klink

Thanksgiving is tomorrow and this year seems to be flying by. In so many ways I am blessed and I know that I need to continue to focus on that. I love my family and I think and feel that God is leading in my professional life. Liz's mom has been here since last Friday. She is staying a week to be with us over Thanksgiving. We've played a lot of Wii already and I know that Liz feels a little closer to home having her here. Water continues to flow under the bridge of life and I hope that I'm drinking as much of it in as I can.

For most of my life I have asked questions. I think it is important to ask questions. Without inquiry there really is never any understanding. However whereas most people ask questions that start with what, when, where, who and how I have often tried to ask why. I have endeavored to understand why I or anybody else would do what they are doing. I have tried to understand why God does what he does and this is where I think my problem lies. When it comes to asking questions we must ask what God wants us to do and then try and figure out how to do it. However I think that sometimes the why is beyond our reach. I think of the discussion between Job and God where God tries to illustrate that his thoughts are beyond are thoughts and his ways are different than our ways. Truly who can know the mind of God. Sometimes asking the why only leads us to doubt what was done for us and is being done through God's continual involvement in our lives. It isn't that God doesn't want us to ask...

How best do we order society? What is the role of the government? Most people would agree that the aim of any society is to produce the most good for the most people. The problem comes in when you try to define who determines what is best for society. Traditionally the debate is between giving the power to a few or to the many. There are merits to both approaches. By giving power to the few those few are able to accomplish what may have been hindered by a multitude of conflicting ideas. However this too is the weakness because if the few do not have the diversity of opinions of the many they will not be able to adequately represent all of the people. A few can move quickly but with less connection to the people and the many will represent the diversity but will be hindered by their numbers. The founders of the constitution of this country attempted to find some balancing principle between the few and the many. We are not a direct democracy which may come as a surprise to many people. A...

I am reading William Dembski's book "The Design Revolution." The book is well written and I am sure that I will have continuing thoughts on the content of the book. Currently I have noticed that design theorists do not attempt to attach any specific attributes with the presupposed designing intelligence. They merely presuppose design based upon the first step of the scientific method: observation. Observation leads design theorists to propose that there are possible explanations of existing biological structures that give evidence of design. In contemplating their methods it is clear to me that they must presuppose design. However I realize also that the adverse is true when it comes to naturalists. They predispose that there is no design and that the biological structures that exist today do not arise out of design. In essence they predispose that life is undesigned. Therefore design theorists presuppose that the biological structures arise because of design while the na...

It's been more than a week now since I completed the week of prayer at Burleson Adventist School. I really think that it went well. The students were respectful and engaged. I spoke out biblical characters and my theme or title was "Lessons from the Little Ones." I tried to highlight what five people: Moses, David, Daniel, Esther, and Jesus learned during their childhood. I really enjoyed it and at the end I offered an invitation to the older group of kids to have bible studies: the week of prayer was divided into two groups with grades Pre-K through 4th in the earlier section and 5th through 8th in the following section. In the younger section a girl from 4th grade requested bible studies without any promptings and in the older section a fifth grade boy also requested bible studies. I'm looking forward to working with both of these children.

I am so excited about the possibilities for the Lakers this year. Kobe Bryant and the rest of Hollywood's finest have the potential to reign on the roost this year. So far they are 7-1 and there are contributions from everyone. They are incredibly deep with Pau Gasol, Derek Fisher, Lamar Odom and the return of Andrew Bynum. While I would like to see more productivity out of Pau Gasol and Lamar Odom I am enthusiastic about the teams' progress.

With the recent appointments by the administration of President-Elect Obama the picture is starting to come into focus. Obama picks Rom Emmanuel as his chief-of-staff and the nonpartisan veneer that was lacquered on so heavily during the campaign begins to chip away like the flecks of paint off an old 57 Chevy. Now rumorings of a possible appointment for Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State are in the air. How benevolent and unresentful Obama appears. Yet beneath even this we see the masterful hand of an ambitious politician that desires to keep the opposition where he can see them if not encumbered by his policies. Obama will further his agenda. That's what's it's alway's been about. The liberal labyrinth begins to unfold.

Choosing the political candidate that I support for president has never been a problem for me until now. I have always made my decision early in the race as I align the candidates beliefs with my understanding of conservatism: the political philosophy to which I subscribe. However this election has placed me between a rock and a hard place. I strongly believe in the three legs of the stool of conservatism: strong national defense, fiscal responsibility in the government combined with the current need to shrink the size and scope of government, and the role of the government to preserve the life and liberty of it's inhabitants by upholding the laws that prohibit and punish criminal activity and that preserve the life of the citizens. However these tenets have not been displayed by the nominee for my party John McCain: he consistently opposed Bush's tax cuts until recently, fought for the equivalent of amnesty, and undercut many of the attempts to grow the economy on the part of ...