Click here to visit the official site for The Dark Knight Rises and watch Bane unleash unholy terror on Gotham City.
Monday, December 19, 2011
THE DARK KNIGHT RISES first real trailer is out right now!!
Sunday, December 18, 2011
North Korean tyrant Kim Jong-Il has died
Breaking news right now...
"Generalissimo Francisco Franco is STILL dead!"
And in related news...
Vaclav Havel, a true leader among men, has passed away
Vaclav Havel, who was born poor, became a pundit, then turned playwright, wound up a political prisoner, and ended up president of the newly-free Czech Republic following the Velvet Revolution that precipitated the fall of the Soviet Empire, has passed away at the age of 75.
Havel lived the kind of life that would have been hard to believe, had it not really happened. Yet for all of it he maintained an intense sense of humility. I've heard stories about how when he was president (a job he did not want at all) that he would often show up unescorted at pubs to discuss matters with his fellow Czechs, as well as popping up unannounced at historic sites to serve coffee to tourists.
Havel did not like being a politician. And I'll dare not sully his memory by referring to him as such. He was, instead, a sincere statesman in every possible sense of the word.
Thoughts and prayers going out to the family of one of the greatest leaders of the past half century.
Saturday, December 17, 2011
A response to a challenge on baptism
A few days ago the following e-mail arrived...
"Chris you are WRONG. Baptism is required for salvation! Acts 2:38 has Peter commanding that we be baptized FOR THE REMISSION OF SINS. Mark 16:16 commands baptism and without it we are damned."There was more to it but that's the heartmeat of this individual's contention. I don't know what precipitated this correspondence. Maybe it was the "Meditation on Baptism" post nearly three years ago. Maybe it was one of the numerous posts I've had to make about a certain cult operating in this area: a group that has among other things harassed others who have met to worship in peace.
Okay, fine. I'll respond to it.
Here is Acts 2:38, as translated in the 1611 Authorized Version (AKA the King James Bible):
Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
For all the beauty of the King James Version, it is rife with problems. Those stem from two primary factors: that the Authorized Version was a project that King James used to placate the Puritan faction of the Church of England (i.e. it was a political stunt, plain and simple) and the fact that the primary source material of Greek manuscript for the Authorized Version was apparently the Textus Receptus of Desiderius Erasmus. Now, Erasmus was otherwise a brilliant scholar, no doubt about it. But the Textus Receptus was hands-down his sloppiest piece of work ever (he was rushing to win a contest... and he didn't have that many manuscripts to draw from to begin with). Combined with the aforementioned purpose of affirming in approved canon the doctrines and ordinances of the Church of England over all others and you get the idea of what is wrong with the King James Version (though I still love the overall beauty of its language).
But anyhoo, let's look at the passage that this reader (and others) have attempted to use to insist that water baptism is necessary for salvation: "Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins..." I emphasized the word "for" because in the Greek the original word is "eis". And "eis" does NOT easily translate into "in order to receive..." Rather, the more accurate rendition is "because of".
So let's translate Peter's statement again, this time with "eis" correctly translated...
"Then Peter said unto them: Repent, and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ because your sins have been remitted."That makes much more sense. It also reconciles that bit of scripture with the story of Cornelius, the first Gentile to become a Christian (recorded in Acts 10) who along with his household had already believed in Christ. That Peter baptized them was outward affirmation that Christ came for all nations, and not merely the Jewish people (per the vision that he received as recorded earlier in the chapter). Here also, we find that baptism is not for salvation, but is rather for all of those who are already in Christ and His church.
That might seem a small matter today, but in those heated days of the early church the issue of non-Jewish converts to the Way (as Christianity was called in the beginning) was a serious controversy. Peter baptizing Cornelius and his family was a threshold moment for Christianity. They were baptized because they had faith in Christ and because of that faith, their sins were already forgiven. Hence, they were fully entitled to baptism, without any regard whatsoever for their nationality.
So that takes care of Acts 2:38. But what about Mark 16:16? Here is what that passage has Jesus telling His followers...
Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.Y'all want the "nice" reason first why this verse doesn't mean that baptism is a requisite for salvation, or do you want the "nasty" reason?
Fine. I'll start off polite. Here it is: this verse does not say at all that the absence of baptism equals damnation. It only states that "whoever does not believe will be condemned". Downright obvious, actually.
But here's the biggest reason why Mark 16:16 can not be used to claim that baptism is a requirement for salvation...
Mark 16:16 doesn't belong in the Bible to begin with.
Feel free to read that again after you've come down from the initial shock.
The Gospel of Mark is apparently the oldest of the four gospels, perhaps composed only about 35 years or so after General Titus and his boys laid waste to Jerusalem and the Temple there. But of all the oldest manuscripts that we have for Mark's book, none of them contain verses 9 through 20 of Chapter 16! The last thing that can credibly be ascribed to the Gospel of Mark is that "...the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid." And if you only have the King James Version to go on, it jumps from there to a sudden re-introduction of Jesus and an ending that is wildly different from the context of the rest of Mark's writing.
Long story short: Mark 16:16 and everything else from 16:9 onward is a later addition. Much later. Perhaps by a century or so. I've tried to find anything that demands why these verses do belong in Mark but as of yet, such justification has eluded me. If anyone has something that I might have missed, leave a comment here or shoot me an e-mail at theknightshift@gmail.com.
Does that mean that your friend and humble blogger is committing sacrilege by ignoring part of the Bible? Nope, not at all. Indeed it is quite the opposite: I am striving for nothing more and nothing less than to understand what the Word of God does teach, in spite of all that man has inevitably attempted to do with it during these two millenia out of either well-meaning or malicious intent.
And however one chooses to adhere to the matter of baptism, it must be acknowledged by all that the endurance of the Word of God - the Truth of God, of which the verbiage of scripture can be but a rough covering - is in and of itself nothing short of a miracle.
Friday, December 16, 2011
MAD TV presents: TERMINATOR 3: THE GREATEST ACTION STORY EVER TOLD
Y'know, the sad thing is: this sketch from Fox's MAD TV is soooooo much better than the actual Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines and Terminator: Salvation, combined!
I think this was first broadcast before Christmas 1998. Arnold Schwarzenegger's Cyberdyne Systems Model 101 Terminator is sent back in time to protect Jesus of Nazareth in... The Greatest Action Story Ever Told!
Christopher Hitchens has passed away. And some words for more than a few fellow Christians...
The sad news broke early this morning that Christopher Hitchens, the celebrated, provocative and brilliant journalist/essayist, has passed away at the age of 62 following a battle for the past year and a half with cancer of the esophagus.
Even when I disagreed with Hitchens - and those times were numerous - I had to have grudging respect for the man, because it can't be said that he lacked consistency. He was one of the rare writers in this day and age who strove in his craft not for sake of political or ideological favor, but instead for nothing more or less than understanding of the human condition and its derivative culture.
Here is Hitchens' final essay for Vanity Fair, appearing in next month's issue. In it he wrestles with thoughts of his own mortality and determination of spirit.
And now, there is something that I feel led to say to too many of those who, like myself, profess to follow Jesus Christ...
To be blunt: I am very disappointed with a lot of you.
Yes, Christopher Hitchens was an avowed atheist. But even so: I'm not going to judge the man. And neither should anyone else. Yeah that means YOU too!
