Motivational Therapy...

When I was in college and taking Education courses we had to take a class called "Educational Psychology". It was taught by the dean of the Education Department, Dr. Clark. Dr. Clark was in many ways the quentisential professor. He loved to teach, and he especially loved to befuddle his students!

We would go 'round and 'round in class on one of his favorite topics: Movitivation. Specifically, we would debate the differences between intrinsic motivation (motivation of oneself) and extrinsic motivation (being motivated by external factors). Dr. Clark loved to take the position that there was really no such thing as extrinsic motivation. In fact, ALL motivation is intrinsic, its just a matter of finding the external simulus that will convince the individual that something is worth doing - and then that person motivates themselves.

I still believe to this day that it is really just a semantic argument. Anyone who's ever been spanked by a parent - or modified their behavior in fear of the paddle or to earn a treat or reward - knows that extrinsic motivation does in fact exist whatever you may call it.

Which brought me in my early morning shower musing (showers are wonderful places to think, so few distractions) to the topic of terrorism. It has become fashionable of late to blame the USA for terrorist attacks against the USA. That our arrogance or violent actions undertaken in attempting to stop terrorists simply make or motivate more young muslim men to become terrorists.

I thought about this, and Dr. Clark's arguments. What I cannot get past is just how a generally rational human being goes from loving life to wanting to blow himself up along with several other innocent bystanders? Is that kind of action really motivated by any one traumatic or even a series of traumatic events?

No. In the end, no stable, sane person wants to blow themselves up to gain any end. To reach that point requires some truly creative and persuasive EXTRINSIC motivation. Or at least a very good bribe.

So why exactly do these young men line up to blow themselves up in the service of their god? Being a man myself, I can really only think of one explanation: Lust.

Consider what the young Jihadist is promised should he fulfill his mission. 72 houri, interpreted by the Immams as perpetual virgins, nubile and young and literally begging to be the one allowed to pleasure you first, with 71 more to follow. Add in the promise of being pampered, living in luxury and oppulence.

Basically, they're promised eternity as Hugh Heffner, without the VD or inevitable old age. All this from a position of possibly never being allowed to marry, or at best scratching out a living in a poor country with crushing poverty.

Now THAT'S motivation.

So, my liberal friends, please feel free to continue to act stupidly and disarm before the rising enemy tide, but please, place the blame where it belongs.

Or we're all going to be getting mandatory motivational therapy.

Now or Later...

Something interesting caught my attention today. A (minor) debate among some friends about the timing of a child's birth. Now, mind you, neither of the debators were in fact involved in the birth in any way. The birth is happening in Texas this weekend, sometime between now and, well, when it happens.

But that was the rub. The debate was about whether it would be better to have the baby before 11:59:59 12-31-09 or after 00:00:01, 1-1-10. Go for the "first baby of the year" award? Or get that cute little bundle of tax credits, just under the wire?

Now, I suppose there would be some prestige involved with being the first baby in your town in 2010, or first baby in your city, or hospital, or whatever. For some, there might also be a benefit to being born on an "even" year, particularly one divisible by 10. (Monk fans, and you know who you are, already know which way Mr. Monk would vote.)

ON the other hand, there is definitely something to be said for getting in under the wire. Something about the idea of "sticking it to the man" or getting a windfall benefit appeals to many. OF course, in this case, there is also the little matter of the expiration of the Bush Tax Cuts, including the doubling of the per-child credit which may not apply in 2010 but certainly does apply in 2009. Might as well get at least one shot at the full deal, eh?

Either way, the child will be born of course. I guess maybe the best way to decide is not to. Let God send the child in His own time.

Then we can stop worrying about it and enjoy the precious gift of life God has given. NO matter how brief that life may be.

The Historical Revealing of Christ

This is nothing new, and not original to me. However, Christmas is about Christ, and so many people think that Jesus is "New Testament" and somehow separate from the "Old Testament" and all those rules, etc. I think it is amazing and incredible how God revealed his Christ the Messiah to the world and his people all through scripture and history.

Enjoy!

