To Save A Life

I recently attended a pre screening of the movie, To Save A Life. I have to admit; 5 days later I’m still rewinding and replaying.

The movie was relevant. It was professionally shot, produced and packaged. It leveraged the best talent and made a movie that teenagers would relate to. At times I didn’t know if I was watching TSAL or Adam Herz.

This was not a “Christian” movie. The word “Christian” makes a great noun, “I am a 'Christian'”. But the word also makes a horrible adjective (ie “Christian” movie). This movie played to Christian themes and came from a solid moral base but didn’t have a Disneyesque happy ending, not all the female actors wore turtle necks during the pool scene and not all the language was taken from the Baptist Quarterly.

It was an effective launch point for deep discussion. Any savvy teen would be able to bring a friend to and use this movie as a basis for natural, intentional, gospel presentation. The way the issues were dealt with in real time and not neatly packaged actually left for post movie, Starbucks dialogue.

The door was opened on several controversial issues (almost too many at the risk of plot deluge) and light was cast on heavy challenges teens face on a daily basis. The movie guided the challenges in a way for constructive conversation and positive situation handling where most teen movies just leave the heavy issue hanging out there or even have the movie deal with it in a way we would not.

In the end the movie was entertaining but the real value is that is a powerful tool. When priming would be viewers it would be wise NOT to compare this movie with a 75 million dollar thriller. Even tough TSAL can hold its own, at the end of the day, we want our teens trained and walking away with a tool that that can be used to help their friends more than a laugh and half a bag of popcorn.

Lincoln's Attitude

Your attitude is communicated to others in three ways,—7 percent by words, 38 percent by tone of voice and 55 percent in non-verbal ways, such as posture.


Those who have the most to overcome in life are often the ones who make the most of it. People usually consider Abraham Lincoln one of the top 5 of the best presidents of all time. Look at some of his many obstacles.

If anyone had a "reason" to have a bad attitude, it was Lincoln.


* He had to work to support his family after they were forced out of their home. 1816
* His mother died. 1818
* Failed in business. 1831
* Was defeated for legislature. 1832
* Lost his job and couldn't get into law school. 1832
* Declared bankruptcy, and spent the next 17 years of his life paying off the money
he borrowed from friends to start his business. 1833
* Was defeated for legislature again. 1834
* Was engaged to be married, but his sweetheart died and his heart was broken. 1835
* Had a nervous breakdown and spent the next six months in bed. 1836
* Was defeated in becoming the speaker of the state legislature. 1838
* Was defeated in becoming elector. 1840
* Was defeated for Congress 1843
* Was defeated for Congress. 1846
* Was defeated for Congress again. 1848
* Was rejected for the job of Land Officer in his home state. 1849
* Was defeated for Senate. 1854
* Was defeated for Vice-President -- got less than 100 votes. 1856
* Was defeated for Senate for the third time. 1858
* Was elected President of the United States. 1860

happy 4th of july

regina spektor - who is laughing at god?

i'm intrigued by the new release of regina spektor. i dont want to commentate here but i love the lyrics, the music and i want them to speak for themselves...

No one laughs at God in a hospital
No one laughs at God in a war
No one’s laughing at God
When they’re starving or freezing or so very poor

No one laughs at God
When the doctor calls after some routine tests
No one’s laughing at God
When it’s gotten real late
And their kid’s not back from the party yet

No one laughs at God
When their airplane start to uncontrollably shake
No one’s laughing at God
When they see the one they love, hand in hand with someone else
And they hope that they’re mistaken

No one laughs at God
When the cops knock on their door
And they say we got some bad news, sir
No one’s laughing at God
When there’s a famine or fire or flood

*Chorus*
But God can be funny
At a cocktail party when listening to a good God-themed joke, or
Or when the crazies say He hates us
And they get so red in the head you think they’re ‘bout to choke
God can be funny,
When told he’ll give you money if you just pray the right way
And when presented like a genie who does magic like Houdini
Or grants wishes like Jiminy Cricket and Santa Claus
God can be so hilarious
Ha ha
Ha ha

