Of Faith and Works, v1.1

I happen to read Revelation 2 and it was about the church of Ephesu, at Rev 2:2-4

2I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked men, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. 3You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary. 4Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love.

They worked hard, they do not tolerate wicked men, tested and found fake apostles, they preserved (note it was said twice!) and they have not tire, but that is not enough, God noted that while they were great examples of a gung ho christian, they forgot the very reason that they are what they are, the love of God in their life.

On a side note, going to post another christian themed post next week, been bz.

Sexier than you thought.

Rawr! We r da fittest of em all!

Ahem.

So, apparently, “Online gamers are fit” BUT, we are depressed people who abuse substances, and possibly use games as an emotional escape.

Now, this is a survey of 7000 players, but only from one Game, the MMORPG Everquest 2.

Thoughts:

• Some of the things they noted, like older population, could be due to the age of EQ.
• I can imagine this conversation going on between the game and the Player…Game:”Psst, complete this survey and get c001 3p1c WMDs!”Player:”Hmm? Sure, lesse… A A A A A A A A and… B. Done, now SHOW ME DA MON…GOODS.”
• What exactly does substance abuse constitute? Any and all use of illegal substances, or actual abuse of it? And why take crap when you are trying to frag that guy who teabagged you?

Aniway, I think if they tried it on WOW, there would be different results, with the younger and female gamers being significantly higher in %.

Checking out the comments: “Age Demographic Skew” and “Gaming Stress Relief” I agree with both of them. (Ctrl+F those two phrases to find them)

Interesting Links:

Annnndddd if you think us gamers don’t have time to snack and stuff cos we are bz gaming, guess again:

http://everquest2.station.sony.com/pizza/

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/pandaren-xpress.html

Yes, I was equally shocked when I 1st learn’t about this a while back. WHY DOESN’T MY COUNTRY HAVE SUCH THINGS!!!

Additional info about Palin’s Hacked Email

Hey, learnt about this just b4 I had to go out some 6hrs+ ago. I’m just gona post some links and stuff that I read about it for those who want to read further into it without much organization and all that. Feeling a tad tired, and I’m not really following the USA elections anyway.

1st thing I see in the morning:

“Anonymous” Hacks Palin’s Private Email
http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/09/17/1949222&from=rss
The comments talk mostly about if doing something like this is too much and about her using a Yahoo account for “business”.
Interesting comments are Here, Here, Here, Here, Here, Here. These are kinda all over, including her non-security conscious nature, to things about Anonymous, the “group”(?) that where the information was leaked to 1st . The last “here link” sums what they are.

Which links over to:

http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/32838
http://www.wikileaks.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin_Yahoo_inbox_2008 (Link is down, probably Slashdotted. Check it in a few days time.)

Wired‘s article confirms atleast one of the e-mails, so its all real.

Last but not least, an article entitled:
The story behind the Palin e-mail hacking
http://michellemalkin.com/2008/09/17/the-story-behind-the-palin-e-mail-hacking/

Ignore his flame about what Anonymous and 4chan is, he probably got burned there or something. Not to say his description is untrue tho. And if you feel tempted to visit 4chan or any of the *chans, stay away from the 18+ areas, its actually 99+ and not for the weak of heart. They have nice wallpapers btw.

Lastly, the obligatory tits.

Of Faith and Works.

Thought I would update an older post for a start:

I was thinking of what to write, unsure what should I start 1st with. And decided on this one as its been bugging me for a while, I even left the related webpages open in my browser for more than a week but never got to reading them. Why? I have a minor case of insomnia and think all kinds of stuff. And sometimes when I decide to entertain a thought, it gets bigger and bigger as it incorporates lots of other things. Which then leads to more stuff which equates into no sleep. :S As I’m writing at the 4th line of the 3rd paragraph, i already thought of 2 related things i should blog about. (Edit: It will be posted here later.)

Now, as I go about my life, ‘collect’ sayings that I believe will be useful to apply to life in my head, among them is a Christian one “Works is the evidence of Faith”. A few weeks ago, it suddenly popped back into my head and I was thinking about it and did a basic research.
“Salvation by Faith”. This can be found at John 3:18 and 8:24. It seems all you have to do is believe in God, and have Faith. Simple eh?° Then how about Works? Is someone who believes in and to a certain extend, put their Faith in God automatically granted a pass to Heaven?° Sounds a bit too easy.

2 Corinthians 13:5 states that we should ‘test’ our Faith to ourselves. I’m guessing its kinda like a stress-test to see if its still there. 😀 Anyway, how else can you test your Faith besides how you live your life? This is where Works come in. Now there is a difference between Dead Faith and Alive Faith. James 2:14 says that Dead Faith cannot give you salvation. This is explained later in James 2:19 where he says even the demons believe in God. Makes sense, as ex-angles(read: Fallen), why would they fear something weaker or imaginary?

So, we gotta work for it now. But does that mean that Christianity is a Works = Salvation belief? *Pause Post* I have always liked the fact that the Bible said that Faith will get you Salvation. And the fact that having an active Faith means you would naturally do good works and so on. As opposed to majority of other beliefs, religions and followings which instead, dictates how you should live with lots of rules. Doing Works = having Faith instead of having Faith = doing Works. The latter makes more sense imo, as I know/seen Works not equaling Faith.° *Unpause Post*

1 Corinthians 13:2 tells us that we are nothing if we do not exercise our Faith, and Galations 5:22-23 tells us what kinds of Works we can expect from having Faith. Ephesians 2:8-9 gives the most obvious answer “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast. (NIV)” So, we can agree that Faith and Works are important parts of our lives, but any amount of Works isn’t as important as the presence of Faith.

I have modded the saying into “Works without Faith is Dead as Faith without Works is also Dead. But Works Born of Faith is True Faith, Exercised.” Hope my grammar’s right on this. And I edited the saying.

Links:

A Constructive Look at Faith and Good Works(Dead Link, Retrieved via Internet Archive)
About Dead and Dynamic(Live) Faith
Faith at the office. Why not?
“You don’t have to leave your beliefs at home. In fact, some employers see the value of integrating religion and work in meaningful ways.”

This post is a updated post from a previously failed blog. I apologise for the false start.

God, Games and Girls

When people ask me, what is my life philosophy, what are the most important things in life and so on, I answer:

“God, Games and Girls. In that order.”

This three G’s came about after learning about the Three C’s(Christianity, Commerce and Civilization) in a history class.
After a while, my brain somehow spit it out, and wallah!

Food is also a major theme in my life, and I gleefully admit that I have successfully increased eating habits upon my own church cell in the time that I have been with them. As much as I wanted to write God, Games, Girls and Food, it somehow lacked the oomph of GGG, so yea. Pity.

Anyway, this blog is mostly a mix of thoughts and things I come across, and wish to share. Just as Salvation is a Treasure that can be given freely without loss, so is the things I wish to type out. They probably will range from Games, Technology, Electronics to God, Christianity, WorldIsEndingOMG. Girls as a topic is something I will touch less on, as this blog was purposely made as an anonymous blog, not attached to my own life, nor my online presence. No, googling my username doesn’t give any hits but my older blog. And no, there’s nothing on it that isn’t here already.

For the Spiritually minded, the level of theology you will see here will not blow your head off, pray you will bear with my less than stellar understanding of God. Help helps btw.
For the Gamers, I won’t stuff God down your throat, Lord knows, the world is full of people who, with good-intentions, over do the “BeChristianOrBurnInHell… NOW!” thing. Hope you get some insights.
For the Girls, I’m currently single. Nuff Said.