Saturday, February 20, 2010

Yet another tagging event!

Hannah tagged me, so here ya go!

1. High heels or boots? Boots! I apologize to all my transvestite followers out there, but I'm going to have to go with boots.

2. What time did you get up this morning? 9, I think. Somewhere around there.

3. What was the last film you saw? Beginning to end, I honestly cannot remember.

4. What is your name? Kyle

5. What is your favorite TV show? Probably the old Twilight Zone.

6. What do you usually have for breakfast? Pop-Tart, Doughnut, or Milk & cereal

7. What is your middle name's initial? A

8. What food do you dislike? Asparagus is a biggie.

9. What is your favorite CD at the moment? Who buys CDs these days?!

10. What did you do tonight? Cleaned up my room, went through my clothes, had dinner...

11. Favorite Clothing? T-shirts, blue jeans, and sneakers.

12. Anywhere in the world on vacation? Scotland.

13. Are you an organized person? I try, but sometimes things get in disarray.

14. Where would you retire to? Arizona. Nice and dry.

15 What was your most recent memorable birthday? 19th birthday - spent it at school from 9am-9pm.

16. What are you going to do when you finish this? Get back to cleaning my room.

17. What is your Birthstone? Pearl

18. Person you expect to read this first? Hannah, probably.

19. When is your birthday? June 2

20. Are you a morning person or a night person? NIGHT.

21. What is your favorite shoe style? I like Aesics... they're comfy.

22. Do you own any animals? Not anymore.

23. Any news you'd like to share? Going on a trip in March... :)

24. When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up? A F-18 pilot in the Air Force

25. What is your favorite flower? Never really had one... tulips, I guess. (Thanks Tiny Tim!)

26. What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to? March 12

28. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? Purple, of course. (Wait - where's 27?!)

29. How is the weather right now? It is very dark.

30. Last person you spoke to on the phone? Mom.

31. Favorite drink? Mountain Dew and coffee.

32. Favorite restaurant? Red Robin's Gourmet Burgers

33. Hair color? Brown

34. What was your favorite toy as a child? LEGOs!!!

35. Summer or winter? Summer.

36. Chocolate or vanilla? Chocolate.

37. Coffee or tea? Coffee – although good tea is hard to pass up.

38. Wish you were still young? I still am young!

39. Do you want your friends to comment on this? If they want to.

40. When was the last time you cried? November-December of last year, I believe.

41. What is under your bed? Stuff. A lot less than two weeks ago, which is a good thing.

42 . What did you do last night? Went to a friend's house for a church youth meeting.

43. What are you afraid of? Not being the man God wants me to be.

44. Salty or sweet? Depends on the day, I guess.

45. Best quality you have? Ask my friends – they'd be able to answer you.

46. How many years at your current job? A year and a half at the Stark State College Help Desk

47. Favorite day of the week? Saturday

48. What four people will you tag? Well, only two followers have blogs, and they've already done this. :(

49. Do you like finding out all this stuff about your friends? Most of the time, yeah.

Friday, February 12, 2010

Tagalicious!

Saw this on a couple other people's blags, figured I'd give it a shot.

BIOLOGY

Are you right-handed or left-handed? Right

Have you ever had anything removed from your body? My wisdom teeth, many moons ago.

What is the last heavy item you lifted? A water softener.


FOOD-OLOGY

What is your salad dressing of choice? I usually don't have dressing... bad for ya.

What is your favorite sit-down restaurant? Red Robin's Gourmet Burgers.

What food could you eat for 2 weeks straight and not get sick of it? hmmm.... Burgers, probably.

What are your pizza toppings of choice? Pineapple, jalapenos, and/or bacon

What do you like to put on your toast? Butter, of course.


RANDOM-OLOGY

If it were possible, would you want to know the day you were going to die?
Nope, I'd rather not.

If you could change your name, what would you change it to? I'd change it to Xerxes Snagglejorgen - just to mess with all the fellow phone support people out there.

Would you drink an entire bottle of hot sauce for $1000? Yeppers - I love hot sauce!


DUMB-OLOGY

How many pairs of flip flops do you own? ZERO.

Last time you had a run-in with the cops? I don't think I've ever had a run-in with them, to be honest.

Last person you talked to in person? Mah momma.

Favorite Month? June. Not too hot, not too cold.

CURRENT-OLOGY

Mood? Tired.

What are you listening to? Grooveshark (E.S. Posthumus, more specifically)

Watching? The loading bar on my iPhone - OS 3.1.3 update...

Worrying about? Life... putting it in God's hands, though.


RANDOM-OLOGY

What’s the last movie you watched? ...beginning to end? None recently.

Do you smile often? I try.

Do you always answer your phone? Depends on who it is.

If you could change your eye color what would it be? Hazel is awesome - why change?

What flavor do you add to your drink at Sonic? I cannot say I've ever graced Sonic with my presence.

Do you own a digital camera? Yep.

Have you ever had a pet fish? I had a betta fish for a while, but after three years it ended up dying.