What is it about Christianity that seems to bring out the smugness and arrogance in some people? Especially when the choice to follow Christ at all is supposed to stem from an acknowledgement that we ourselves are not worthy of being in His kingdom... nay, of being anywhere within His sight, even!
Yet God loves us so and through Christ has adopted us into His realm. That should be cause enough for joy unceasing. And yet there are far too many Christians for whom that is not enough. For them, Heaven isn't sweet unless they know with absolute certainty that there is at least one poor miserable soul roasting in Hell for eternity. Based on what I've been seeing around the Intertubes since this morning, that particular soul of the day is Christopher Hitchens.
I honestly don't know who to feel more sorry for: a man who wrote that he did not believe in God, or a person who claims belief in God while literally gloating that someone else chose to be separated from that very God for all time.
I am in no position to judge the soul of Christopher Hitchens. But I can assert that based on what I have read of him and found in his writings, that he was an individual who not only struggled with the idea of God, but perhaps had more reasons than most to endure that struggle at all. That he chose to be open and even brazen about it does not befit one who is necessarily comfortable with the notion of there being no God. Rather it seems more that Hitchens was searching for a rationale for God's existence. And indeed, in recent months he had even begun to question his atheism within his essays.
I can't believe that God can't honor that. As our Lord Himself declared...
"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you."And we should be thankful that the matter of our own salvation is not dependent upon the understanding of other men!-- Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 7, Verse 7
Because in the end, Christopher Hitchens was a frail man who did not possess fulness of wisdom and understanding. He was a person who was imperfect and had fallen short of the glory of God.
Aren't we all?
Thursday, December 15, 2011
New poster for THE HUNGER GAMES movie adaptation
I know practically nothing about The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, apart from this book being everywhere when I go into any of the local bookstores. In fact, the synopsis for the upcoming film adaptation - which I just read a short while ago - is all that I know about it at all...
Every year in the ruins of what was once North America, the evil Capitol of the nation of Panem forces each of its twelve districts to send a teenage boy and girl to compete in the Hunger Games. A twisted punishment for a past uprising and an ongoing government intimidation tactic, The Hunger Games are a nationally televised event in which "Tributes" must fight with one another until one survivor remains. Pitted against highly-trained Tributes who have prepared for these Games their entire lives, Katniss is forced to rely upon her sharp instincts as well as the mentorship of drunken former victor Haymitch Abernathy. If she's ever to return home to District 12, Katniss must make impossible choices in the arena that weigh survival against humanity and life against love. THE HUNGER GAMES is directed by Gary Ross, and produced by Nina Jacobson's Color Force in tandem with producer Jon Kilik. Suzanne Collins' best-selling novel, the first in a trilogy published by Scholastic that has over 16 million copies in print in the United States alone, has developed a massive global following.What sayeth y'all who might have read this book: any good?
Here's the just-released poster for it, which has officially colored me intrigued...
Okay, I just found that there's also this trailer for it too...
Looks pretty solid. I may have to make time to read this book before the movie comes out :-)
The Iraq War is officially over
On this day, the Iraq War has officially drawn to a close. It began in March of 2003, lasting nearly nine years (more than twice as long as the United States took to fight and win World War II across both the Pacific and European theaters).
The Iraq war cost our own country nearly one trillion dollars. It also cost the lives of more than 4,500 American military personnel and more than 100,000 Iraqis (many of whom were innocent civilians not attached to Saddam Hussein's army).
Now... can anyone finally tell me why it is that we went to war in Iraq in the first place? "Enforcing sanctions" won't cut it. We lost too many lives and wasted way too much money on this fiasco. What has come of it? An Iraq which will sooner than later tear itself apart across ethnic and religious lines (specifically Sunni, Shiite and Kurd) and a wide-open corridor from its western border for Iran to get pokey with Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Israel.
In short: we took an already unstable world region and primed the fuse for even worse potential for globe-rattling mayhem.
The only reason we honestly went into Iraq to begin with is because we had, at the time, a small-minded narcissist in the Oval Office. A man who only got there because of his friendships and his family connections. A control freak who was too used to getting his own way. A simpleton who had no grasp of history and yet wanted to be remembered as a "war president". An individual detached from sympathy, empathy and sincerity. A man who thought himself and was allowed to think of himself as "favored of God" and that all others as such were expendable according to the whims of his divine right to rule.
Yes, George W. Bush and all of his kind... by all means, "Take a Bow".
Future generations will look upon this conflict - and what it will eventually spawn - and accordingly rank our own era as being among the most foolish in American history.
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Time for... THE LOBO PARAMILITARY CHRISTMAS SPECIAL!
This was posted on the blog a number of years ago, minus an embeddable video. That's since been fixed and hey, it is too good not to share once again!
It's The Lobo Paramilitary Christmas Special! Adapted from the eponymous one-shot special published in the early Nineties, DC Comics' resident badass and intergalactic bounty hunter Lobo (one of Superman's more colorful enemies) is hired by the Easter Bunny to kill Santa Claus. A bit of warning: there's some pretty harsh language in this film... but it's oh so very funny!
Newt Gingrich: The GOP's John Kerry in waiting
I once met Newt Gingrich. He's a strong writer and speaker. I think he's got a very good mind for history. I also happen to share many of the views that he holds.
Nonetheless, I've got to say it...
Newt Gingrich is poised to become for the Republican Party in 2012 what John Kerry was for the Democrat Party in 2004.
Meaning that if Gingrich is the GOP's nominee for President, that will most likely assure that Obama will be re-elected.
Part of me is wondering if that might have been the plan from the start, although by whom and for what purpose, I could only speculate.
Can anybody provide evidence strong enough to compel me that there is any significant difference between the "two major parties" running the show in the United States? And that's all this really is: a show. Albeit one that has cost us billionstrillions of dollars, a wasted economy, individual liberty and even more than a few lives.
We, the American citizenry, will never be free until we make the conscious and conscientious choice to turn away from these petty illusions of political grandeur and at long last accept the responsibilities that God has entrusted with we the people.
(Just my .02 that I felt led to share after reading this morning's news...)
17-year old creates cancer-destroying nanoparticle (and wins lots of $$$ to boot!)
That's what Zhang has been doing for the past two years, spending over a thousand hours researching and creating a microscopic means of destroying tumors. And for her efforts she has just been awarded the $100,000 Grand Prize in the Individual category of the Siemens Competition in Math, Science & Technology!
The title of Zhang's project is "Design of Image-guided, Photo-thermal Controlled Drug Releasing Multifunctional Nanosystem for the Treatment of Cancer Stem Cells". In layman's terms, it means that she developed a nanoparticle that, when delivered to the tumor site via the drug salinomycin, destroys the cancerous stem cells. Not only that but she smartly utilized gold and iron-oxide so that the particles could also be picked up on MRI and photoacoustics. Meaning that Zhang's method can overcome cancer resistance and be monitored in real time without any extra special equipment.
Clever lass, this one is!
Geek.com has more about Angela Zhang and her very cool work. Wouldn't surprise me if this product of her ingenuity sees routine use within the next ten years (if not sooner).
Friday, December 09, 2011
One reader's tale of incompetence at the Internal Revenue Service
Way, waaaaay back when this blog was just getting started, I posted an essay titled "People who should be shot when the revolution comes". It was a tongue-in-cheek (kinda) piece about who in our society should be the first ones to be thrown against the wall if and when the citizens of this country finally get their fill and overthrow those who have gotten too uppity for anyone's good.
