Darin Matthew

I was first wondering why it is that I am disappointed when the pastor of my church fails to live up to my expectations.  Reviewing it from the standpoint that I am not the only one who feels this way, I began to wonder what sort of pastor would be best for a church.  Next I imagined that someone like Moses would certainly do the trick.  He’s proven himself capable enough in the Bible; but who exactly is Moses?  I know certain bits about his life, but there are also many things I don’t know about him–like what our culture would label him today: jock, nerd, outcast, celebrity?  When I think about what Moses would do, at least vaguely, in a situation where my pastor behaves differently than I want him to, I’m actually fabricating a superior trait and attributing it to Moses, thereby inventing someone who probably isn’t the Moses of the Bible.  It’s not fair to the pastor because now I’m creating a super hero.  Abandoning that train of thought, seeing that it’s leading away from an actual logical, defensible argument for why Moses would be a superior pastor, I began to delve deeper into the emotions behind it, and the reasons why I hold Moses so highly.  I think part of it is that other people hold him highly–which by itself is an invalid reason.  However, God spoke directly to him, and considered him worthy to lead his people, but that isn’t a necessary qualification for church leadership, and is an event that occurred outside of the present church age.  I determined that there must be at least two reasons motivating my feelings behind my desires, and they are: 1) When little it known about a person, I tend to fill in the blanks with speculation to satisfy my curiosity and laziness. 2) Like so many before me, I desire someone physical to worship.  Idolatry is, I believe, the driving force behind all of my feelings as to why Moses would be a better pastor.  My desire for a better leader is one that can only be fulfilled by God.  Looking for fulfillment in any other location is idolatrous, dangerous, and unfair to whoever is being idolized.

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I have heard so many men say so many things that I am nearly convinced it would be better for me to never speak again.  Apart from the damage my silence would cause Chelsea, I have difficulty leveraging my responsibility to share personal insights about how God has changed me, with the reality that it is so unlikely that I could recognize, much less categorize, His work that my efforts would come out less coherent than my contemporaries, who credit God for work at the first sense of feeling.  Considering how grossly lacking I am in recognizing the work of God, I expect I would be more likely to give consequence to all things in His credit, than nothing at all, but that is precisely my delimma.  How can I recognize divine intervention, and if I do, how do I explain it to someone who did not witness it?   Clearly, God has made promises–the Bible tells us that–but how are we to qualify and quantify his work?  At what point can we say “God has done this” as evidence of His power.  Is not every experience subjective?  I cannot be sure of what I have seen Him do, and what I have not seen Him do, because in reality, His work is too intricately woven in the threads of my life.  His promises are what I place my hope in–not what I hope to see Him do.  It is precisely that I cannot confine the boundaries of His intervention that makes it nearly impossible to predict or witness His work.  What I can say for sure is that I am a different person than I was a year ago, but how, when, and where it happened, I can’t be sure.  I know more today about how I should have lived yesterday than I did about tomorrow a year ago; and I’m confident to say that tomorrow I will likely know more about what I should have done today than I do right now.  It is only as God reveals Himself to me that I learn how I am to live, but finding God is not a profession suitable for men.  I am limited to His pace, taught when He teaches, and considering my lack of awareness of His work, I could very well be in a lesson at this very moment.  I look to the Bible to learn of the God who calls me, but feel hesitant to make mention of what I read in His word because I have seen so many before me tangle the truth from the Bible with the foolishness of men–men who proclaim truth, but do not really believe it.

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This is a first draft.

When I look back on my life as a whole, it seems that I have rarely been offended.  I began to wonder if that was the result of a lack of motivation, passion, or risk-taking on my part, or possibly that I was unsure of my convictions, but I’m beginning to think that offense comes when the things we love are endangered, abused, neglected, mistreated, or otherwise deemed less valuable than they truly are.  Over the past fifty-five weeks, I’ve found myself offended more often, and more easily than ever before, which made me curious.  During that same period of time, I also found myself loving more deeply than I ever loved before, and wondered if there might be a connection.  I may be wrong, but I think that I was so rarely offended because I had so much control over all of the things I loved, or cared about.  I could control what I did, where I went, who was allowed to visit me, be my friend, borrow my things, etc.  I was independent and needed nothing from anyone.  Now, being in a relationship, I find myself required to give up that control in order to more effectively love my girlfriend.  Afterall, John 15:13 says, “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.”  Perhaps that is why so many relationships go awry: one or both parties are unwilling to lay down their lives for the other, thus presenting themselves with the constant occasion to be offended, resulting in constant, self-centered agony.  When I’m truly honest with myself, I recognize that my love for God is so elementary in its nature because my love for Him is hindered by my unwillingness to lay down my life for Him, as He did for me.  I’m a selfishly-independent, evil creature.

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Chelsea and I got some sugar gliders.  We named them Pancake and Bacon.

Day 1 (11/20/09)
Doug and I left early in the morning to head to Las Vegas and pick up the gliders.  When we got there, Bob was nice enough to help us get them into their traveling cage, and show us around the pet store.  He kept insisting that Paris Hilton buys her pets from this store.  Anyway, I picked up another pouch there for them to hang out in, since the green one was still in the mail.  In the parking lot, Doug and I got them into the pouch, and we drove to Tommy’s for some dissapointingly Nevadanized hamburgers.  Disgusting.  After that we drove home, and were back at my parents’ place by 6.  I called the lady at the checkpoint “sir”, which should have been an indication that I was hiding something.  Stupid.  Anyway, she let us through without a hitch.  Once home, I got settled and went over to Chelsea’s at 7 to show her pancake and bacon.  That’s when we picked out who was who.  Pancake is aggressive, untrusting, and has a shorter tail than bacon, with almost not black on it.  Bacon is much more naive, trusting, and playful.  Chelsea and I played with them on the floor for a while, and then let them poop, I mean crawl, all over us.  After that, I went home, put them in their cage, and setup their dining room with some food.

