Best Laid Time Travel Plans

Greetings Warriors and Scholars!

Found on the IMDB page.

Have you been watching Timeless? I have. At first I felt like it was a little bit predictable and sometimes it is, but the quality of acting and intriguing portrayals of historical figures with the mystery of Rittenhouse have kept me watching. Most sci-fi shows nowadays are very dark, apparently since BSG was rebooted the networks think everything has to be dark. It is refreshing to see a lighter science fiction show with nuance that recognizes dark situations.

So essentially in Timeless we have a team of 3 people trying to stop another team from changing time. One team takes the stolen "Mothership" back in time and the other team, at the actual HQ, sees where it has gone and takes the "Lifeboat" back to keep the timeline from being altered and/or stop the thieves.

Spoilers Ahead.

Last night's episode was a little different. Wyatt (Matt Lanter) and Rufus (Malcolm Barrett) went back to change time instead of protect it. Wyatt's wife was killed before he had been pulled into the program and he wanted to make sure the man who did that never existed. When they got back, they found out it had not worked. The man did not exist, but his wife had still been killed.

"We may throw the dice, but the Lord determines how they fall."                    Prov. 16:33 NLT

The reality is we can not fix everything ourselves. We have tried for years to fix things. The problem is we are a sinful race.

"Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. All such boasting is evil." James 4:13-16, NIV

Wyatt thought he knew what would happen when he got back. He thought he would go back to his find his wife there to welcome him. It did not work. Maybe the man who said he had killed her lied, or maybe Rittenhouse had been behind the murder somehow even from the start. His idea, which had even lead to a man's death as well as erasing one man from history, simply did not work.

But if you notice we are not told to never have any plans or that our ideas or points are useless. "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that." We are supposed to be part of the solution. In fact James goes on to say that failing to do something we know we should do is sin. The question is more of an issue of whether we are cooperating with God and trusting Him or if we are trying to fix it on our own.

We might yet see Lucy get her sister back and Wyatt get his wife back. Or they might find that tampering with time is never going to work. But what about your life? Have you been seeking God's direction? Are you cooperating with Him? Why would you want to do it on your own and without Him?

Events of Feb./March 2017

Greetings Scholars and Warriors.

Here is a list of events Nerd Chapel will be at over the next 2 months.

I'll have a table at all of these events.

February 4: Byron Center Rec Comic Con https://www.facebook.com/events/228038290910925/

March 3-5: Michigan Statewide Teen Convention http://mistatewide.org/
Of these events, this is the only one that will use my public speaking skills. I'll be sharing at one of the main sessions and possibly leading a workshop.

March 11-12: Fantasticon Toledo http://www.fantasticon.net/

March 18: Muskecon https://www.facebook.com/events/1102894249776217/

Foggy and Fakery

Greetings Warriors and Scholars!

Found through google/tumbler:
https://www.tumblr.com/search/foggy%20please

On my long quest of collecting and reading old issues of Marvel Comics. I have been reading issue 2 of Daredevil Marvel Masterworks which includes Daredevil 18 and 19. Foggy Nelson trying once again to impress Karen. His idea? Pretend to be Daredevil. Ok, so it was actually the idea of the guy at the costume shop who wanted to fight and kill superheroes to prove that he was the best costume maker (call him "Gladiator"). Foggy was just gonna have the costume around for her to find. DD had been noticing what was going on, of course. He was following Foggy when it all went down and managed to fight the villain and protect Karen. Of course, then the news somehow got wind that Foggy was DD and it got a whole lot more dangerous.

We all know that lying is a sin. It is condemned in the Ten Commandments as well as in Proverbs. But this was a particular kind of lying. This was putting on a show to impress people. He was being fake. By doing this he put both himself and others in danger. For most of us our fakeness will not get us in deadly situations. We won't be hunted down by someone who thinks we are another person to try and kill us. But, it still affects our friendships. It keeps us from getting to know others and them from getting to know us. The false pretenses it leads to will ultimately damage your relationships.

Why do we ever be "fake"? Quite simply, we like the attention. A pat on the back, laughter at jokes, smiles, hugs and of course invitations to events or dates. These all come with high emotions. But do these fulfill us? In most cases these are good things. They can all be forms of encouragement but they will not be the real fulfillment of any soul. That comes from Jesus, who was not afraid to say things that others did not want to hear, who has never pretended he was someone he isn't.

You are enough yourself. The only good kind of change is one that draws you closer to Jesus and is done for character growth and obedience to His calling. You do not have to pretend to be someone you are not. Look, we all have sinned. We have all had moments where we chose something wrong whether it was some form of sexual sin or lying or hatred. Also, we have all had silly moments where we did something socially awkward. You are not alone in that.

