A great quote my Dad made me aware of

“We the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have done so much, with so little, for so long, we are now qualified to do anything, with nothing.”

 

This is just to good.

WATCHMEN: Awesome Graphic Novel

WATCHMEN Book Cover

I just got back from a relaxing vacation and part of that relaxation time was spent reading WATCHMEN.  I went to a movie about a month ago and saw a preview for the WATCHMEN movie that is out in theaters now and that it was based on the graphic novel.   I haven’t ever read a graphic novel and immediately thought that this one would be a good one to read.  I picked up a copy the day before we left for vacation and I completed it today.  The book is awesome and I would highly recommend reading it if your looking for a great piece of fiction.  This book is outstanding from a literary and artistic viewpoint.   This novel really paints a picture of evil and how it decays the world. Though this book really didn’t strive for a hidden Christian message of any kind, I found the following quote from the text fitting:

“I guess I’ve just reached a point where I’ve started to wonder whether all the grandstanding and fighting individual evils does much good for the world as a whole.  Those evils are just symptoms of an overall sickness of the human spirit, and I don’t believe you can cure a disease by suppressing its symptoms.”  Adrian Veidt (Ozymandias)

Go out and grab a copy if your looking for an entertaining read.  I plan to read more graphic novels and I am looking forward to selecting the next one to read.

Reset Local and Group Policy on a Windows PC

I have found myself in many situations where I needed to run this command in order to start with a clean slate in regard to policy.  Putting it here on the blog will ensure I can find the command the next time that I need it.   In short, there are times when you move machines from domain to domain or you have done a series of policy edits over time and your RSOP (Resultant Set of Policy) just doesn’t seem to be accurate.  When I find myself in this situation, I run the command below:

secedit /configure /cfg %windir%\repair\secsetup.inf /db secsetup.sdb /verbose

After running this command I reboot the machine, log back in, and run a  “gpupdate /force” to pull the policy back down.  I then check the RSOP again to see where I stand.  I have found that this command is very helpful in troubleshooting RSOP while cleaning up the trash.

Bibleshark: Cross-Translation Concordance

We are proud to announce that the first revision of our Cross-Translation Concordance is up and functional.  We know that the first revision needs some work and we plan to deliver the needed functionality.  We wanted to go ahead and get it out there knowing that it is already a beneficial tool.   We are currently delivering 32,004 unique words showing up 2,204,761 times in 16 translations of the Bible.   We have everything from Aarabah to Zuzims.

We designed this concordance to be almost identical to a printed Bible Concordance.  You choose the starting letter which will then give you pages of results for words that start with that letter.  The words are in alphabetical order and each page will list the first and last word at the top (just like a dictionary/concordance).  For example,  the first page of words for the letter “L” starts with “laabim” and ends with “lands” so you will see “laabim through lands” at the top and bottom of the page.

We hope you like the functionality.  As always, feedback is welcome.

Galatians 2:21 Christ did not die needlessly

I was reading in Galatians and came across this verse that summarizes a thought that I have had and preached before.  So many people claim that being a Christian requires an additional act that we must perform.  They believe in the following equation:

Jesus Christ + Something = Righteousness

Paul targets a group of people just like this in his letter to the Galatians known as the Judaizers.   This was a group of  Jewish Christians that still believed that many of the ceremonial practices in the Old Testament were still necessary in the New Testament church.  For example, they wanted to force Gentiles that became Christians to follow through in circumcision.   The Judaizers believed that righteousness required Jesus Christ + something else.  Many current denominations have similar requirements.  For example they may require Jesus Christ + Baptism to achieve righteousness.  These current day Church requirements are  Church Law just like the Old Testament Jewish Law that the Galatians refused let go. Paul describes this as “foolish” (Galations 3:1).    Galatians 2:21 summarizes it perfectly:

²¹ “I do not nullify the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly.”

If there is any other requirement/law other than Jesus Christ that is required for righteousness, then Christ’s death on the Cross is worthless unless that additional law is fulfilled.  That makes the additional law more powerful than Christ’s death and thus his death would be “needless” and it would “nullify the grace of God”.   With that being said, I hope you can rely on the below equation as truth:

Jesus Christ = Righteousness