I think I’ve finally gotten to the point where I can finally more or less ride off into the sunset. Less than a week after SonicBlu’s housing crisis broke, God has him and his entourage into a nice three-bedroom townhome. Problem solved.

Now I can only hope God has taken note of my unselfishness throughout the week and elects to keep me here at the Breckenridge as well. He can still elect to force me somewhere else, may His will come before mine, but to be honest, I don’t want to be homeless.

It’s been tons of fun watching six young men attempt to empty an apartment that’s taken on the appearance of an enclosed landfill in the five years they’ve live there.

The big lesson learned today: Don’t acquire more stuff than you want to move every five years or so. Nothing cures you of materialism quite like being forced to move into a new apartment.

I’ve lived at the Breckenridge Apartments 3½ years, longer than I’ve lived anywhere else in Central Ohio. I reckon nobody gets to live longer than five years in any one apartment, so it’s stupid to hang onto junk any longer than you have to. Best to keep your belongings light and easy to move.

Part of me is a really dictatorial control freak. The problem with that part of me is there is no other person on the planet over whom it can display its absolute mastery but me. When it yells, “Jump!”, God help me if I utter anything else but, “How high?”

My Inner Dictator usually shows up when I’m on Second Life doing something fun or interesting when a blue menu drops down out of the top of the screen. The menu says:

Harmonia Trefoil is offering you a teleport to her location.

singing luv 2 c u

At first, I decide I don’t want to. But that is when my Inner Dictator steps in.

“Whaat?!! Did I just hear your scum-sucking wimp mind say, ‘I don’t want to?’!!!”

But Jwheels Carver is having a Comedy Open Mic over at the Chuckling Priestman! I can earn some tips over there!

“Butt is what I kick when I don’t get the desired results, dammit! You, you worthless maggot, will pop straight over to that concert, tip Harmonia, tip the venue, tip the hostess, and keep your butt parked there for the whole damned hour, you hear me?!!”

What my Inner Dictator wants is pure obedience. Obedience purely for the sake of obedience. Do what you’re told for no better reason than you’re told to do it. It doesn’t have to result in something good. It doesn’t have to be sensible. Just obey when the demand is made.

In fact, the more nonsensical and outrageous the demand made by my Dictator, the more of a sacrifice is being made when I comply with it, and the better the obedience is.

But, as with all dictators, you give my Inner Dictator an inch, and he will take a mile. If I let him have unchallenged sway over my Lindens, will he then claim sovereignty over my real life U.S. dollars? Will he order me into harm’s way. For the virtue of pure obedience, will I obey?

I think Phoenix Audubon, in his comment to my last post, has brought up a very good point. In confronting the indecently exposed trolls trying to bait Christians, I would only be supporting the argument they make that Christians are all about denouncing people and things.

I believe this is where my experience as a customer service rep would come in handy. The reason I think Christians are being baited at such places as ALM and Club Eternal is somebody doesn’t think the Church is behaving in the way they’re advertised to behave. The customer gets angry, calls the number, gets me on the other end, and lets me have it between the eyes with both barrels.

So I really think my calling in SL is to man the Complaint Desk. When I come upon an angry customer, the thing I have to do is draw him out and find out why he is angry and disappointed.

Yes, Christians don’t behave in the way set forth in the advertising. I don’t know enough about the content of the advertising, or who exactly is doing the advertising, but I do know there is a sharp break between the advertising and what the church actually does. The baiters in ALM, I think, are angry customers with legitimate beefs against the Church, and maybe the time has come for somebody to answer their calls.

Has the customer fallen victim to misleading information, or information so incomplete that it leaves the audience to draw the wrong conclusions? It just may be my job to draw the griefer out and find out what legitimate complaints they have and address them.

I guess I have to train myself to do a different kind of troubleshooting.

My Internet service went down last night, and when it does, it’s fascinating the panicky thoughts my head goes through during these outages.

One of the more farfetched explanations for what’s happening to me  suggests that there is a battle raging around me in some unseen spiritual dimension, invisible bombs and bullets flying everywhere. I am a target, and a demonic bomb took out my Internet.

This is all happening because someone or something sees me as a threat. Or so I’m given to believe.

Perhaps I need to go backward somewhat. My religion teaches me that I have an enemy, a wily one, if not one so powerful as He who is on my side. The number one power of this enemy is the introduction of false ideas to our minds, ideas we mistakenly think we thought of ourselves.

Think about it. It took no less than a talking reptile to get Adam & Eve to bite the forbidden fruit. This is probably because they had not yet fallen. Later, when Abel’s sacrifice of blood from a lamb was accepted and Cain’s sacrifice of vegetables was rejected, nobody or nothing had to audibily talk to Cain about how he P.O.-ed he should be about it, or to whom he should target his hatred. Nobody or nothing had to audibly suggest killing Abel. Cain seemed to have come up with that idea on his own.