That this particular post should come to mind more than seven years after writing it, might clue y'all in on the kind of rage that I feel when I read the e-mail that one of The Knight Shift's viewers sent me recently.
I can't put it any more plain than this: the income tax is a means of economic and personal slavery. Think about how much time and energy gets wasted by millions of honest people in this country every year. Seriously folks: ever think about about what could be done productively, if all those billions of aggregate man-hours that we spend preparing tax returns were done away with?
Then there is how decent people do their best to adhere to a mountain of burdensome legislation that not even the finest tax attorneys in the land can agree on what it's supposed to mean. It's just not possible. I guarantee that if the government wanted, that it could find grounds for criminal indictment against every single taxpayer in America... only because it's impossible to meet each and every single condition of a tax code that is ridiculously volumnious!
And then there are the heartless bastitches of the Internal Revenue Service. Heck, let's name some names here: like Robert W. Nordlander, the IRS "special agent" who prosecuted a cold and cruel vendetta against ultra-marathoner Charlie Engle. Click on that link and just see if that story doesn't get your blood boiling.
I bet what I'm about to share will resonate with too many good people as well. It's what one individual submitted and asked me to pass along to this site's readers...
Waiting for me when I arrived home this evening was an "important" message from the I.R.S., saying it was "important" that I return their call by close of business today (which surprisingly to me was 8 p.m.). I was also asked to reference a "case number" when I returned the call.This is the kind of bureaucratic crap that was symptomatic of the Soviet Union. And the late Roman Empire.After confirming the number appeared to be legitimate from the IRS web site I returned the call, despite my concerns (who wants to get harassed by the IRS?) and suspicions (that this was a scam.)
I decided in advance that I WAS NOT going to give out any personal information, so I bypassed the prompt asking me to enter my Social Security Number. After a 10-minute wait, a "Mrs. C***, ID# [deleted]" answered the phone. She asks for my SSN, and I inform her I'm not giving out any personal information. "Well, we're not going to get very far," she replied. I told her the message I received instructed me to give a case number and that I would give that, which I did.
Little good giving the case number did though, as "Mrs. C***" said she couldn't give me any information unless I gave her my name and "verified" that she was talking to the right person. I told her why not give me the name of the person your trying to reach, and I'll verify if I'm that person or not. No good.
I then mention that I find it peculiar that the IRS would try to contact me by phone rather than mail about a tax issue. (Let me say here that I've been contacted about errors on my federal tax returns before, and each of those few occasions, I was contacted by mail.)
Her explanation was that the IRS does try to make initial contact with individuals by mail based on the address that's on file with their tax return. Only afterwards, do they try to contact an individual by phone.
So I mention that the address they have for me is good because I haven't moved since I filed my taxes. And since since I haven't received a letter prior to this phone call, I must not be the person they're trying to reach. She says, "No! What did I say?"
I responded, "You said that the IRS tries to first contact individuals by mail based on the address filed with their tax return if there are issues. Then you try to contact them by phone." She says that's correct.
So, I ask again, since I HAVE NOT received anything in the mail from the IRS, may I deduce I'm not the individual this case number involves?
"Mrs C***" tells me no, that she can't give me any information unless I give her my personal info, accuses me of arguing with her, says she has other calls she needs to take and that I need to go my local tax office for information.
I could see this wasn't getting anywhere (and wasn't going to) so I ended the call. This drives me crazy and makes me mad on so many levels I gave them the case number they referenced on the message. That's all they asked me to give, and that's all I was going to give. I've "rendered unto Caesar" and filed my taxes on time every year.
Perhaps what made me the most angry was "Mrs. C***'s" comment that she "had other calls to take." Last time I checked, the federal taxes I pay (and we all pay) pay "Mrs. C***'s" salary. The least she could do was do the job I help pay her to do and be a little more helpful.
I defy anyone to tell me that the above example is something that should be tolerated by a free people who enjoy the liberty that God has given us and that so many fought... and died... so that we might continue to have.
And I was woefully shortsighted when I came up with that list in 2004. Perhaps we should make room for soulless cretins like Mrs. C*** and Robert Nordlander. I can hear it now...
"But we were only following orders! We were ONLY FOLLOWING ORDERS!!"
Thursday, December 08, 2011
Has the Dan Cooper skyjacking case finally been solved?!
Two weeks after the fortieth anniversary of his dastardly deed, it looks like the mystery of Dan Cooper might have been cracked at last.
And if true, it means that Cooper did survive his crazy stunt after all!
In the image above, you see one Lynn Doyle Cooper on the left and on the right, one of the sketches of Dan Cooper (or "D.B. Cooper" as he was erroneously referred to be by early press reports) made from descriptions given by passengers and crew of Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305: the flight that Cooper hijacked on Thanksgiving 1971.
Marla Cooper, niece of Lynn Doyle Cooper, has come forward to tell the FBI that her uncle arrived at her home on the day after the skyjacking. He was severely injured and claimed that he had been in a car crash.
But what's more, the FBI is apparently close to matching a fingerprint from Lynn Cooper with one found on a cheap clip-on tie that Dan Cooper wore (and left behind) on the plane before the scoundrel bailed out with a parachute and $200,000 into the frigid night of the Pacific Northwest somewhere over the state of Washington.
Lynn Cooper died in 1999. Meaning that if he was Dan Cooper, he got away and was likely laughing about it for almost three decades!
Mash down here for more of this story.
The one who voted against war with Japan
Yesterday was the seventieth anniversary of the Empire of Japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor: the event that catapulted the United States into World War II. On the following day President Franklin Roosevelt delivered the famous "Infamy Speech" before a Joint Session of Congress. Less than an hour after Roosevelt's address, Congress passed an official declaration of war against Japan.
Jeannette Rankin, member of the House of Representatives from the state of Montana, was the sole vote against the declaration of war. Rankin was also the first woman elected to Congress. During her previous term in Congress she had also voted against the United States entering what became known as World War I. And in case you're wondering, she was a Republican.
And it was almost unanimous. The final tally was 388 for war, and 1 against...
As you can probably imagine, Rankin's stance was roundly unpopular: not just with her constituents back home but all across America. She didn't even bother to run for re-election. She passed away in 1973 at the age of 92.
But as for why Miss Rankin did not vote for the war declaration, I can't but find her rationale to be intriguing...
"As a woman, I can't go to war and I refuse to send anyone else."I must admit: as much as a military response was mandated by the horrific nature of the Pearl Harbor attack, I have to appreciate Jeannette Rankin's rationale. Had women been allowed to serve on the front lines or more to the point, had Rankin been a male... I can't imagine that she would have cast a vote against war. But neither of those happened to have been the case.
I believe that Congress did the right thing by voting for the declaration of war. But I also have to believe that Miss Rankin was acting according to the best of her principles by not voting for that same declaration. That may have conflicted with the demands of those she was elected and sworn to represent... but there I am reminded that ours is a democratically-elected republic and not a pure democracy. It's not perfect, but it's the best that man in his limited wisdom has been able to come up with so far as governing himself goes.
Jeannette Rankin's vote against declaring war with Japan is a most curious example of that.
And all of this was seventy years ago today, December the 8th 1941.
Wednesday, December 07, 2011
George Burns presents CHRISTMAS CAROL II: THE SEQUEL!
