All moved!

There was a seating arrangement change at work, so I had to move my workstation today. Here's my nice new corner cubicle!

The hearts on the left are love notes from my wife. :-)

The book on the right is Effective C#, of which there is a new version due out in October.

The End for Which God Created the World

What follows is from a message from the 2003 Desiring God Conference that I was listening to on the way to work. John Piper quotes from Edwards' book, The End for Which God Created the World, which is one of the most important books I have ever read.

God is the beginning, the middle, and the end of all things. Nothing exists without his creating it. Nothing stays in being without his sustaining word. Everything has its reason for existing from him. Therefore nothing can be understood apart from him, and all understandings of all things that leave him out are superficial understandings, since they leave out the most important reality in the universe. We can scarcely begin to feel today how God-ignoring we have become, because it is the very air we breathe.

[...]

Listen as he [Edwards] weaves together God's joy in being God and our joy in his being God:

Because [God] infinitely values his own glory, consisting in the knowledge of himself, love to himself . . . joy in himself; he therefore valued the image, communication or participation of these, in the creature. And it is because he values himself, that he delights in the knowledge, and love, and joy of the creature; as being himself the object of this knowledge, love and complacence...[Thus] God's respect to the creature's good, and his respect to himself, is not a divided respect; but both are united in one, as the happiness of the creature aimed at, is happiness in union with himself.

In other words, for God to be the holy and righteousness God that he is, he must delight infinitely in what is infinitely delightful. He must enjoy with unbounded joy what is most boundlessly enjoyable; he must take infinite pleasure in what is infinitely pleasant; he must love with infinite intensity what is infinitely lovely; he must be infinitely satisfied with what is infinitely satisfying. If he were not, he would be fraudulent. Claiming to be wise, he would be a fool, exchanging the glory of God for images. God's joy in God is part of what it means for God to be God.

- John Piper, "A God-Entranced Vision of All Things", October 10, 2003

No such thing as chance

"The lot is cast into the lap but it's every decision is from the
LORD." Prov. 16:33 (ESV)

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The Beauty of a Will Enslaved

Free-willers were chatting in the break room today about the "beauty of free agency". I tried to pipe in with an observation about Divine Providence but it was not received. I had to leave the room in order to avoid upsetting people.

Why are so many people convinced that "free will" is a major tenet of the Christian religion? It's not taught in the Bible anywhere. Just look at Romans 8. Where is free will in there? Verses 7, 8 (ESV): "For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God." The unregenerate human soul has no choice but to live a life of degradation. It is only by the indwelling Spirit of Christ, when we are born again, regenerated (v. 9-11).

The paradox is not God's Sovereignty vs. man's free will. It is God's Sovereignty and human responsibility. We are responsible for the sins we commit, even though it is in our nature to commit them.

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iPhone 3G vs. Wi-Fi comparison

Using DSL Reports, here are the speed test results from my wife's brand-new iPhone 3G.



Here is my speed test from my first-gen iPhone over Wi-Fi, with AT&T DSL.

So, putting my wife's phone on the Wi-Fi network at home is pretty much pointless...

Podcast setup, Old-skool

Since my MacBook died, this is the setup I used for the Podcast this morning (visit http://www.sovereignjoycf.org to hear the results, or here's a link directly to the message on Matthew 5:21-22). Cakewalk Sonar 2.2 from 2003. An E-mu APS sound card I bought in 1999 and have migrated from PC to PC through the years (they finally made an XP driver for it!).

I only have 4 GB of free space in my HDD, so this setup isn't going to last very long...

My Macbook died...

I went to my computer and made the mistake of looking at it. Then it said it couldn't write to the iTunes library (iTunes was already open). I tried to open Firefox, but it wouldn't open, some error message about it already being open. Mail was being really slow. Tried force-quit. When I rebooted my computer, nothing came up. There was just a gray apple and the indicator animation. I could tell by the repetitive sound the hard drive was making that something was wrong. I waited a long time and tried again. And again, and again. Found a website on my iPhone that said how to reset the PRAM and use the install disk to repair the hard drive. That didn't work it said there were errors. Of course there are, that's why I want to fix it! All attempts to boot in safe mode have failed. Now when I try to boot there is no apple. Just a blank light gray screen for a long time, and then this.

[UPDATE: According to this help page, you can restore your purchases to another computer using your iPod. I know I've purchased a couple songs since the last time I sync'ed my iPod, but this is better than losing everything from the last year!]

Switchfoot on Prince Caspian

So, I didn't even know they wrote a song for the movie. We left as soon as the credits began because, having just finished the book the night before, we were not impressed at all with the filmmakers' idea of "poetic license."



I read an article online that pretty well summed up what was wrong with the movie. I think it was on World Magazine, which requires a paid subscription in order to view the articles online, so I wouldn't be able to link to it anyway (my Dad linked it to me, which is why I was able to view the article "for a limited time"). The article mentioned that Aslan was misrepresented (and therefore, so was the Gospel) in that he roared at Trumpkin rather than playing with him.

But the biggest issue I had with the movie was the "preventative measures" taking by the Narnians, who chose to attack Miraz's castle unprovoked, even going to the length of attempted murder, which is in stark contrast to the more Davidic behavior of Prince Caspian and the Pevensies in the book. I bring up King David because when he never attacked King Saul, and even when his son Absolom rose up against him, he sounded a retreat rather than risk shedding royal blood.