If you want to change, make it a healthy change. You do not have to agree with sin or do make up a story for attention. Especially the attention that is not in line with what God has for you. If you don't know what God has for you, start with scripture. Ask a friend for help. Just don't put on a show to get attention for the wrong act or to try and feel better. Foggy came clean at one point and you know what? Neither Matt Murdock nor Karen were all that mad at him. They just wanted to have the real Foggy safe.

2017 Begins

Greetings Warriors and Scholars.

Today I want to look at the coming year. I am excited for a few things happening. Some are ministry details and some are just fun nerdy things. We'll look at fun stuff first.

As we continue what seems to be the "Decade of the Nerd" we have so many things happening on screen this year! I am not doing a "top 3" or anything like that because there is so much happening. The last season of Grimm starts this coming Friday along with a new, darker screen adaptation of The Wizard of Oz called Emerald City. I am very interested in how NBC's Friday night lineup these next couple of months will do. That will add to the shows I already keep tabs on (no, I am not going to list all of them). We also have Iron Fist and the Defenders coming for the Netflix MCU and 3 MCU movies this year! Also, we have Skull Island, both Wonder Woman and Justice League, Star Wars Episode 8, etc.

Boardgames? Well, I am not sure what games are coming out this year beyond the 2 I have coming from kickstarters. Unreal Estate is a card game about building a fantasy style city and Zephyr:Winds of Change is a cooperative game where you have a skyship that you take on missions. Honestly, I have not caught up with 2016 yet as I still have yet to play Scythe, Terraforming Mars, or Seafall. Gaming wise I am just excited to get back to Gen Con this year. I had to miss last year so I really don't want to miss this year!

In March I will be at a Christian youth convention called "Michigan Statewide Teen Convention" in Kalamazoo, MI. This will be my first time taking Nerd Chapel and 42:Discovering Faith through Fandom to a youth convention. It came about because I have been volunteering at this convention as a lighting tech for the main sessions for a few years now and they were interested in bringing a locally based non-traditional ministry to show students that ministry doesn't always mean working at a church full time.

I will also be at the Byron Rec Center Comic Con and Muskecon. These are both 1 day shows within driving distance of where I live that I'll have tables at. I do not have complete details on what shows I'll be returning to this year for Nerd Chapel. GrandCon is always a sound bet for me for a service. I expect to go back to Jafax, Midwest Media Expo with services and Fantasticon Fort Wayne with a table as well but we shall see what transpires.

Yes, I am going to be working on a sequal to 42. We have a direction to go in but we have not started the full writing process quite yet (although that will be soon).

Identity and Powers

Greetings Warriors and Scholars.

Legends of Tomorrow progressed a new theme for this season, one of an identity crisis. Spoilers if you have not yet watched this season.

The team itself faced it as they found their leader missing when rescued from time by Oliver and Nate Heywood, a historian. Rip Hunter had scattered most of the team when the ship was damaged while stopping a nuclear incident. He then went somewhere in time and chose to keep himself hidden from them. Basically, they lost their leader. When you don't have a leader, your team suffers. Another reason the team had such an identity crisis was that individuals were facing so many questions.

Heywood wanted to be a hero in the footsteps of his grandpa and had a rough first meeting with him when they met the JSA. He then gained powers but then had to figure them out.

Ray Palmer lost his suit after a Japanese warlord took it. Without his suit he was questioning his role on the team and his use as a hero. He even went to the point of trying to become Captain Cold. That persona did not fit him at all.

We also had another run in with a young Professor Stein. After seeing his future self and realizing that time travel was real, he lost himself in his studies. To a point that it was damaging his marriage quite heavily.

In most of these cases, you have people basing their value on their equipment and skills and knowledge. They all lost sight of the real truth. These things all come out of our identity; they do not shape it. As a Christian, I find my identity in my savior. In following Jesus I am forged and granted skills and powers (a.k.a. spiritual gifts), though not the same as those you see in comic books.

From an early point the church struggled with the concept of viewing our identity in skills and knowledge. Paul often wrote against Gnosticism, which was trying to affect the church with the lie that if you have special knowledge you are more special or important. Many in the church got overly focused on having certain spiritual gifts (a.k.a. powers). We have a whole chapter dedicated to warning us about the over-emphases on speaking in tongues.

You see while spiritual gifts are great, useful and sometimes extraordinary, our view of them can be skewed by our worldly desires. What did Paul say about worldly desires and objects?

"More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ," Philippians 3:8, NASB

Our abilities and our desires will never fulfill us. They are part of us but they can not define us. They don't have that power. Even our roles don't really define us. Often times we define these things but scripture makes it clear: Christ is our fulfillment. Hobbies, roles, even gifts from Christ will never be able to fill the place in our lives meant for Him.