AMC has been doing multiple broadcasts of A Christmas Carol, the 1984 television movie adaptation with George C. Scott as Ebenezer Scrooge, for the past few nights. It's easily my favorite version of Charles Dickens' timeless potboiler (no really, he only wrote it to sell and pay some bills) although Patrick Stewart's one-man performance runs a very close second.Part 1
But have you ever wondered what happened after Scrooge changed his ways at the end of that story?
Well wonder no more! Back in 1985 there was a short-lived show called George Burns Comedy Week. It was a comedy anthology series hosted by Burns: sorta The Twilight Zone but all about the laughs. And just before that Christmas, Burns and company produced a follow-up to A Christmas Carol.
So without further ado, here is Roddy McDowall, Ed Begley Jr., Carolyn Seymour, Paul Benedict, and the one and only James Whitmore himself as Scrooge in... "Christmas Carol II: The Sequel"!
Part 2
Harry Morgan has passed away
This guy shined in everything that he was in, during a career that stretched all the way back to 1942. The following year he appeared in The Ox-Bow Incident, quite a controversial film for its time. Morgan followed that up with roles in The Glenn Miller Story and Inherit the Wind. In 1962's How the West Was Won he played General Ulysses Grant. And those were just a few of movies that Morgan appeared in (along with quite a few comedies).
It was a Bill Gannon, alongside Jack Webb in Dragnet, that would have most cemented Morgan's place in entertainment history. But then he did Col. Potter in M*A*S*H: a role for which he earned an Emmy. And yeah I grew up watching M*A*S*H and I liked Hawkeye and Klinger and the rest... but for some reason Potter was even more the heart and soul of that show. A model Army officer and field surgeon, but with crack wit and profound wisdom. Not to mention some of the best lines of the entire show: "Horse feathers!" etc. And I also remember him in that series of "Incident" television movies that he made with Walter Matthau.
Rest in peace, Mr. Morgan. And thanks for the many years of good drama and great laughs.
Seventieth Anniversary of the Day of Infamy
Perhaps the most iconic photograph from the attack on Pearl Harbor: the battleship U.S.S. Arizona suffers a hit to her magazine by a Japanese torpedo.
1,177 sailors and officers perished aboard the Arizona. To this day, most of them are still there.
Today, seventy years later, there are approximately six thousand who survived the Pearl Harbor attack who are still among us.
Remembering them on this 70th anniversary, as well as those who died that day and those who have passed on since.
Monday, December 05, 2011
MUSIC FROM THE TRANSFORMERS TRILOGY (Look! Real physical CD!)
First things first: I have yet to hear any news about a CD release of the score from Transformers: Dark of the Moon, which was once again masterfully composed and orchestrated by Steve Jablonsky. A bunch of readers have been asking me about this for the past several months (and quite often more than once!). No word either on the rumored box set that would have Jablonsky's complete score from all three Transformers movies, which I would gladly plunk down serious coin for and based on the enthusiasm I've been observing, so would many others out there.
Until we have something more substantial to go on (and I tend to believe that it will be coming sooner than later) here's something ya might wanna check out: Music from the Transformers Trilogy!
Performed by London Music Works, this CD includes 16 tracks from the three movies: six tracks each for Transformers and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, and four tracks from Transformers: Dark of the Moon. Some great stuff here (though I'm a bit disappointed that "Decepticons" from the first movie didn't make the cut). I don't own this yet but based on the samples on the Amazon.com page this is an amazing composition and definitely well worth investing in! I was especially impressed with the recording of "Arrival to Earth" (a track so beautiful that it has been used at weddings!). It's currently going for $14.08 at Amazon and I'm certainly ordering a copy right now :-)
And if you're feelin' lucky punk, ScoreKeeper at Ain't It Cool News is giving away five copies of this sweet album! Deadline for the contest is this coming Sunday, so click on the link and give it a try :-)
Zoe and Wally are in the first ever I Can Has Cheezburger? daily calendar!
Awright you're probably wondering: Chris who the heck are Zoe and Wally?!
They're my girlfriend's two cats. And two years ago she submitted this wacky photo of the two of them laying on her futon to the popular humor site I Can Has Cheezburger?...
Zoe is the black and white and orange one sitting at the far end, and Wally is the orange dude screaming (or whatever the heck he's doing). And they are now the January 10th featured photo from the I Can Has Cheezburger? 2012 Calendar!
Now available at fine retailers, bookstores and online outlets everywhere!
Leaking roof could lead to revealing of the Ark of the Covenant
There's no way that I'm going to make a post about this and not include a pic from my all-time very most favorite motion picture...
The Chapel of the Ark on the grounds of the St. Mary of Zion Church in Aksum, Ethiopia.
But if you thought that the Ark of the Covenant made its way to a warehouse in Area 51 (or a warehouse in Arlington, Virginia as one of my history professors said years before Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull), it's been the longstanding belief of many that the real Ark is here...
The story goes that King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba produced a son together: Menelik. Years after the Queen's visit that was recorded in scripture, Menelik came to visit his father and it was at that time that Solomon let Menelik take the Ark of the Covenant to what is now Ethiopia. There the Ark was kept by Menelik's descendants and when Christianity arrived over a thousand years later, the Ark came into the custody of what today is the Orthodox Church of Ethiopia.
For the Christians of Ethiopia, the whereabouts of the Ark has been no real secret. It used to be brought out on certain religious occasions (always covered with a thick shroud) and kept in the St. Mary of Zion Church. Then in the 1960s the chapel that you see in the above photo was built and the Ark moved into it. Only one man is allowed to see the Ark of the Covenant itself: a "guardian of the treasure" who is appointed for life to keep the Ark safe from harm. Before the guardian dies, he chooses a young man to be the next to watch over the Ark. So it has gone for generations. The guardian never leaves the chapel, and no one else is allowed inside.
But now, the entire world might be about to see the Ark of the Covenant... all because of a leaking roof.
Rain water is now trickling into the Chapel of the Ark. A new temporary chapel is being built nearby to store the Ark while repairs are being made. And moving the Ark requires four men to pull it off. That's if the instructions found in the Bible are followed, anyway (which they should be, because both Bible and Hollywood warn about nasty things happening to those who would locate the Ark in anything but the prescribed manner).
There are two photographs of the Ark of the Covenant that I'm aware of. One of them was taken in the Fifties or Sixties and shows the Ark outside during a religious festival, completely covered. The other one shows a group of monks carrying a shrouded Ark with their backs turned toward it out of respect. There's something there, all right. And whatever it is, it might very well soon be all over CNN and YouTube.
Star Wars cello battle!
I am actually genuinely surprised that my good friend Brian (aka Darth Larry) had nothing to do with this, since he's a bigger Star Wars geek than even I am and also an accomplished cello player!
Here's the video that has musicians and saga fans alike everywhere talking today...
Thursday, December 01, 2011
How The Salvation Army created modern music
So it's December 1st and I'm finally allowing myself to enjoy the music of the holiday season! Not that I'm a grinch or anything. It's just... I've never liked how the Christmas stuff now seems to start coming out the day after Halloween (and lately even before then). It only "feels" like Seasons Greetings when it's after Thanksgiving, and maybe several days after that just for good measure. I mean, doesn't the year go by fast enough without it needing any "help"?
The Salvation Army is well renowned for a lot of things regarding its charity work and emergency aid in times of need. Right now as always this time of year, you can find good folks ringing the bell at those cute lil' Salvation Army red kettles all over the place (I'm gonna ask all of The Knight Shift's faithful readers to please consider chucking some coin in this season whenever you encounter one... and the people working the bells are always fun to talk to as well!).
