I just got back from the Tase of Chaos tour. Bands such as The Used, My Chemical Romance, Senses Fail, Saosin, and Killswitch engage were there along with a bunch of other ones. Originally, Underoath (one of my favorite bands right now) was supposed to be there and who knows how much i’d pay to see them. But alas, they didn’t play the Saskatoon show. My firend Kyle and I decided to go despite the lack of bands we listen to being there. It was a good night of heavy music, I very much enjoy the style of music, and ALL the bands were tight, but i wasn’t thoroughly in awe. I’d have to say that I enjoyed Killswitch Engage the most. They were extrememly tight, deadly musicians, had a good on-key voice, and put on a good show. The rest of the bands all seemed like the exact same band and , oddly enough, they all had the exact same amount of members playing the same insruments in each band. Every single band was tight, it’s just …something was missing. Maybe it’s God.

After not touching my blog for about a year, some comments started to build up on the few posts that I had. Posts especially built up concerning my rant about a satirical essay on how Lord of the Rings sucks. I like Lord of the Rings and am a huge fan and honestly, I really could care less if anyone else likes it. What ticks me off is when people feel they need to put it down just because they don’t like it. I guess it’s in our nature to put stuff down like that, especially since I loath country music and put it down alot. However, there was some nasty, profanity filled comments aimed at me and that wasn’t fun. I guess I learned my lesson… If something ticks me off and is clearly said (or written) out of harshness and just to get a response I should just turn the other cheek. I must be careful to only say things out of love and make sure they are constuctive instead of returning destructive comments with destructive comments.

You have heard that it was said, “An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.” But I say unto you, do not resist him who is evil; but whoever slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if anyone wants to sue you, and take your shirt, let him have your coat also. And whoever shall force you to go one mile, go with him two.

Matthew 5: 38-41

Lately I’ve been learning to be obedient… truly obedient. It’s unbelievably difficult… I mean, I’m
only human. God has told me in the past to destroy things that I see no offense in owning and to
abstain from things that wouldn’t be considered harmful or sinful. It’s tough, because I see
nothing wrong with thing’s He tells me to change, but if I’m not obedient, He pulls on my heart
until I obey.

About 3 years ago, I was introduced to a band called Dream Theater. There are four musician’s in the band
who are all amazing (and a lead singer who’s stuck in the 80’s–but that’s not the point). I’m
convinced they’re the best musicians in the world. Not only are they incredible at their
instruments, but I like their music. It’s so creative and catchy. I started collecting their ablums with one, then one became a couple, and soon I had 17 CD’s and 5 DVD’s from Dream Theater
(only 2 CD’s short of owning every single one of their albums).

One day in October, I was thinking about my Dream Theater CD’s for some reason and God spoke to me saying,
“Destroy them.”. I’d heard God a few times before, being able to recognize fairly doubtless that it was
Him, and I knew this was Him, but I tried to convince myself otherwise. I tried to bicker with
God and say, “How ’bout I just put them in my drawer?”. I convinced myself that He was okay
with that… so that’s what I did.

So there the CD’s sat hidden away in my drawer. Always in the back of my mind, anytime I’d try
to pray, and especially when I’d pray for obedience, God would softly say “The CD’s”. It was
brutal. I didn’t want to destroy 22 discs, that’s around 500 bucks worth! I didn’t want to do it… I
wasn’t going to do it. It’s not like I was idolizing them over God, In fact I
hadn’t listened to them for a while, but anytime I’d try to draw near to God… “The CD’s”.

This went on for a couple months. I finally decided this had to stop. I knew the only way to get
rid of this tugging on my heart was to destroy them. Were these CD’s really more important to
me than the one who created me and was tortured and killed for me? Were these CD’s making me
prideful and hurting our ministry with stereotrap?
Were having these CD’s bringing me closer to God in any way? Obedience sucks.

So I took the CD’s along with me to my girlfriend’s acreage. There, in a rusty burning barrel,
along with garbage and dirty diapers, the collection of CD’s I’d been working on for 3 years
melted into a bubbling mass of plastic.