That’s what man’s fallen nature will do for us. It’ll provide a permanent backdoor access in the operating system so the most horrid ideas can download themselves into our heads.

Right now, I’m dealing with some scarewares in my brain of the really wildest type. I’ve written before about scarewares, and how much they are like our thinking processes. They want to convince me that I’m in more trouble than I’m actually in, hence, the idea that I am a threat to a powerful enemy, and that so-called powerful enemy has the Internet in his icy, iron grip.

Hard to say about the icy, iron grip part. After all, the number one arrow in this guy’s quiver is the baldfaced lie.

Blender training

My self-training in the 3D animation software Blender begins apace. I found out what Sculpt Mode does, which is a little bit early for my level of training, and tried to use it to sculp a head out of a mesh sphere. It doesn’t work quite the way I had hoped. Oh well. Gotta keep learning.

One of the things that the tutorials would have me do is construct a crude humanoid figure out of cubes, the kind which you start with every time you boot up Blender. It is here where my pride gets the best of me.

“Me? Do that?!! I’m a skilled cartoonist! There’s no way I can do that and feel good about signing my name to it! There’s gotta be some other way!”

At the feet of the Master

I have a bad case of Ed Gruberman. I want to learn all the “nifty moves” up front, and think that wearing the “pajamas” is all I need to be ready for them. I need, as amazing as it may seem to Christians whom Jesus may come to collect as early as later today, patience. Granted, I don’t have beating people up in mind, but the impatience is still there.

There is the danger that I could become too enamored with the nifty moves that Jesus has given to me to know now. The 70 ministers that Jesus sent out to preach in his name (Luke 10) came back undoubtedly impressed with all the demonic tail they could suddenly kick in the Lord’s name. I can readily identify with that feeling, as I myself judge myself by the nifty things that I can do. It’s a hard thing to do to throw my own abilities into the trash and trust instead in what Jesus wants to do that I obviously cannot. I am prideful. I want to do what I do best, in spite of the fact that the enemy probably has people in his stable who can outdistance it by miles. Only the name of Jesus can effectively fight the enemy.

I would appreciate some prayer for the patience the Lord obviously wants me to have.

The people who had put my new Palm IIIxe up for auction told me that they had made a mistake in the advertising. The device has no front cover. They offered to refund my money.

Before I could make my decision about whether to take them up on it, the power to my apartment went out. Some electricians from New Line Electrical had to fix something in one of the main breaker boxes outside the 1682 building. Two hours, they said.

Two hours to think about my next move, I guess. Two hours to curse illegal drugs, or the economy, or whatever else it is that is making it necessary to steal anything that is not bolted down.

I almost called out to God for justice against thieves, conveniently forgetting that I myself am guilty of the crime. I haven’t been pitching His piece of the action into the offering bag lately, rationalizing that the effect is still the same. A legalized loan shark is taking away 15% of my income. Do I not have to learn to get along without that?

Bah! I will still grumble. Yes, Lord, I am a thief, but what is happening to me is still bad. Unlike You, what is taken from me will be sorely missed.

By the way, I opted for the refund, because the sellers had a second Palm IIIxe up for auction, currently going at $5.99, with 4 hours left on it. I should win it.

Today’s the day when all are encouraged to enumerate all the ways in which you are quite well off.

I can count at least 20.

1. Alive.
2. In a warm apartment.
3. Not in prison.
4. Not in a hospital.
5. Not in a homeless shelter.
6. Have a car.
7. Have a job.
8. Have a computer.
9. With Internet access.
10. 2 blogs and several art sites.
11. Know HTML and how to write Web pages.
12. I can write well so as to not bore you.
13. Television and stereo.
14. Smooth jazz and contemporary Christian music.
15. Stuff to eat.
16. Coffee to drink.
17. Several imaginary friends.
18. And I can draw pictures of them.
19. Within easy driving range of a $1.00 2nd run cinema.
20. My heavenly Father gave me all the above.

Not a bad set of blessings after just a few minutes of counting, eh? I’d have to say I’m doing well.

Some people, out of what passes for piety, tend to stick both feet in their mouth. Take this example of a guy who meets Jesus just as He was seeking to get away from the pressing crowds.

When Jesus saw the crowd around him, he gave orders to cross to the other side of the lake. Then a teacher of the law came to him and said, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.”