I’m at Olive Garden with Doug. Chelsea’s at lunch right now… I hope her first day is going well… work is slow, I’m exhausted, and there is a 30 minute wait for our table. we’re 5 and a half minutes into the wait… and there is our pager. hahaha apparently someone recognized Doug and we got bumped to the front. mmm time to eat.

Ok, so I found THIS place:

http://www.turtlebay.org/index.php

Which would be awesome, and I could get there, and have enough time to search for a girlfriend for Jorge… (I’ve decided that’s what I’m going to do today…) but I think that one of the valves in the truck needs to be adjusted (it’s missing a little) and the gas mileage has dropped… not to mention it eats oil, and could use an oil change before I drive to Redding, CA and back in a single day.

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Download Day 37!

Here we go again… another late start.  How do I manage this? I have no idea… it must be a skill…

So Joseph interprets two dreams and they come true.  The cupbearer lives, the baker dies… BUT the cupbearer forgets about Joseph, and he’s left rotting in a prison for no… good… reason.  MEANWHILE…… Pharaoh has a dream… and who in all of Egypt can interpret it?

Read Genesis chapter 41

Chapter 41

1. What was Pharaoh’s first dream?
2. What was Pharaoh’s second dream?
3. What did Pharaoh do when he woke up?
4. What did the cup bearer say to Pharaoh?
5. What did the Pharaoh do when he heard the cup bearer’s story?
6. What did Joseph say Pharaoh’s dreams meant and how he should respond?
7. How does the Pharaoh respond to Joseph’s interpretations?
8. What does Joseph do once he’s put in power?
9. What did Joseph name his two sons?
10. What happened when the famine hit?

My Answers:

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Download Day 36!

OK, so it’s late (10:51 pm) and I’ve not been getting enough sleep lately… and chapter 41 is like 60 verses…. so we’re only doing chapter 40 today. (:  Enjoy a short day… (:

k, so Joseph has been thrown out of Potiphar’s house cause Potiphar’s wife is a jerk… and he’s now in jail… HOWEVER, God put Joseph in charge of everyone in the jail… so he’s not really all that bad off. (:  and there is something wrong with my shift key… so any typographical errors in this post will be because of that pesky shift key… or should I say, “shifty” shift key… bahahahaha I crack myself up… ok, anyway,… moving forward.

Read Genesis chapter 40

Chapter 40

1. Why were the cupbearer and the baker imprisoned?
2. Who put Joseph in charge of the cupbearer and baker?
3. How did Joseph find out about their dreams?
4. Joseph told them that dream interpretations belong to God.  Joseph believed it matter-of-factly, and had no trouble telling them so.  Write about a situation where you had an opportunity to share what you believe.  Did you take advantage of it or not?
5. What were the interpretations for the two dreams?
6. What did Joseph tell the cupbearer about his situation?
7. What happened 3 days after the men had their dreams?

My Answers:

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Download Day 35!

Ok, so genesis 38 is sort of a JUMP out of the Joseph story… so what’s THAT about?  Why throw in chapter 38 about Judah and Tamar?  Hmmm… it MUST be important.  Also, there is a sexual theme in chapter 38 that is considered taboo by the majority of the Christian community, and may be offensive to some. If you want to skip that part, simply skip question #3, and don’t read my answer.  I apologize if you’re offended by it, but I’m not going to ignore a part of the Bible simply because it’s considered offensive. :-/  I’m going to address it and offer different interpretations.

Read Genesis Chapters 38 and 39

Chapter 38

1. What is wrong with Judah going off and taking a wife the way he did?
2. What happened to his firstborn son, Er?
3. What happened to Onan?
4. What did Judah tell Tamar after losing his first two sons?
5. Once Judah’s wife died, and Judah had not given Tamar Shelah as a husband, what happened?
6. What happened with Tamar appeared to have become pregnant through harlotry and how many children did she have?

   Chapter 39

7. Where did Joseph live in Egypt?
8. Why did Potiphar look favorably on Joseph?
9. What did Potiphar put Joseph in charge of?
10. How did Potiphar’s wife feel about Joseph?  How do you know?
11. How did Joseph respond the first time Potiphar’s wife expressed her desires to Joseph?
12. Potiphar’s wife continually expressed her intentions with Joseph until one day she grabbed him by his garment.  What happened then?
13. What did Potiphar’s wife do to Joseph after he denied her for the last time?
14. Why do you think Potiphar was so upset with Joseph?
15. What happened to Joseph when he was put in Jail?

My Answers:

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Grrrr… so I called in sick today cause I woke up late… BUT,… I got sick.  I went with my dad to get his oil changed, and we stopped at McDonalds on the way home… I think I got food poisoning from that McDonalds, because I feel like I’m about to throw up… I feel pretty bad. v_v  I’m supposed to go to this dinner/banquet tonight… but I don’t think I’m going to make it…  I’m supposed to go in like 20 minutes.