Thursday, June 14, 2007

During some of my recent promptings it became apparent I am supposed to begin exploring the gift of teaching. About two years ago, while attending Southeast Vineyard in Baton Rouge, our pastor felt led to do an exercise where people walked up to a bag and pulled out a sheet of paper with one of the five gifts (Ephesians 4) listed on it. At the time I was in the throes of my introduction to Streams and was so high on revelatory breakthrough and my newfound identification with all things prophetic, that was the only thing I could even want to accept. And, as the Lord would have it, I picked out teacher. Well, shocking to no one, including myself, teaching was the one. Sharnael pointed out that she had gotten the same word from Bob Jones and was disappointed, but Bob noted that apostles were able to move in all the gifts. From this, I just noted that we are often given a starting place, teaching in my case, and grow from there. At any rate, I am beginning to focus on my call. Tonight, as I was digging through internet articles, I did stumble across a catholic encyclopedia entry discussing the different gifts listed in the Ephesians passage among others. What jumped out to me in this entry, though I am not fully agreeable to catholic doctrine, was the idea of the charismata. In my writings I have been discussing the idea of genius off and on simply because it was the closest concept upon which I could hang what I have been trying to communicate. As I noted the term charismata, which itself is hardly a new term to me, it came clear that the notion of genius, particularly the etymology and the general contextual roots of this concept, was not right for what I have been trying to express. Genius is more of a personal ability, an unusual gifting, but the focus is the self. Charismata, however, focuses on the fact that it is a gift, that is, something given to one, not innate in nature. As is true with so much of what I am learning is the spiritual walk Jesus laid out, genius is really more about self for most than charismata. We can't claim to have given ourself the gifts, in my case, the gift of teaching. And, furthermore, I must realize, if I am being honest with myself, that the gift is not really for me, it is from God, for others. I am simply the vessel. So, there was a major shift in my perception about a subtle distinction, but, one that cleared up some major cobwebs in my mind. All things considered, I am eager to look into the office/gift of teacher to see what the charismata itself suggests.

A few days ago Kerri and I went to one of Barbie's meetings. While talking with Steve I asked if he had any books that he could think of which discussed the office of teacher. The question really grew out of the disparity between the overwhelming number of books there are on apostolic, prophetic and evangelistic matters, yet, the lack of books of the office/gift of teacher. Steve said maybe it was my place to write one. I pray he is right! Not to mention how cool it was that, though I had been thinking about emailing Barbie for a month about exactly those resources, I didn't and lo and behold, that night, she noted that 2008 will be a year for annointed teachers to be released. I immediately leapt at the thought..."This is it!" Then I realized, if it is, I've got a lot of work to do. We'll see...

On another unrelated note, I heard a musician named Anthony Skinner on Streams Music over the past few weeks. One of his songs just absolutely floored me and it came back to mind while listening to a Vineyard disc. The Skinner song I flipped over is called "All I Want is you". It can be heard here: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/askinner. Just an awesome song. From his site I found several other awesome musicians and websites. Seems an answer to recent prayer requesting a new breath of music in my life. Praise God. Another musician I found recently, well, she actually came to our church, is Michelle Tumes. Great songs. Amazing annointing. I'm so eager to hear what happens with her over the next few years. Her site is located at: http://michelletumes.com/default.asp. For me, the one song that really spoke was "Hold on to Jesus". It's so envigorating that He is bringing a little life in such a dry spot of my life...I miss music and am glad he has brought some to me.

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

While doing some research on file type and library registrations I had a little bit of a random question. As I tried to find answers to the questions, I found a nice little resource about hidden file types. At a rather humorously titled site, Microsuck.com, I found a nice resource about a few switches I had never seen before. (The article is titled Microsoft's Really Hidden Files by the way.) Within the article it discusses explorer pre-configured masking of the IE and TIF (Temporary Internet Files) regardless of whether you modify the .ini files in these directories. What's more interesting, and here is where the switches begin to come into the picture, is the fact that DOS does not mention anything about these directory contents. In the article, it is discussed that you should go to these directory, use the dir command with an /as/s switch to display the contents. Now, you can't see the contents via Explorer even if you turn on the hidden files in the Folder Options >> View panel. Being an anti-Microsoft proponent this is an interesting arguing point, but, the extra piece of info gives a nice bit of leverage to extra otherwise inaccessible files. Furthermore, I discovered the Recycler (Recycled in pre-XP OS's) directory and was able to find some interesting contents on test machines with the /as/s switch there as well. You have to know the profile ID numbers for each profile on the machine, otherwise you're out of luck because, again, you cannot browse to the folder contents via Explorer, but you can access them with the /s[ecret] switch. This type of stone being turned over makes me wonder what other hidden directories I don't know about. I did run C:\dir /as/s > c:\testoutput\hidden.txt to find a nice accessible list, because, otherwise, I'd have to run a huge buffer for the DOS window. It took a while to process, but showed a lot of space Microsoft hidden directories consume. Neat stuff. I like CEH research.

Sunday, June 03, 2007

While reading through some blogs of folks from a message board I frequent I realized that there are many more people I encounter these days who blog not to make an impact on the world, but rather, to record their thoughts. I find myself with my feet in one stream as much as the other. I think we must have record of our thoughts, mainly for posterity's sake. A while back I mentioned that specifically as being one of the reasons for my blogging. Yet, I find that I long for community at the same time. Blogging fashioned a bridge to allow me, and I think many others, with the opportunity to leave a trail of bread crumbs along the paths of our mindscapes and life's journey. At the same time, a need for community, a need to share this journey consistently presses into my heart and mind. Sometimes the notion that a given thought is pretty unique or possibly even original... Or the hope that what I'm experiencing may help someone in their growth and development... Perhaps the possibility that what I write will spur someone else to a new insight or revelation...

This type of hope is something that moves people to write, and for as long as most writers have put ideas in public form, the most practical solution. With the advent of the information explosion and public technology, the boundaries of distributing information have shifted. Now, people can express their ideas more easily and readily than ever before. Yet ,this has created a new dynamic: the problem of informational quality. Before, publishing was an educated person's privilege. As technology for publishing personal writing proliferated the percentage of educated writer's content dropped signficantly in the entire body of published writings. Now, readers have to think and be more crtical of what they allow their minds to consume more than ever. Anyone can open up a word processor and spout things, save the document and be done. Though publishing to the web had some restrictions just a decade ago, that baracade has been dropped with the advent of blogging and public systems whose aim is widespread, ease of access for basically anyone with internet connection.

So, there is a bit of a dichotomy now. With so many people sharing their lives, there is a newfound wealth of personal experiences from which to learn and study human lives...to explore human narratives...and to see how folks you might never meet in the ordinary course of events live. So, even though we are isolated more and more by life schedules and the unspoken walls erected by classism and the dictatorial nature of today's fear-based society of avoidance, we have this virtual insight into the lives behind the walls. We have to wonder how true and accurate these dialogues are. Most blogs are unread and most questionable thoughts, beliefs or experiences probably never get questioned because their isn't enough dialectic since dialectic requires others with which to dialogue. Their is a mixed blessing in this blog-manic society. More information than ever before with less critical review means the degree of potential error and danger is higher than ever before. So, as many wise folks have noted of the blogging revolution, take everything with a block of salt, there is still a new mass of raw material from which great riches can be obtained if the right mind and opportunity meet.