It all began in 1878. The Salvation Army had been founded more than ten years earlier by Methodist minister William Booth as an effort to reach out in Christian service to the worst slums of Victorian-era London. And by the late 1870s the labors of Booth and his wife Catherine were beginning to bear great fruit: hundreds of English people - many of them alcoholics, drug abusers, prostitutes and countless others who had been deemed "undesirable" by the upper crust of English society - had been won over to Christ through the message of "soup, soap and salvation".
Charles William Fry, his wife and their three sons
Well anyhoo, it being the time properly leading up to Christmas at last, I'll kick things off with a post I've been considering for some time now. It's a neat lil' bit of historical lore that I've always enjoyed and I like to think that others will appreciate it as well.
So here we go with the strange but true tale of how The Salvation Army from its very beginning was the catalyst for the style, the substance, and the soul of just about everything there is about modern contemporary Christian music... and much of other modern music too.
But along with Christmas bells, thrift stores and charitable efforts throughout the community, The Salvation Army is also world-renowned for its brass bands. Once upon a time it seemed that every small town in America had a Salvation Army band playing around Christmas. These days you're more likely to find them in the United Kingdom, but a few places on this side of the pond still have a brass band affiliated with the organization. Even so, most Americans of the current era will probably only know a Salvation Army band from one's fleeting appearance in the 1983 film A Christmas Story (which was set in 1940).
But it turns out that The Salvation Army brass bands have some very neat history behind them. Indeed, it could be said that through its musical ministry, The Salvation Army has wound up pioneering a lot of modern melody!
But eventually there was a problem. Namely, the owners of the saloons, pubs and beer halls around London who gradually came to lose a lot of money because formerly regular patrons began flocking to The Salvation Army instead. The new converts gave up liquor as they turned over a new leaf... and that didn't play too hot among the procurers of alcoholic beverage in the East End (where Jack the Ripper would run amok a decade later). That many zealous Salvation Army "soldiers" were returning to their previous haunts to preach against booze - and being fairly successful at that - didn't make Booth's cause too popular in many quarters, either.
Well, before long William Booth and his followers began getting heckled, jeered and cajoled by various drunks and louts. Sometimes it came to worse: Army members being assaulted and attacked and barraged with rocks and bottles. And it fast became apparent that William Booth and his Salvation Army... well, needed protection from the hostilities.
Enter into our tale one Charles William Fry, a builder from Salisbury. He and his family had joined The Salvation Army. And as concern grew over Booth's safety, Fry and his three teenaged sons offered themselves to be bodyguards.
It also just so happened that Fry and his three sons all played brass instruments.
Now it was supposed to be that when Fry and his boys went out to keep Booth and other Salvation Army workers from harm, they would be providing musical accompaniment for the singing. But it didn't quite work out that way. Pretty soon other Salvation Army members were bringing their own musical instruments along. And they were using them... whether they had a lick o' music talent or not! Bells, banjos, drums, whatever could be found or crudely made, the Army wound up employing. "It sounds as if a brass band's gone out of its mind," said one observer.
But something else soon began happening, as well. You see, these poor and down-trodden who had thrown in with Booth's Salvation Army, well... "nice", "clean" Christian hymnals weren't something that they were accustomed to. Okay, they didn't know about them at all. These were people far more used to songs that you could drink some hooch to, then sing some more after getting all gassed.
And that's when it started. The Salvation Army members began taking popular songs about partying and getting drunk... and inventing their own lyrics for the same music!
(I guess it could also be said that The Salvation Army was already doing song parody about a hundred years before "Weird Al" Yankovic hit the scene, but anyhoo...)
Hit tunes like "Here's to Good Old Whiskey" became "Storm the Forts of Darkness". "Way Down Upon the Swanee River" inspired "Joy, Freedom, Peace and Ceaseless Blessing". Many other "secular" songs came to be adopted as Christian hymnals with unorthodox melody. And this went on for a few years. William Booth himself didn't know what to make of it. In fact, he came to harbor severe doubts about the music that his own group's members were coming up with.
Then came a night in January of 1882 when Booth was visiting Worcester. The Commanding Officer of the town's Army contingent, George Fielder, came to the stage and began singing "Bless His Name, He Set Me Free". It was something that Booth had never heard before, and he thought it sounded beautiful. Soon afterward he asked Fielder what tune it had been set to.
"General, that's a dreadful tune. Don't you know what it is? That's 'Champagne Charlie Is My Name'."
It was all that Booth needed to be convinced that whatever it was that The Salvation Army was doing musically, there was nothing wrong with it. "That's settled it," William Booth declared. "Why should the devil have all the best tunes?"
Over the next decade The Salvation Army published numerous official adaptations for the bands that were soon being organized throughout Britain, as well as several original compositions: most in the rousing style that the Army's band had discovered such enthusiasm for. The volumes of Salvation Army music proved to be wildly popular among Christian performers and secular artists alike. Some of the songs are still used by Army bands today. And it is a trend that The Salvation Army has continued on into the new millennium: adapting the message of Christ to current tempo even as modern music has followed the example of Charles William Fry and that first Salvation Army brass band.
The Salvation Army had demonstrated that music could be as malleable and adaptable as it needed to be in order to grasp the attention of an audience. It was a pragmatic approach that had not really been done before, and in retrospect has helped to shape and form not only modern Christian music, but music as a whole.
So this holiday season, the next time you crank up your iPod and listen to Lady Gaga or They Might Be Giants or whatever and you happen to see a red Salvation Army kettle, be of good cheer and think about dropping some change in. You're not just giving to a good cause, you're honoring your musical roots!
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Look! VIDEO of me frying those Thanksgiving turkeys!
When I first posted about this Thanksgiving's deep-fried turkey earlier this evening, I forgot to mention that for this past holiday's music to fry to, I chose to use Steve Jablonsky's soundtrack for Gears of War 3. Should have made a note of that earlier 'cuz hey, that kind of thing is important to my personal ritual of deep-frying turkey. Kristen and my friends that I was frying for all thought that it was a terrific score and perfect for the occasion :-)
Well, a short while ago Kristen surprised me with this video that she put together of me preparing the turkey in the kitchen and then putting it into the oil... which turned out to be the most dangerous bird that I have yet to fry!! No seriously: a tiny bit of hot oil jumped up and hit me in the face. It startled me for a second or two but there was no burn (thankfully!). Still, it was a sobering reminder that this is dangerous and it takes considerable forethought and a bit of lunacy to attempt :-P
Okay well without further ado, here is my girlfriend Kristen's video that she shot and edited together!
Once again, great job Kristen!! I especially loved the end credits (including that lil' jab at PETA :-)
Pics of this year's Thanksgiving fried turkey!
As I have done (most) Thanksgivings since 2002, I deep-fried some turkey! Just now getting the pics up 'cuz my girlfriend Kristen stayed here for the holiday: our first Thanksgiving together! And she was the one taking the pics and I hadda wait until she got back home to pull them to her computer and send them to me. So for those who had wondered if I fried turkey this year: ohhhhh yeah!!
In fact, I fried two birds this Thanksgiving. The first for another family that are good friends of mine, and the second was ours. Kristen was there to photo document most of the entire process.