Jesus replied, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”

— Matt 8:18-20 NIV

Well, this teacher of the law might have meant well, and was probably honestly seeking Jesus, but he got from the Master a bigger call for commitment than he bargained for. What Jesus was saying to this man is, “I’m homeless. Are you willing to be homeless right along with Me? Are you willing to follow Me into times of no comfort and no certainty? Are you willing to make Me your source of comfort instead of what you see around you?”

Isn’t that just like Jesus? Just when you think you’re making a big commitment to Him, just when you’re ready to pat yourself on the back, He always asks for more and casts doubt on your ability to really follow Him. If you’re going to follow Jesus, you’re going to be following Him into the unknown, nowhere near your comfort zone. It’s not going to be four-star hotels and filet mignon. It’s going to be the kind of life that’s going to test you to see what you’re made of.

It’s not for wimps. Sissies need not apply. We’re looking for a few good men. That sort of thing.

In his epistle to the Romans, Paul places the name of Abraham among his great heroes of faith. The story of Abraham begins with God calling him away from all the things he ever knew into the unknown, a new land filled with nothing but uncertainty. “The land I will show you,” God says. (Gen. 12:1) Not much is known about it.

I don’t mind being tested. I think that mankind thrives on struggle. Why else would we make up artificial adversities in the form of sports? Why else would I play chess and solve Sudoku puzzles. Man loves to be challenged. It’s hard-wired into us, I think. Bring it on, Lord Jesus. I’m sure I’ll learn important lessons from it.

]]> http://angelbearoh.wordpress.com/2008/11/10/led-through-uncertainty/feed/ 0 Skye Goodfellow http://angelbearoh.wordpress.com/2008/11/10/surviving-micro-layoffs/ http://angelbearoh.wordpress.com/2008/11/10/surviving-micro-layoffs/#comments Mon, 10 Nov 2008 07:04:38 +0000 angelbearoh http://angelbearoh.wordpress.com/?p=583 ]]>

Another terrible day at work. Not performance-wise, mind you, just ploddingly slow with very few calls coming. Operations has to send people home hours ahead of when they’re due, and I’m already smarting in the paycheck from being sent home Thursday and Friday. I normally work 5:00 PM to 1:00 AM, and I was secretly laying odds I wouldn’t last until 11:00 PM.

I find this lack of business hard to fathom. What causes it? Are folks just so scared of being charged out the wazoo that they’re getting their troubleshooting advice online whenever possible? I thought I was in one of the more immune lines of work. I was betting on how newly unemployed people would hit Monster.com really hard before being forced to cancel their broadband Internet service.

I don’t have that peace that Peter Knehaus (from my church) does about being unemployed. I may seem cool on the outside, but inside I’m as torn up and worried as I can be. I don’t know if I’m doing this faith thing right. Do I keep it hidden or do I cut loose with a loud wail to my God?

The Devil just loves to chime in with his two cents, mostly along the lines that I’m nowhere near doing it right. I’m not screaming myself hoarse or crying enough tears. I’m not on my knees enough or didn’t put enough money in the offering bag. Always some reason or another for God to not hear word number one of my prayers.

Whenever you’re doubting yourself like I do, best thing I can tell you is to ask God for stuff anyway, not because you’re good but because He’s good. And he came through for me tonight. While other 5 to 1 agents were going home before 11:00 PM, I stayed in there, and a fresh, large queue of support work finally came in, shortly after 11. Kept me busy right up to 1:00 AM.

God is so good…

Election official training

You remember what I wrote about how I worked at the primary election back in March? Back then, voters would come to me with those Authority to Vote Slips that tell me what ballots they would be voting, either Republican or Democrat, this precinct or that precinct? In the general election, I’m going to be looking up voters in the roster and writing those Authority to Vote slips.

I just found out this morning that the Vets Memorial Hall on West Broad Street in Columbus, OH has free parking. I will be taking my car down to my training class tomorrow morning.

How God zings me

I don’t know how to enjoy Jesus.

When I listened to a podcast from a few days ago from Joe Stowell, who writes a daily devotional titled Strength for the Journey, it struck me that I just don’t know how to enjoy the presence of Jesus who is right next to me. This sure takes the wind out of the sails of hoping for a place called “Heaven”, and expecting it to make me happy when I’m dead and gone. I think of the words of a classic hymn:

I come to the garden alone
While the dew is still on the roses
And the voice I hear
Falling on my ear
The Son of God discloses

I dunno. Maybe I’m just not the garden type. What is my favorite meeting place for meeting the Lord? Why a garden? Gardens are beautiful and peaceful, to be sure, but why a garden for me? For a tech-head like me, why not … Second Life? I’ve never been to Second Life because I cannot afford a newer computer. In the absence of Second Life, the blogosphere is my consolation. My thoughts on this important matter have not quite gelled. Maybe I should wait and write about them later when they have.