abolished. God loves the real human being. God became a real human being.
To be conformed to the crucified- that means to be a human being judged by God. People carry with them every day God’s death sentence, that they must die before God because of sin. They demonstrate in their lives that before God nothing can stand except in judgement and in grace. Human beings die daily the death of sinners. They bear humbly the scars and the wounds that sin inflicts on body and soul. They cannot lift themselves above other people or establish themselves as models because they recognise themselves as the greatest of all sinners. One can forgive the sins of others, never one’s own. Human beings bear all suffering laid upon them, knowing that it serves them to die to their own will, and to let the justice of God prevail over them. Only by acknowledging that God is in the right over them and against them are they right before God. “In suffering does the master impress his all-sufficient image on the heart and on the spirit.”

It’s a helpful corrective to remind oneself that I too am a broken person & that as a minister, my goal and intention isn’t to set an example per-se, but to point people toward the one true example in Jesus Christ. Do I approach my youthgroup kids with this kind of mindset? Am I humble before them in the same way that I humble myself before God?
I’m not a big fan of posing questions to my readers, especially since I’ve become a blog slacker & my stats imply that I have little readership left. Still, here’s the question for the day. How open and broken should a minister appear before his congregation (insert “youth minister” or “Bible study leader” into the position of “minister” as required)? How does one marry their authentic christian humanity with their call to lead other people?

He was a mild mannered engineer. Polite fellow, well kept room, eager smile. It wasn’t his fault that he had to spend half a year in the dorm room opposite mine.
I decided he was too “nice”, so I decided to give him a much more masculine, fear inspiring name. Poochy would do just nicely!
Reborn into a new level of danger, the pooch became an automatic chick magnet, succeeding, just before his return to Tasmania, in winning the attention of one Jackie (Jacqui? K works much better for me!) Brown. The fact that she shares a name with a Tarantino movie meant that she had automatic credibility with yours truly.
So it’s two years later & the Pooch now officially has a Mrs Pooch! The Jury is still out re: whether she inherits the name “Mrs Pooch” or maintains “Jackie Brown”. It’s line-ball at the moment…
Anyway, in other news, I just had my last ever lecture for my Bth. I also handed in my last assignment & now I stand 2 exams (5 essays) away from graduation. What a crazy world!

Jackie made the dress herself! It was pretty darn cool!

What an awesome cake!

490 years since Martin Luther nailed the 95 theses to the door in Wittenberg.
Here’s Luther’s famous song “A Mighty Fortress is our God”
A mighty fortress is our God
A bulwark never failing
Our helper he amid the flood
Of mortal ills prevailing:
For still our ancient foe
Does seek to work us woe;
his craft and power are great,
And armed with cruel hate,
On earth is not His equal.
Did we in our own strength confide,
Our striving would be losing,
Were not the right man on our side,
The Man of God’s own choosing.
You ask who that may be?
Christ Jesus, it is he;
The Lord of Hosts, His Name-
From age to age the same,
And he must win the battle.
And though this world, with devils filled,
Should threaten to undo us.
We will not fear, for God has willed
His truth to triumph through us.
The prince of darkness grim,
We tremble not for him;
his rage we can endure,
we know his doom is sure,
the Word of God shall fell him.
That Word above all earthly pow’rs,
No thanks to them, is standing;
The Spirit and His gift is ours-
We answer His commanding.
Let goods and kindred go,
This mortal life also;
The body that may kill;
God’s truth is ruling still-
His Kingdom is forever!
Amen!