Here I am with that crazy look that I get whenever my mouth starts salivating for fried turkey. It was probably a good thing that Kristen spent this Thanksgiving with me: she got to see how I really am when it comes to deep-frying turkey. I'd been warning her for months that this was coming, but to see it with her own eyes... well, nothing could have truly prepared her. You know how in the past few movies that he's done, how Daniel Day-Lewis gets that murderous glint in his eye before going psycho on some poor shlub? Well, that's pretty much me at this time of year...
Injecting the bird with garlic butter. I began marinading at 4 a.m. on the day before Thanksgiving, and gave each bird three full treatments of marinade and Cajun seasoning!
More marinading after giving a bird a healthy dose of Cajun seasoning. I pour gobs of the stuff onto the skin and then vigorously rub it in hard and deep...
Thanksgiving morning: pouring the cottonseed oil into the pot, which will soon be heated to 350 degrees Fahrenheit...
CAREFULLY lowering the turkey into the oil...
45 minutes later (cooking at 3 minutes per pound) the turkey is done! :-)
Now all that's left to do is carve into it and eat it! And everyone agree that it was incredibly delicious as always! Kristen said that it was lived up to the hype :-)
Now, only 25 days before I get to do it all over again. The second-most deadly form of cooking known to man (after preparing fugu) and in the tenth year of doing it, I haven't burned the house down. Yet. Let's hope my streak of good luck continues for many more years to come :-P
Thanks to Kristen for taking such great photos!
So last night I finally got to watch the mid-season finale of THE WALKING DEAD...
I didn't dare watch it until I went over to my girlfriend's place, 'cuz I've gotten her hooked onto this show and we've taken to enjoying it together. And since she was out of town when "Pretty Much Dead Already" - the last new episode until February - aired on Sunday night, we both held off on catching it until we could hook up again.
So now that I've finally seen it, let me reiterate what I've said all since last night about The Walking Dead's mid-season finale...
JEEBUS CRIPES CRISPIES WITH MILK!!!!!!
Awright, I'll admit that I am not a routine television viewer but even so: if this episode didn't firmly establish The Walking Dead as THE finest show currently being broadcast, then I can't possibly imagine what could be.
The whole heapin' episode was some of the finest television ever scripted and shot. Again, I have to observe that this show is not so much about a "zombie apocalypse" as it is about the intensely and very real human drama. It's what this show does best and "Pretty Much Dead Already" pegged the needle before breaking it off and sending it spinning wildly. Witnessing the tensions rising among Rick's band of survivors and then the clashing with Hershel, culminating in those last five minutes outside the barn where Hershel and his family have been keeping well over a dozen walkers.
If it had stopped with Shane's screaming and ensuing slaughter of the walkers, it would have been a solid point to leave things until February. But then, that one final walker had to come out of the barn...
That might have been the most disturbing and haunting payoff of a lingering plotline that I've seen in a long time. Maybe ever.
It's gonna be a long three months until February. But if the show resumes then with as much high-caliber storytelling, we are gonna be in for something insanely good.
Oh yeah, I couldn't make it out last night but going back on my DVR in high-def: Hershel's Bible study as he eats lunch is Luke 8, beginning with verse 22. That particular selection is about Jesus calming the storm, His healing of the demon-possessed man at Gerasenes, the healing of the woman who had long suffered a bleeding sore and the raising of the dead girl, Jesus sending out the Twelve Disciples, and the feeding of the five thousand. Don't know if that has any bearing on the story but, well... now y'all know :-)
Fan-made BIOSHOCK movie trailer channels all the right vibes!
Okay, I gotta ask: am I the only fan of BioShock who is not really all that jazzed about BioShock Infinite? Because unless that game solidly connects to classic BioShock, I just can't see counting this upcoming game as part of the canon (no offense to Ken Levine). To me BioShock is and always will be about Rapture: that mysterious city on the floor of the northern Atlantic, envisioned by Andrew Ryan to be the ultimate escape from a world surrendering itself to socialism and corrupted religion... before it all went horribly wrong. And there is sooo much more storytelling left in the classic BioShock franchise. I mean, BioShock 2 brought us to, what, 1968? Now you know that eventually the American and Soviet governments are going to come looking for Rapture. And when they do...
Well anyhoo, until we get a proper BioShock 3, behold this awesome fan-made trailer for a BioShock movie, featuring Bobby Darin's "Mack the Knife" as appropriate background score!
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
The last Lauryn photo
Here it is: the post that I have somewhat dreaded having to make because it's going to plunge a lot of single guys out there into tears.
Lauryn, my ravishingly beautiful cousin (okay, "second cousin" if we're going to be technical about it) who has served as The Knight Shift's official pin-up girl for the past few years, was married to her boyfriend Jason over the weekend! I'm so very happy for the two of them, even though this blog is losing one of its biggest attractions!
(But hey, I lose a poster gal and I gain some family: not a bad deal, and I've another single lady waiting to be the next beautiful attraction on this site :-)
So here it is: the very last pic of Lauryn that I foresee posting on this blog (barring family reunions etc.) Fittingly it's of her being escorted by her father at her wedding...
Congratulations Lauryn and Jason! And may God bless you all the days of your life together :-)
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Thanksgiving 2011: What I am thankful for
For the Thanksgiving last year, I did not make a post like this. That's because a year ago I was in the midst of what I've since realized was the longest, darkest and most spiritually trying period of my entire life. Last year at this time, feeling thankful seemed like the last thing that I could muster up.
What a difference a year makes...
If anybody had told me that twelve months from then, that I would be at a totally different place, I could not have believed it. And trust me: there were lots of good friends who were doing their best to encourage me then. Telling me "Chris, God hasn't given up on you! The best is yet to come! You will get through this!"
I've never enjoyed telling so many people that I was wrong and they were right, as I have been compelled to do these past few months.
And today, today... well, I can't feel anything but so very thankful for what God has blessed my life with!
So here I am, picking up again what I hope will continue to be an ongoing tradition of this blog.
I am thankful that this past year has been the very first that I have been able to completely enjoy without my bipolar disorder making life a living hell. And I am also thankful that I have been able to write about that on this blog, and apparently it has become a boon for others who must live with this condition. I'm going to begin writing more about Being Bipolar very soon, incidentally. But that I have been able to at last get a grip on my own mind has been an incredible blessing!
I am thankful for having two very wonderful parents, who have been there for me and encouraged me and have been a bigger inspiration for me than I should have been thankful for already.
I am thankful for my sister, who I honestly have not appreciated nearly enough but hope to do better by that.
I am thankful... and extremely thankful at that... for having what honestly must be the most wildly awesome circle of friends that a guy could possibly have in his life. So too many than I could come close to naming them all.
I am thankful for the many new friends that I have made since 2011 began.
I am thankful for Theatre Guild of Rockingham County and the sense of family that I have come to enjoy from working with so many incredibly talented and wonderful people!
I am thankful for new opportunities.
I am thankful for my iPad: truly an indispensable gadget!
I am thankful for ballroom dancing, which I have come to enjoy more than I had expected and I'm looking forward to getting better at it.
I am thankful that I got to read a bunch more books in this past year (including Atlas Shrugged at last).
I am thankful for the music of "Weird Al" Yankovic, which became a huge catalyst for some insanely good things in this past year!
I am thankful that I finally got to see The People vs. George Lucas and that so much of my own movie got to be part of it and is now making people all over the world laugh to our work!