Genesis
Seed of the woman (Gen. 3:15) Shiloh (Gen. 49:10)

Exodus
Passover Lamb (Ex. 12:3)

Leviticus
Anointed High Priest (Lev. 8:7-12)

Numbers
Bronze serpent (Num. 21:8-9; John 3:14-15) Star of Jacob (Num. 24:17) Scepter of Israel (Num. 24:17)

Deuteronomy
Prophet like Moses (Deu. 18:15) The great Rock (Deu. 32:4; 1 Cor 10:4)

Joshua
Captain of the Lord's army (Josh. 5:14)

Judges
Angel of the Lord (Judg. 2:1)

Ruth
Family redeemer

1 Samuel
The great judge (1 Sam. 2:10; Ps 96:13; 2 Tim 4:8; Rev 19:11)

2 Samuel
Seed of David (2 Sam. 7:12-13)

1 Kings
Lord God of Israel (1 Kg. 8:15, 25)

2 Kings
God of the cherubim (2 Kg. 19:15)

1 Chronicles
God of our salvation (1 Chron. 16:35)

2 Chronicles
God of our ancestors (2 Chron. 20:6)

Ezra
Lord of heaven and earth (Ezra 1:2)

Nehemiah
Covenant-keeping God (Neh. 1:5)

Esther
God of providence

Job
Risen and returning Redeemer (Job 19:25)

Psalms
Anointed Son (Psa. 2:2,12) Holy One (Psa. 16:10) Good Shepherd (Psa. 23:1) King of glory (Psa. 24:7-10)

Proverbs
Wisdom of God (Prov. 8; 1 Cor 1:24) Architect at Creation (Prov. 8:30; John 1:1-3; Col 1:15-17)

Ecclesiastes
The one above the sun

Song of Songs
Chief among 10,000 (Song 5:10) Altogether lovely (Song 5:16)

Isaiah
Virgin-born Immanuel (Isa. 7:14) Wonderful Counselor (Isa. 9:6) Mighty God (Isa. 9:6) Everlasting Father (Isa. 9:6) Prince of Peace (Isa. 9:6) Servant (Isa. 52:13) Man of sorrows (Isa. 53:3)

Jeremiah
The Lord our righteousness (Jer. 23:6; 33:16; Rom 10:4; 1 Cor 1:30)

Lamentations
Faithful and compassionate (Lam. 3:22-23, 31-33)

Ezekiel
The tender shoot (Eze. 17:22) The one who has the right to judge (Eze. 21:27)

Daniel
The rock (Dan. 2:34) One like a divine being (or like "the Son of God") (Dan. 3:25) One like the Son of Man (Dan. 7:13)

Hosea
King of the resurrection (Hos. 13:10-14)

Joel
God of the battle (Joel 2:11; 3:2,9-17) Giver of the Spirit (Joel 2:28-32)

Amos
Lord God Almighty (Amos 4:13) Plumb line (Amos 7:7-9)

Obadiah
Destroyer of the proud (Obad. 15)

Jonah
Risen prophet (Jonah 2:10) God of the second chance (Jonah 3:1-2) Long-suffering one (Jonah 4:9-11)

Micah
God of Israel (Micah 4:1-5) Born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2) God who pardons (Micah 7:18-20)

Nahum
Avenging God (Nah. 1:2) Bringer of good tidings (Nah. 1:15)

Habakkuk
Eternal (Hab. 1:12) Pure (Hab. 1:13) Glorious (Hab. 2:14)

Zephaniah
King of Israel (Zeph. 3:15)

Haggai
Desire of all nations (Hag. 2:7)

Zechariah
My Servant (Zech. 3:8) The Branch (Zech. 3:8) Builder of the Temple (Zech. 6:12-13) King of triumphal entry (Zech. 9:9) Pierced one (Zech. 12:10) King of the earth (Zech. 14:9)

Malachi
Sun of Righteousness Mal. 4:2)

Matthew
King of the Jews (Matt. 2:2; 27:37)

Mark
Servant (Mk. 9:35; 10:43-44)

Luke
Perfect man, Son of Man (Lk. 2:40,52; 9:22,58; 22:48)

John
Eternal God (Jn. 1:1-5; 20:28,31)

Acts
Ascended Lord (Acts 1:9)

Romans
The Lord, our righteousness (Rom. 10:4)

1 Corinthians
Our resurrection (1 Cor. 15)

2 Corinthians
God of all comfort (2 Cor. 1:3)

Galatians
Redeemer of those under the law (Gal. 4:4-5)

Ephesians
Head of the church (Eph. 1:22; 2:19,20) Giver of gifts (Eph. 4:7-16)

Philippians
Supplier of every need (Phil. 1:19; 4:19) Obedient servant (Phil. 2:5-8)

Colossians
Fullness of the Godhead (Col. 1:9; 2:9-10)

1 Thessalonians
The coming Christ (1 Thes. 4:13-5:11)

2 Thessalonians
The consuming Christ (2 Thes. 2:8)

1 Timothy
Savior of sinners (1 Tim. 1:15; 3:16)

2 Timothy
Author of Scripture (2 Tim. 3:16-17) Righteous and rewarding judge (2 Tim. 4:8)

Titus
Our great God and Savior (Titus 1:3; 2:10,13; 3:4)

Philemon
Payer of our debt

Hebrews
Appointed heir of all things (Heb. 1:2,4) Greater than prophets or angels (Heb. 1:4; 3:3)