Anxiety . . . frustration . . . sadness … . . . . . . . . . peace

There was peace in knowing that those CD’s couldn’t possibly be holding me back from Jesus any
longer and I could take steps forward in my relationship with Him. I had removed some bricks
from the pride wall keeping me from seeing Him. I had come to a harsh realization that
everything in this world is gonna burn. God has been teaching me so much, and new things arise
which I must be obedient with. I know, that if I overcome these new problems, God will
bless me in the way He did with destroying the CD’s.

“If you fully obey the LORD your God and carefully follow all his commands I give you today,
the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations on earth.”
Deuteronomy 28:1

I KNOW what I want to do with my life. I love music. It moves people in a way that mere words
cannot. I have been moved aesthetically innumerable times by it (and the Holy Spirit moving
through it). I KNOW that I want to pursue a career in music and everything to do with It, I love
it.

Now let’s face the excruciating facts. Society teaches us that in order to be truly successful (ie.
have lots of money and power), you should pursue secondary education. There are degree
programs for art and music, but most of them acquire you teaching positions, and those have low
salaries. What I really want to do is perform . . .you know. . . be a rock star, a rock star for
Jesus. That goal seems very unattainable. It is very difficult to be successful in the music
business. I believe God can and wants to bless my band with success, success in both winning
souls for Him and earning enough to support ourselves and families. However, we must be
wholeheartedly pursuing excellence in both our playing and our personal relationships with Him.
It’s tough, because even if I were wholeheartedly practicing my instrument and having faith in
God, there’s no assurance that the other members will do the same (not saying that I’m a perfectly
in tune wit God now).

I’ve looked at other career opportunities, and some of them are mildly interesting, but nothing I’d
wanna do for the rest of my life. When we play shows and I look out on a sea of faces, my heart
goes out to those youth. I want to see them experience God in the way I have. I want them to
know that God can give them a life more fulfilling than sex, drugs, and rock & roll. I want to be
successful in music so that I can do what I enjoy everyday and enjoy being worked through by the
Holy Spirit. The pressure’s on to decide what I want to do. I mean, I’m “only nineteen", but I
guess I’m impatient. I want to be settled into a career and have a vehicle and a house now so I
can get married. I guess I’m seeking fulfilment, but I know (although I don’t always genuinely feel
it) that true fulfilment comes solely from Jesus Christ. I know God wants to give me the desires
of my heart and it’s my prayer that i’ll be willing to conform to His will.

So I KNOW I want to do music and KNOW I don’t want to study anything else, but I KNOW
that God has great plans for those who are obedient, even though It’s tough to be patient and
focused.

Tonight at DBC Youth, Christine Bartz spoke about leaving our Christian comfort zone. Sometimes we don’t want to go out on a limb and speak to someone, especially about Christ, but in the end, what bad is going to come out of it? She handed out a small piece of paper to half the youth the and got them to write their names on it. Placing the names in a hat, the remaining half of the youth drew a name from the pile. Those two people would then join up and pray for each other. I found it cool to pray alone with one person, something I don’t do very often, let alone with someone i don’t know that well. I think it would be awsome to be able to have the confidence to just pray with someone when you feel the need, and I belive it is important to have someone who will keep you accountable.

I have never been an outgoing person and am usually not the one to start up a conversation. Something I especially need to work on is learning to speak with people after our concerts. Lately, I have been trying to put off taking down equipment for a while to talk to a few people after a show. Hopefully, they felt Christ through our music, but I also want them to be able to recognize that we love Jesus when we talk to them. I think I for one, and maybye the rest of stereotrap, forget sometimes why we’re doing this, and forget that God’s the one who gave us these musical talents. I simply pray that God would pop my shyness bubble and give me the words to say to those who are seeking.

Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens.
- Tolkien

I was surfing the net the other day and came across an article entitled “50 Reasons Why Lord of the Rings Sucks” writen by someone going by the name of “Dr. Albert Oxford, PhD -London Film Institute”. He was obviously trying to be funny, but I was so angered by some of his remarks I had to write him an email. The article can be found at http://www.pointlesswasteoftime.com/film/50reasons.html.

Here is the email I sent to him:

I came across your 50 reasons why LOTR sucks the other day and was perturbed at some of
your irrational comments. I agree with you views on the greed of Hollywood and how it seems to
be taking over the education system and that New Line Cinema is milking us for all we’re worth,
but I think you probably should have done your research (like read the book) before writing this
article.