I am thankful for the chances to travel that I have come to have.
I am thankful for the second chances to make right the mistakes of my life.
I am thankful for Kristen, the abundawonderful lady that God has brought into my life. She is not merely my girlfriend. She is... my soulmate, my sister in Christ, the one who I can always count on to make me smile when I need it most, the girl who has made me more happy than I can ever remember being in my entire life. I am truly thankful beyond words for God bringing us together and, well... I'm soooo looking forward to seeing where He takes us from here! :-)
But most of all, I am thankful to God. And I am thankful that He has brought me through the grief and suffering of the past few years and to a place where I am closer to Him than I have ever been able to be before! I am thankful for the faith that I now have in Him: a faith that had been there before but is now stronger, more resilient, more yielding to Him and His will than I have had before in my life. I am thankful that God brought me through the darkness, that He was faithful and true even when I could not feel Him, when I couldn't even believe He was there at all. But He was. He has been with me and He will always be with me and... I thank Him now that if it took the hardship to draw me into this deep a relationship with Him, that I did endure it.
And last but not least, I am very thankful for you, The Knight Shift's readers, who come to this humble lil' blog and (I like to think anyway) enjoy the insights and commentary of its eclectic proprietor. The readership of this site has grown immensely in the past few years and, I count myself as the luckiest guy on the Intertubes that so many good people come to this place on a regular basis. I hope that I'll be able to keep y'all entertained, educated and Lord willing even enlightened a bit for many more years to come :-)
Fortieth anniversary of Dan Cooper's skyjacking
Forty years ago tonight, a man calling himself Dan Cooper arrived at Portland International Airport and purchased a ticket for Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305: a short flight to Seattle.
Shortly after taking off, "Cooper" passed a note to the stewardess: "I have a bomb in my briefcase. I will use it if necessary. I want you to sit next to me. You are being hijacked."
So began the tale of what has become one of the most brazen and legendary (some have even said heroic) crimes in American history...
Cooper (often referred to as "D.B. Cooper") showed what he purported to be a bomb (some red cylinders in his briefcase that later turned out to be harmless), demanded $200,000 in unmarked bills, and four parachutes: two loaded in the front of the plane and two in the back. After the plane landed at Seattle-Tacoma the demands were met and the Boeing 727 took off again.
At around 8 p.m. Cooper bailed out of the rear of the plane, holding onto his newly acquired satchel of cash. Along with the parachute he wore the business suit he wore when he boarded the plane: seemingly no protection at all against the elements, but Cooper by all accounts was cool and confident nonetheless.
Hurtling himself into pitch black night with freezing rain and driving wind, Cooper was never seen again.
Here's the Wikipedia entry about Dan Cooper, where you can find out much more regarding his infamous skyjacking along with the various theories that have cropped up over the past four decades.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Department of Homeland Security issues turkey fryer safety warning
Janet "Big Sister" Napolitano's Department of Homeland Security (okay let's be fair, it was George W. Bush's "brilliant" idea first) has decided that turkey fryers are a dire threat to national security. "Make sure the turkey is completely thawed before placing in a fryer", the DHS is warning in a new video.
Hey, Janet Napolitano: I'm a hella lot safer with my turkey deep-fryer than anyone is with your X-ray body scanners! You know: the X-ran body scanners that YOU REFUSE TO PUT YOURSELF THROUGH.
Who do these people think they are?
Charlotte TV station reports "Man Killed To Death"
You mean there's another way to do it?!
That's from WBTV-TV 3 in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Tip o' the hat to Mark Childrey for finding this :-)
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
48th anniversary of the JFK assassination
Here's a rare photo from happier times, when Lee Harvey Oswald, Jack Ruby and "White Hat" were still a band...
Fifteen years after first seeing that and it's still about the gosh-darned funniest Photoshop job that I've ever beheld :-)
Monday, November 21, 2011
Time for... THANKSGIVING WITH THE KRANZES!
I have reposted stuff on this blog twice in the past, on rare occasions. But never three times. This deserves it though (and no doubt will be posted again in years to come).
It's been two years since the last time I shared this YouTube video. And since this is the week of Thanksgiving (yes I've already begun preparing to deep-fry a bunch of turkey) and there are perhaps still a lot of people who've never enjoyed this before, I thought it was well worth posting again :-)
It's the short film Thanksgiving With The Kranzes. Produced a few years ago by aviation students, it's a dead-on hilarious parody of Ron Howard's movie Apollo 13.
It is Thanksgiving 1970. This year it's Gene Kranz's turn to host the traditional dinner for his NASA colleagues. The heroic crew of the Apollo 13 mission has been given the command of the kitchen. But then... something happens.
"Take-out is NOT an option!"
Watch now the film that the real-life Gene Kranz has taken to watching with his family every Thanksgiving!
Quote from yesterday evening
"It's Shake 'n Bake and I helped!"Said aloud by me, at the end of the prologue from last night's The Walking Dead.
Go watch it from your DVR or from iTunes or whatever if you wanna "get" that joke :-P
Sunday, November 20, 2011
A ponderance on the Church, Christ and Christian liberty
There are some who throughout the history of Christianity have claimed to be the "one true church": the only legitimate body of Christ that came into being at Pentecost in the days following the ascension of our Lord. I speak not of those who acknowledge parity with brethren of however peculiar perspective who yet profess Christ as Lord, but instead of those who deign to be the exclusive institution established by divine mandate. Such are the ones who incessantly badger, harass and even lust to destroy their fellow servants out of the notion that doing so makes them "first" in the sight of God and man (mostly man).
Such people are terribly ignorant at best, and outright liars at worst. Invariably their founding tenet is that they are the sole custodians and guardians of "the pattern" of worship found in the New Testament.
Therein rests the fallacy of their argument. One that betrays as much a lack of faith in God as it does an ignoble grasp of theology.
Because to claim to be the "one true church" or the "restored church" or whatever is to imply, nay confess before all that Christ's Church is so invirile, so impotent, so corruptible and so weak that it has not survived and prevailed for these two millenia!
So let me put it succinctly and with some bluntness: the New Testament age... never ended.
Oh sure, the New Testament writings came to an end, when John finished his manuscript in his cave on Patmos. The time of the apostles eventually drew to a close when John died.
But the New Testament era itself?
Nope. It's still here. We're living it even now.
Where is the church of the New Testament, then? I'd say: pretty much anywhere and everywhere. It's wherever it needs to be. It is what-ever it is required to be! It becomes... all things unto all men, so that Christ is preached.
Who are the New Testament Christians? Me and... well quite a lot of people, I can tell you that! And a lot of 'em, are some that many of us don't appreciate that they are seeking after and serving the Kingdom just as we are, albeit perhaps in different ways.
I've been thinking quite a bit lately about something that Billy Graham is famous for saying: "Go to the church of your choice." And he's right. Go and worship at the place where... well, wherever it is that you believe that God is leading you to worship Him at. It could be at a Methodist church. Could also be a Baptist church. Or a Presbyterian one. Or a Roman Catholic assembly. Or a Mennonite place. Or a Seventh-Day Adventist congregation. Or a Church of Christ. Or a Lutheran gathering. Or Pentecostal. Or... need I go through them all?
So long as it is a matter of sincere conscience between you and God, it does not matter where I or anyone else tells you to worship Him at. You aren't even obligated by any of us to attend regular worship services if that is how He is leading... but as the writer of Hebrews cautioned, there is a danger in complete forsaking of assembly.