Favorite Christmas song? "Who is He in Yonder Stall?" is a good one.

What’s on your wish list for your birthday? Dunno...

Can you do push-ups? Sure can.

Can you do a chin up? Yeah... just not very many.

Do you have any saved texts? Yeah - I'm too lazy to delete them. And I have a lot of space on my phone.

Do you have an accent? A lighter east-coast one, yeah.

What is the last song to make you cry? "Ohne Dich" ["Without You"] It was a while ago...

Plans tonight? Chillaxin'.

Have you ever felt like you hit rock bottom? Ohhhhh yeah.

Name 2 things you bought yesterday: Battlefield 1943 and some jeans.

You ever been given roses? Can't say I have.

Current hate right now? None right now. Hopefully never.

Met someone who changed your life? I would say so, yeah.

What were you doing 12 AM last night? Talking to a friend from college.

What was the first thing you thought of when you woke up? "Already?"


TECHNOLOGY

How many televisions are in your house? 9 - only reason we have so many is for school.

What color cell phone do you have? Black. Because white is for posers.

What does the first text message in your inbox say and who sent it? Jonathan H.: "ok is it as good as the core 2???"

Who was the last person to call you? Hannah!

--- --- ---

If none of you know E.S. Posthumus... chances are if you saw any promotional videos for Sherlock Holmes, you've heard them. Kinda like a Hans Zimmer-ish kinda deal, except they aren't doing film scores.

This is new

Well it looks like I can do this from my iPhone now. Whether that means it'll be updated more often, I have no idea.

It doesn't even have landscape mode.

--Kyle


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

My Story

I said I was going to tell you a story, so here it is.

I was born on June 2nd, 1990. I grew up in a newly Christian family, and attended Bethel Mennonite Church for the early years of my life. However, the teaching was shallow at best, and the atmosphere was almost too laid back. In an effort to find a church that offered more spiritual “meat,” we began visiting churches around 2000-ish, and came across many different kinds.

There was one we were visiting for a while, and I remember one evening a missionary from the Philippines came and gave a sermon. He talked about the status of his efforts in the Philippines, and where he was planning to go from his current situation. Near the end of the service, he mentioned an incident where his car broke down. By the end of the story, several random Filipinos had stopped to help get his vehicle back up and running. He said that they were all nice people, but they're missing the one thing that will get them to heaven – a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

From what I had come up around, I was accustomed to the “good people go to heaven” point of view. I was a good kid – not a perfect kid, but I never did anything like sneak bad stuff into the house or steal cars. “If good people don't go to heaven, where do they go?” I thought.

The missionary then explained that Jesus was the only way to eternal life (see John 14:6), and that any other way – including being a good person – would lead to eternal death and separation from God. Mr. Missionary had me at this point, but then he added in another bit which, looking back, might've scared me into it. He talked about the return of Christ, and how no human really knew when it would happen. I remember he said “He may come this month, He may come tomorrow, He may come before your bedtime – but if you are not one of His children when he comes, the only place for you will be Hell.”

There wasn't much after that – the prayer time started, and I began to think. I could be a good person all I wanted, but that would never get me into Heaven – and I had this sinking feeling that Mr. Missionary was right. So I began to pray. I prayed for forgiveness from the sins I had committed (which even for a young boy can be plenteous), and accepted for Jesus to be my Lord and Savior.

It's hard to really explain how relieved I felt once I finished that prayer. I don't remember the day, I don't remember the missionary's name, I barely remember the year – but I remember that moment in time when I accepted Jesus as my savior. And that, to me, is all that matters. The joy of knowing I was part of His kingdom was unlike anything I've felt before or since. I told everyone I knew at that church that I had gotten saved – and everyone was happy for me! I went home that night and began to wonder about how awesome it would be to be caught up in rapture with the Most High God.

I remember a couple days later, after school, sitting in my room watching Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. I distinctly remember during the fight scene with tank, posing the question to myself - “Well, I'm saved. Now what?”

Unfortunately, I didn't properly address this question until much later in life.

Shortly after I got saved we found a church we liked, and are still attending – Heritage Baptist Church. I read my Bible, turned in my Sunday School homework, and filled in the blanks of my outlines, just as every good Christian does. However, it all became a routine activity – no real thought went into it, it was simply “something you had to do.”

This attitude persisted throughout most of my teenage years. In 2007, I got my first job working as an office assistant for Glick Real Estate. It was a 9 to 5 job at a small office. Looking back, I am rather thankful that while things that happened at that office may not have been the best thing ever, the people I worked with were Godly people, or at least very religious. One of my co-workers was a pastor, and was using his job at the office to make extra money so he could provide for the family. Kevin, the pastor, gave me guidance from time to time that really helped me in retrospect.

During that time, however, things began to change. My Bible reading began to trickle off to nothing. My prayer was nonexistant. And conversations about spiritual things? Pft, forget about it.