James
Ever-present God (4:8) Coming One (Jas. 5:7-8) Great Physician (Jas. 5:15)

1 Peter
Unblemished Lamb (1 Pet. 1:19) Great example (1 Pet. 2:21-24) Lord of glory (1 Pet. 3:22) Head Shepherd (1 Pet. 5:4)

2 Peter
Beloved Son (2 Pet. 1:17)

1 John
Word of life (1 Jn. 1:1) Advocate (1 Jn. 2:1-2) Sacrifice (1 Jn. 4:10) Son of God (1 Jn. 3:8; 4:15; 5:5)

2 John
Son of the Father (2 John)

3 John
The truth (3 John; 8)

Jude
Preserver and only wise God (Jude 25)

Revelation
Alpha and Omega (Rev. 1:8) Lion of Judah (Rev. 5:5) Root of David (Rev. 5:5) King of kings (Rev. 19:16) Lord of lords (Rev. 19:16)

Black Hole Blog

Like may others, I agonized over the choice of color/style for this blog.

Yeah, right... "Hey, that black one looks cool!" CLICK

So, why black? Was it just "it looks cool"? Why does it look cool?

Well, because it is cool. In temperature, so to speak. To be completely honest, I do like the look, but a large reason for that is because the black background gives off a lot less light. Bright sites are harder on the eyes. Darker sites with lighter text are easier to read, and less likely to give a headache.

The fact that they're "cool" is, well, a bonus.

So enjoy the cool background. Hopefully it won't put you to sleep!

Anger Management

Anger: a feeling of extreme displeasure, hostility, indignation or exasperation toward someone or something; rage; wrath; ire.

Management: to manage. Manage (v): To direct or control the use of.

How many of you folks out there use a secondary email client, like Incredimail? Hmm? I see that hand. Thank you, yes, I see the hands. Hands all over the auditorium...

My ISP provider, Mediacom, in its wisdom decided recently to 'upgrade' its email server system. In the process, they trashed most of the most popular account management tools in favor of several new and supposedly desirable tools that do less and are harder to use. They also, of course, lost all of our settings, and they're having the inevitable 'upgrade' issues.

Like tonight. I set this blog up, and of course google wants to verify my email address. So I log into Incredimail to check my email.

Nothing.

So I look. Its working... working... working...

WOOT WOOOT WOOOT ERROR ERROR ERROR....

Seems the thing is rejecting my password. This frustrates me, particularly since I don't mess with this particular password all that often and it isn't in the front of my brain what it is.

But I cannot resist. I re-type it, since I DO know it and it WILL work.

Nothing. NO dice. NO SOUP FOR YOU!

Now I'm not so sure. Did I just screw it up? Maybe. Obviously there's only one thing to do. Reset the password.

So I go to Mediacom's site and click the link. You know the one. It says "Forgot your password?"

Click

Logon screen appears WITH A FREEKING PASSWORD required! Right there, on the new page, are the instructions: "Enter user ID/email address and password to access account information."


D'OH You LOGGERHEAD! I got here by clicking a link that is supposed to take me to a place where I can change my password BECAUSE I FORGOT IT! And you start by asking me for it?!?!

At that point, my anger management failed. Anger, going gangbusters. Management, laying down on the job.

After several attempts I found the right place to be, and eventually everything worked again. Turns out there was never anything wrong with my password, it was the email system having issues, but now I have a bright shiny NEW password on my account anyway. And I am reminded once again that I am utterly incapable of managing my anger on my own.

God has richly blessed me with many gifts, but one of them is not a calm temperment. I am impatient. I am easily frustrated, particularly by machines that do not work as designed. I am especially frustrated by problems that I cannot solve. Tonight I was confronted with all three, and instead of asking my Lord for help in directing and controlling my anger I let it control me.

Forgive me, Lord.

So now I get to go eat some humble pie and ask my wife and kids (who had to witness my angry outbursts) for their forgiveness. At least I know they'll give it. They have to, they're Christians. :-)

Forgive us our Debts, as we forgive our debtors...

Ranging shots...

Well, this should be interesting. I kind of stumbled into this, I didn't mean to create the blog, but what the hay. Here goes nothing...

Since I'm here, I guess I might as well take advantage of this opportunity while I can. I'll probably vent a bit, rant a bit, and talk about my views and how I see the world. This is, after all, a blog, so I can do what I want, right? Well... Maybe not everything.

There is the matter of Truth. We should probably talk about that some, too. :-)

And, of course, when there's nothing else to talk about, we'll have to talk about Battletech. (notes groan from his wife and daughters)

OK, maybe not much Battletech... Only a little? Tiny bit?

So, here we go. Fire mission Alpha, outbound...