The New Testament Church didn't go away. It's persisted and endured for nearly two thousand years. It is not a brittle thing ready to collapse at the first mild breeze, but a robust edifice built upon a firm foundation. And though I wouldn't dare ascribe any like import to my own writing on par with that of Jude or James, I can at least smile a little in the assurance that mine is a role not unlike Polycarp (in spirit if not in style). The church survived those early years in spite of the weaknesses of men like Peter and Paul, and it will endure in spite of this man's weaknesses also.
I am the New Testament Church... and so can you!
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Some classic listening for a Saturday night
From a time of much better music. Here is "November Rain" by Guns N' Roses...
Yes, I have posted this before. Since it's November again and we're looking at a lot more rain in the next few days, it seemed appropriate.
And also because this is one of the greatest songs in the history of anything, to say nothing about the masterpiece of its accompanying video.
Friday, November 18, 2011
First poster for THE EXPENDABLES 2
2010's The Expendables was twelve scoops of action insanity with sprinkles on top! Saw it at the theater with my good friend Steven and, it just all-out assaulted our eyedrums and earballs with high octane metal mayhem and madness. In short it was exactly the kind of movie that we used to dream of seeing happen back in the Eighties and Nineties... and then some!
So if putting all that action heavyweight into the same film was gloriously good fun the first time, what might we expect from The Expendables 2, due this coming summer?
Ah-nuldt, you should have stayed in acting all this time instead of playing at governor of California. And looks like we're gonna get a whole new heapin' helpin' of Chuck Norris whup-ass!
The geek in me wants this movie to premiere first at ActionFest, 'cuz I've been going to that festival since it began in April of last year and it's the perfect venue for this sort of thing! But if not, I can wait 'til August :-)
World's lightest solid material
Crazy buff for wild engineering that I be, this lil' news item just blows my mind...
A team of researchers from the University of California at Irvine, HRL Laboratories and the California Institute of Technology have come up with a metal lattice material that is the lightest solid yet discovered. As you can see in the photo above, a sample of it can be perched atop a dandelion without damaging it at all. This stuff has less density than the air surrounding it! It's also much stronger than aerogel: the previous "lightest solid" title holder.
It's stories like this, friends and neighbors, that still give me a reliable sense of optimism about the future. Who knows what the uses and demand for this stuff will end up being.
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
An open letter to Ron Price, member of the Rockingham County Board of Education
Dear Ron,
Five years ago last week, on the night before the election that included the names of you, me and fourteen other individuals on the ballot for Board of Education, you were involved in an incident that continued to make headlines long after the polls had closed.
In the many months following that incident, there were individuals who attempted to extract a measure of accountability from someone who was by that time a duly elected public official. I was one of those, as you well know. It is not only a matter of public record what I did with this blog regarding the events of November 6th, 2006, but a legal one also, as I was subpoenaed during your lawsuit against another party.
I am not writing this to reiterate what it is that you may have done, or to again press claim for what I sincerely believed was required from the seeking after a higher standard in good conscience.
I have had much time and opportunity to reflect upon what I did on The Knight Shift following those events. And now, I cannot but be left with the conclusion that the vast majority of my actions in that matter came not from a spirit of civil responsibility but, unfortunately, a heart of wrongful disposition.
So I am asking you now to please accept my apologies. I have come very much regret that I went too far, and that I failed to consider whether my own actions were earnestly in accord with the better angels of my nature. Indeed, I now recognize and do acknowledge that much of what I did to you in the name of pursuing justice, was far too much of an akin spirit to certain few in this community who revel in spite and trade in rancor and grief.
That, is not the sort of person that I wish to be or would ever want to be associated with.
And I don't believe that you're a person like that either, Ron. You're only human, like me. You made a mistake, like I have... many more times than I care to count! Maybe it took going through what I have had to endure in the past few years to appreciate anew what it is to be here by the grace of God. Maybe it took going through that to realize that I should have done my best to extend the same grace to you, instead of harping about it too many times than was ever necessary.
So now, tonight, I do extend you my most heartfelt apologies for my own part in that matter. I hope that we can move on from here, as two people who only want the best for Rockingham County and its people. I do believe you have the best interests of the children of Rockingham County at heart, and I am glad that I can now tell you that I do count you among the fine men and women who are serving the schools of this community.
I don't want this bothering me anymore, Ron. I don't want you to think that I will always hold this against you, because I don't. I was petty and inane, and I should have been better than that. And I'm thankful for the opportunity to try and make this right.
Sincerely,
Chris Knight
Government redefined reality: Pizza is vegetable, Brillo pads are illegal gun silencers
What is it about food that brings out more than the usual looniness from government? Remember when California tried to impose the "snack tax"? And before that it was President Reagan who sought to have ketchup officially deemed a vegetable.
Now the squabbling between the Obama Administration and the Republican-held Congress has made it so that pizza is to be classified as a vegetable. The article is nigh worth reading, if only because it is the first (and I pray last time) that this blogger has ever agreed with the food Nazis at the Center for Science in the Public Interest (hey, a stopped clock is right twice a day...)
But that's not the most ridiculous act of federal gubmint to come across this desk today, folks. No, that dubious honor belongs to the assorted thugs and goons at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, which has now declared it illegal to possess Brillo pads, Chore Boy Pot Scrubber and similar cookware scouring/cleaning material, depending on how it is construed. From the article...
"[S]ound/gas absorbing materials manufactured from Chore Boy copper cleaning pads, along with fiberglass insulation, constitute a silencer.The article further states that "The original letter included a question about the owner of a legally owned silencer having a reserve of such pads. In case, you know, they needed to clean something. According to the ATF that would be considered a "stockpile" and considered an illegal act."Therefore, it is illegal for an individual to replace deteriorated material within an already- registered suppressor without an approved ATF Form 1, 'Application to Make and Register a Firearm,'" along with a "$200.00 making tax" and "a 'no-marking' variance...since there is no viable area in which to apply a serial number to the sound-absorbing material."
So in the BATF's eyes, there is an illegal stockpile of munitions, ohhh... inside the cabinet beneath every kitchen sink in America.
I wouldn't put it past the BATF to seek warrants to invade private property on those measly grounds.
William Shatner and State Farm make weird Thanksgiving safety video
One week from today I'm gonna be up to my elbows in marinade, Cajun seasoning and all kinds of other good stuff as I prepare three... count 'em, three... turkeys for a hot fryin' bath in cottonseed oil. Yes it's that time of the year again, when Yours Truly goes bonkers for the deep-fried turkey! As has been done in years before, expect photos chronicling the art, and perhaps even a video or two.
However I cannot emphasize it nearly enough: deep-frying turkey is potentially a very dangerous activity. I haven't been burned (yet) but there have been a few close calls, despite taking every precaution that I know of. To me it's worth the risk because deep-frying honestly does produce the most tender and succulent meat that you'll ever get from any method of cooking a turkey, and I suppose that there's always going to be a possibility of injury with any activity involving a heat source. Unfortunately the vast majority of turkey frying disasters happen because those doing the cooking overlook some ridiculously simple and even common sense issues pertaining to the peculiarities of deep-frying.
And speaking of things "peculiar", State Farm Insurance has produced this wacky and fun public service announcement starring the one and only William Shatner! So without further ado, here is The Shatner in "Eat, Fry, Love"...