As we follow Jesus, He will fulfill us. As He fulfills us and trains us to love each other and Him, through what we often call the Fruit of the Spirit, we become better at handling all these things. Our hobbies do not necessarily get lost, but they often become part of God's mission for us. Our skills and powers are used for that mission. But overall, the one single fulfilling aspect of life is Jesus Himself.

 

Melody Against Chaos

Greetings Warriors and Scholars!

http://www.tvfanatic.com/2016/11/the-librarians-season-3-episode-1-review-and-the-rise-of-chaos/

So, last night I excitedly turned in to watch "The Librarians" on TNT. Flynn Carson, his Guardian and his team of Librarians are at it again...and they did not disappoint. They are trying to get back to the feel of the movies which did come across a little bit in this episode and you could also see a strong taste of Doctor Who in a few scenes. Spoilers ahead my friends.

This week they went against the Egyptian deity of chaos, Apep. He was trying release "pure evil" and had this little trick. He would often get people fighting each other. A wave of blackness would spread out and everyone would turn on each other. He used this several times over the episode but it had a short range to it.

After the second time of experiencing this, Eve noticed that she was free of the screaming at others after getting a certain distance. She pulled the others out and they all realized what he was doing to them. He was creating chaos so they could not work together. They had a simple way of dealing with it: they got unified. They came out singing the Battle Hymn of the Republic and when he tried his power on them again it failed. Their signing built a harmony (pun intended) that could not be undone. Then they told him who they were. In a scene which felt like the end of Matt Smith's first episode as the 11th Doctor (even with similar music) they stood and told him who they were and stood against him.

This scene reminded me of 3 of significant tools/principals of spiritual warfare.

First of all, unity is hugely important. The Bible warns us time and again to cooperate.

"Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken." Ecclesiastes 4:2

 "Do not stop him," Jesus said, "for whoever is not against you is for you." Luke 9:50

But how do we build unity?  We do it by serving each other, by serving with each other, by worshiping ,etc. I have made it a point to be involved in many "multi-denominational" events and groups in my life. From a Christian club at my high school to couple of community service days to the Journey to Bethlehem (imagine a giant huge living nativity where you down a trail meeting the wise men and the shepherds, etc. Alternatively, think of it as Bible reenactors).

Second, "do the opposite". The word from Greek that we translate as "repent" was a military term. It essentially means to stop, turn 180 degrees and walk the other way. Not all temptation has a demon or a fallen angel behind it, but sometimes they like to take our natural temptations and encourage such activities. When you choose not to act in a way you are being tempted and go do something else, it sends a message to any spirits around: "I am for Jesus and nothing else owns me".

Finally, worship is important. The scripture tells us that God inhabits the praises of his people (see Psalm 22). And connected with my mentioning of unity above, we are told in Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3 to "sing songs and hymns and spiritual songs". Ephesians tells us to sing them to each other. When we praise the God of creation and worship Him, it reminds us who we serve, why we serve, and where our hope can be found.

The Librarians won this battle. They stopped Apep with unity and doing the opposite of what he wanted them to do and with music. They got the key he needed to open the portal and this round is over. We should all learn from their example. Right now so many groups in our nation are being played against each other. That does not have to win. Our hope is in Christ, not any government. As we share that hope with others by action as well as words life will move on. 

Should I Respond?

Greetings Warriors and Scholars.

A couple weeks ago I saw a post in a board game group in FB that caught my eye. It was a general post that I think was asking for suggestions of games. There was one guy who commented on there about the Christian faith of the guy who posted. He essentially claimed that mankind doesn't need religion and basically attacked faith.

I had so many things I could say, but I said nothing. You see, Proverbs warns us about answering some people who start arguments. He was looking for an argument and showed no interest in understanding other people.

Here are a few questions to ask when seeing such comments and posts:

1. Are you calm enough for a healthy conversation or are you just responding out of anger or another negative emotion? Getting riled up and angry does not point people to Jesus. There is such a thing as righteous indignation but Jesus rarely ever used that. He tried grace mixed with truth more than that and he really loved using story telling to make points.

2. If this is a comment on a post, is the orginal poster responding? If not, then do you really need to? Sometimes it is best for the poster to respond first. Other times it might be ok for you to respond. This is one of those questions of observation. Just feel it out.

3. Does the commentator or poster seem interested in healthy conversation? Are they asking a question or using logic? Sometimes it is better to leave attacks as they are. Ignoring a bad direction can leave you open to pursue a better one.

4. If a comment, does it fit the goal of discussion set by the actual post? Is it a rabbit trail? We have all seen strange comments. You have probably also seen people lead huge argument trails in a post that have nothing to do with the post. Again, some things can be a ignored.

Many people of different paths and beliefs have often gotten flame wars going because they would not ask questions such as these. There are reasons we should "think before we leap".  Remember, you do not have the time or the necessity to respond to everything you see on the internet.