C. S. Lewis was a theologian more than he was a novelist. He wrote what he wrote for a reason. I wish they wouldn't have messed with the story.

Waiting in line at the Auctiva Family BBQ

Fwd: Add my location

Skyhook Wireless is the company that provides the Wi-Fi positioning data that's used by the Google Maps application on the iPhone. So, if you have the first-generation phone that doesn't have GPS, and you want a more accurate "My Location" when you're at home than the cell tower triangulation can give you, you can submit your own Wi-Fi router's MAC address with your coordinates!

http://skyhookwireless.com/howitworks/submit_ap.php

What I'm listening to

Good stuff.

This is interesting and unexpected...

I was trying to turn off my iPhone using the old-fashioned method, both buttons at the same time, the way you used to do it in 1.0. But instead, the screen flickered. When I next synced with iPhoto, there were a bunch of screen captures in there! Apparently in 2.0, the method you used to use to bring up the off switch is now the way you take screen shots!

It's not just our company...

The whole world is down for Thursday night maintenance... Wikipedia... Amazon... Twitter... eBay...

Twinkle vs. Twitterific

So I was wondering whether to use Twinkle or Twitterific on my iPhone, I Googled the two and found these twitscoop results, where the consensus seems to be Twinkle. What's ironic is that I was going to post on twitter about this, but it's down at the moment...

(Note: The search results are dynamic and up-to-the-moment, so that link will probably become outdated in the not-to-distant future.)

Twitter feed

You can now find me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/alord

P.S. Had toaster strudel for breakfast.

Sent from my iPhone

Christina's birthday

IMG_0324, originally uploaded by The Lord Family.

It's my beautiful wife's birthday today. We had a get-together at her parents' house in her honor. I pray that this next year will be the best year of her life. Happy birthday, my Love!

Feed Readers: Why I'm Switching

The Big Two when it comes to RSS/Atom feed readers are Bloglines and Google Reader. I started using Bloglines years ago to keep track of my friends' Xanga entries. Nobody I know uses Xanga anymore, but I continued using Bloglines to manage my blog subscriptions. Now they have a public beta version, which is pretty cool. And I've been using their iPhone version to read blogs on my iPhone.

Bloglines was fine when all I wanted to do was be notified that someone had updated their blog (by way of the indicator in the system tray), but then I used to go directly to the blog to read the post, and perhaps even leave comments. But now there is so much more content available via RSS/Atom syndication, so it has become necessary to use the feed reader to read content as well. Furthermore, the mobile versions are optimized for reading on the iPhone, and you can't say that about every individual blog out there.

However, I am making the switch to Bloglines' chief competitor, Google Reader. My chief complaint with Bloglines (standard) is that when you view a feed, it automatically marks all available entries as read. They seem to be addressing this issue with the beta version, but this doesn't help on the iPhone, which retrieves 5 entries at a time (and marks them as read).

Google Reader, however, uses Ajax technology to mark an entry as read based on whether the entry is visible in your browser! This is a much better method of keeping track of your blog subscriptions, because you're guaranteed not to miss anything.

The only down side, I think, to Google Reader is the smaller font size. But if you hold the phone sideways (landscape mode), it's a bit bigger.

Tips: If you're using Google Reader on the iPhone, push the plus sign at the bottom of the screen and add it to your home screen (with a nifty little icon, too!). Also, in the footer next to the copyright, you can select "Mobile" or "Classic". To use the best iPhone version, select "Mobile". It makes use if Ajax's asynchronous loading of data and has more features than the other version.

Oh, and on another note, the brand-new MySpace App on iPhone 2.0 rocks!!! The comments interface is great. And you can even upload photos straight from your phone (unfortunately, you can't move them to a different folder, though). What I really don't get, though, is why you need to fill out a stinkin' captcha form if you're using an iPhone! Still, the app is cleaner and more elegant than any other form of MySpace interface I've ever seen, and just might make MySpace something I'll enjoy using again! (It doesn't let you view or edit blogs, but who uses MySpace for blogging anyway?)

Sent from my iPhone

P.S. Here's the news from Google in May about the new iPhone version of Reader.

BSOD Lives!

I don't use Vista personally, either for my workplace IDE or at home, and I'm typing this now on a Mac, as a matter of fact! However, I just read this post from Joseph about how Microsoft actually names some Vista errors "BlueScreen" errors in honor of the "Blue Screen of Death"! He even has a screenshot.

Challies: "Every Word of God"

It has been a long time since I've been around people who called themselves Christians yet thought it was okay to use a non-literal translation of the Bible. But today's post from Tim Challies provides compelling evidence and encouragement for anyone who finds himself in this battle. Thank God that his very words have been preserved for us to read today.

http://www.challies.com/archives/articles/bible-study/every-word-of-god.php

Sent from my iPhone

The Voice of the Martyrs - News

It amazes me how much people are willing to turn a blind eye because of the Olympics. Don't turn a blind eye to this, dear Reader. It is an article from Voice of the Martyrs about Chinese Christians being persecuted in Beijing.

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We have a due date!

The doctor just confirmed. Official due date is January 25, 2009!