(his remark)
4. “In the massive Mt. Doom battle scene at the beginning of Fellowship of the Ring, a DVD
pause reveals at least half a dozen of the 50,000 Orc Warrior extras are wearing modern tennis
shoes.”

(my comment)
The animators probably did this to be funny.

6. “The Orcs were obviously stolen from PC game maker Blizzard and its Warcraft series. Too
bad Blizzard is apparently too scared to sue New Line over it.”

Orcs were created by Tolkien and portrayals of them were drawn far before the creation of
Warcraft. In fact, Warcraft III has copied almost every aspect of Tolkien’s creatures (ex. Ents,
tall elves, and especially the orcs).

7. “The ring, which is seen to be at least two inches in diameter at the beginning to fit the polish
sausage-sized finger of Sauron, suddenly fits Frodo’s child-sized finger later. I guess this movie
takes place in a world where rings magically change sizes on their own.”

The ring, possessed with Sauron’s soul, has the ability to become attached to it’s beholder and
therefore change sizes to suit the bearer’s finger perfectly. In fact, in one scene where it shows
Isildur holding the ring in his palm, you can actually see the ring shrink.

9. “Give me one reason that story couldn’t have been told without all the fighting.”

Okay. Violence is in our nature. It’s a fact that in history, there were wars, and at one point,
probably with swords. Middle Earth is Tolkien’s fictional history of today’s modern world, and
even in today’s world, all creatures fight for survival. (And you have to admit, sword battles are
way cooler than a gunfight)

10. “Why didn’t they take horses on their quest? Or even better, why didn’t Gandalf’s giant flying
bird friend haul them into Mordor? Watch out, Frodo! All of your methods of transportation have
been swallowed by the Dark Lord of the Plot Hole!”

They probably didn’t take horses on their quest because they were trying to hide from the Nazgul.
They probably didn’t fly an eagle into Mordor because Sauron’s eye would see them and send all
nine Nazgul with they’re flying beasts to come and take them down. Also, Gandalf wouldn’t
want to use his favor from the eagles unwisely, when is was used better later to get Frodo and
Sam OUT of Mordor when Mt. Doom was erupting.

12. “In FOTR, if you watch closely during the Inn scene, Frodo and his crew are shown getting
stabbed by the Ring Wraiths. Then, five seconds later, they are fine again. Note to the director: try
proofreading your movie before you release it to the public.”

This has to be the stupidest statement. It is obvious that in the movie, the Hobbits place pillow’s.
under the blankets in their room to look like they’re bodies sleeping in the beds. Meanwhile, they
hide in another room When the Black Riders stab the beds they find the pillows, and not the
hobbits.

13. “Liv Tyler’s character is seen easily defeating nine strong supernatural beings, even though she
is clearly a woman.”

That’s just rude. Plus, she’s a female ELF.

15. “Gandalf’s smoke boat at Bilbo’s party is pretty impressive, but smoke cannot be made to
travel horizontally, thus revealing it to be nothing but a cheap special effect.”

He’s a wizard you tird.

16 “We all saw Gandalf fall into the molten core of Middle Earth after his battle with the firebeast
thing in part 1. Well, I guess the Gandalf action figure must have sold well, because in the
slap-together sequel Two Towers, Gandalf is back. Perhaps it was voodoo, a la the corpse in
Weekend at Bernie’s II (look closely and you’ll notice LOTR steals several elements from the
WAB films).”

First of all, nothing created by Tolkien is “slap-together”. I would like to see you create your
own world all on paper, with several races all with complete languages, fom cosmology to
destruction. Second, Gandalf the Grey layed down his life for his friends, and is later
resurrected as the mighty Gandalf the White. This, I believe is symbolic to the life of Christ, and
what Tolkien was getting at.

27. “The “happy village of little people” idea was stolen from Willow. ”
28. “The wise old wizard character was stolen from Harry Potter.”
29. “The “travelling on our quest through a corn field” scene was stolen from Shrek. ”
and #’s 30-35

ALL THOSE MOVIES WERE MADE AFTER THE LOTR WAS WRITTEN!!!!

Thankyou, and next time, please do some reasearch.

Hello, and welcome to my blog site. I’ve never really kept any kind of journal before, but I hope that this site will be influentual for both myself and the people who read it. I’m not sure what I’m going to write about, but when I have thoughts, i guess i’ll vomit them on to this site.