This translated into my work ethic. About a quarter of the way into my tenure at the office I began to get sloppy, and adopt the “why do today what you can do tomorrow?” mentality. To clarify, I wasn't doing a menial “collate this document” kind of job – it was my job to make sure real estate transactions got processed by the title company, and get the paperwork back. This was one of the bigger money-makers for the company. The pile of stuff in my “to-do” box on my desk kept growing.

Then one day I asked my boss' wife if it would be okay to download some files, stick them on a CD I had brought, and take them home (once I clocked out for the day). She said that would be fine, so I clocked out, copied the files, and went home. (I should explain – we had dial-up at home, and the office had broadband.) I continued to do this over the course of several weeks. However, one of the files I downloaded must have brought a virus onto the computer. I went back over everything I ever took home a bit after the fact and scanned everything with a fine-tooth comb, but everything came back clean. Anyway, it did a real number on my work computer. My supervisor, who goes to the same church I do and still keep close contact with, called my dad late a couple nights afterwords to give my dad a heads-up – I was going to get fired the next day.

My parents, to say the least, were not pleased. The next day my dad drove me to work, and went in with me. We talked to my boss, and he explained why he was going to let me go. First he talked about my work ethic, and how lax it had become. He explained to me that it was a critical function that I performed – something I really didn't realize, being the first job environment I was in. He then talked about my downloading deal, and asked me if I knew what the policy said about using the work computers for personal use. Much to his surprise, that was the first time anyone ever mentioned a company policy to me. I was given a copy of the company policy, and told that if I violated it I was out the door.

He then addressed my sloppy work ethic. He told me “I really don't care if you're flipping patties at McDonald's or working on a multi-million dollar project – do your job, and do it well.” He then gave me one week to clean up my act, or I was fired. I think having Dad there helped me get that one week – I tell him he saved my job for me. I cleaned up my work habits and began working like a maniac to keep my job. I did, and managed to get back the trust of my co-workers. However, even though my exterior habits had been cleaned up, my internal ones had not. My spiritual life continued to take a walk off a cliff.

Then August 2008 came. I began attending Stark State College of Technology pursuing the Cyber Security & Computer Forensics degree (my interest in computers and security went WAY up after my virus incident), and began working at the Stark State Help Desk as a student worker. That was when my spiritual life was truly ignored. Few people were religious, let alone Christian – most people lived ungodly lives in any way you can think of.

I was told that it would be very easy to just blend in with the crowd, and forget my spiritual walk. And whoever told me that was right. My Bible reading was already negligent – now it was gone completely. Prayer hadn't been voluntarily committed in a very long time. Christianity became my label – it had no other real meaning to me. All my thoughts about God and the Christian walk took a back seat. After all, I was in college now; I had more important things to worry about.

My conduct and conversations echoed this. My attitude towards my parents, my church, and life in general took on a rather ungodly perspective. My relationship with my family became strained to say the least, and I didn't want to spend any more time in church than necessary. I was “playing the part,” you could say.

That progressed until the summer of 2009, when Mom asked me when I was going to get around to joining the church. I had kept my general lack of a spiritual walk hidden from my parents, and was still playing the part when I was around the family. The way I had set up school and classes over the summer, I had a 9am – 12am class, and then work at 5 pm. So, I would sit around the college and do whatever I needed to do. When Mom asked me that, I began to think. In order to become a member at our church, we must give our testimony to the congregation. What would I say? Looking back over my life, I remembered that initial joy and eagerness to tell everyone about Him. But now, I'd put Him out of my life completely.

That night, I got on my knees and prayed. I didn't know where to begin – I'd done so much wrong, I'd kicked God into the closet of my life and left him there. I had sinned so much – not so much in action, but in thought and conduct. I didn't think God would take me back, but He did.

I steeled myself that night to serve God no matter what got thrown at me. I picked up my Bible and began reading it again. Not as “the book you're supposed to read,” but as God's Word, through which He revealed Himself to us. There was so much I missed all those years! And with those wondrous truths came a lot of conviction... I had a lot of work in front of me. Habits and actions I had thought nothing of for years now had to change. But I knew I was right with God, and that He would help me through it.

And so began my renewed walk with God. It has not been easy, but it has been totally worth it.

--- --- ---

...That is my story. There was more I was going to add that talked about recent occurrences, but I figured this was long enough for now. If you want to see it (which I don't mind), just let me know in the comments. :)

-Kyle

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

I'm Not Dead

My my my, where does the time go?

Last post was in the beginning of December... a lot has happened since then. Friendships have ended and begun, a new year arrived, and a new semester started - not to mention the usual persistent personal struggles in my spiritual walk.

Apparently I lost a couple of followers during my absence - can't really blame 'em, seeing as I barely posted anyway. Hopefully I can try to get this thing on a somewhat consistent track, and see what happens. Classes are in full swing now, so I've been pressed for time. I guess if I didn't spend so much extra time playing Doom 3 and Flight Sim X, I probably could've gotten some coherent content on here.

As for that story I mentioned in a poll way back before the beginning of time... I was going to tell a fictional one, but I think a true story would work better. That should be here by the end of the week. Depends on if a snow day hits tomorrow or not.

Until next time,

-Kylo