No one laughs at God in a hospital
No one laughs at God in a war
No one’s laughing at God
When they’ve lost all they’ve got
And they don’t know what for

No one laughs at God on the day they realize
That the last sight they’ll ever see is a pair of hateful eyes
No one’s laughing at God when they’re saying their goodbyes
But God can be funny
At a cocktail party when listening to a good God-themed joke, or
Or when the crazies say He hates us
And they get so red in the head you think they’re ‘bout to choke
God can be funny,
When told he’ll give you money if you just pray the right way
And when presented like a genie who does magic like Houdini
Or grants wishes like Jiminy Cricket and Santa Claus
God can be so hilarious

No one laughs at God in a hospital
No one laughs at God in a war
No one laughs at God in a hospital
No one laughs at God in a war
No one laughing at God in hospital
No one’s laughing at God in a war
No one’s laughing at God when they’re starving or freezing or so very
poor

No one’s laughing at God
No one’s laughing at God
No one’s laughing at God
We’re all laughing with God

1980's Music Flashback from Twist Weeblow

My good friend Scott Sorgea (aka Twist Weeblow from Plain White Rappers fame) published a best of the '80's song mix called '80's Ultimate Mix. And i'll have to say i disagree with very few of his choices. Infact, i'm still trying to convince myself not to drop $58.35 and buy the whole list. Great music, great decade, great list Scott.

Perspective

Tennis pro Rafael Nadal quotes his uncles view of excellence in an interview to American Way Magazine, “First, if you ever throw a racket, we’re finished. They’re expensive, and when you throw a racket, you don’t just disrespect the sport, you disrespect all the people who cant afford equipment. Second, losing is part of competing. You will lose. And when you lose, it’s not going to be my fault or the fault of your racket or the balls or the courts or the weather. It is your fault, and you will accept it and try and do better next time. Third, have fun. When you stop enjoying this, its no good. You’ll find something else that gives you pleasure.”

Netbook on top of car + 50 mph + gravity = only scratches

Ok, so this is an answer to prayer, a miracle and a surreal moment all at once. We just left the in-laws and because i was carrying a 25 pound man child in a car seat (his name is Sage and he is awesome) i absent mindedly put my padfolio (containing 2 yellow pads and about 20 papers i was working on at the time), a book (tribes by seth godin) and my acer netbook on top of my expedition (about 6.5 feet from the ground).

At the first stop light i head something shift and thought it was stuff in the backseat coming to a rest on the door. because we didn't want to open the door and have things fall out, jeanne checked out the noise and found nothing. i entered the dallas north tollway on ramp at frankford and accelerated to about 50 mph when i heard a thud on in the back. i checked my rear view mirror and saw a flurry of papers and knew in an instant i was gonna have a bad night. i knew exactly what it was. i couldn't stop because by this time i was doing 60 and well into traffic. i cautiously took the next exit, stopped, got out and hoped that somehow only the papers fell and the netbook was stuck somewhere in the roof rack, nope!

i sped back on the tollway took the next exit and proceeded to the drop zone. i called my father in law for assistance, pulled to the side of the tollway on ramp, turned on the hazards and made my way a quarter mile down the tollway picking up my book, padfolio and miscellaneous papers but no netbook. bother, i said to myself, its probably got a cracked screen and has already been run over 10 times. But i prayed as i walked along the tollway as my wife and daughter prayed in the car. then i saw it, upside down and seemingly in one piece. it was. i picked it up, ran back to the car and headed for home.

my wife took inventory; one book (albeit dinted but very readable), one padfolio (complete with beauty marks), surprisingly, ALL the papers that i was working on (which was by far the most valuable item and most desired for retrieval) and one netbook. we pushed the on button with low expectations and guess what happened? Nothing. but thats ok, i thought, i can remove the hard drive and get my data back (most of it was already backed up since i use google docs).

all in all i thought, i got everything back, everything. and for sure i got the most important things (my working documents) and hey, i'll probably even get lucky and retrieve most of the data from the hard drive. when i got home and finally got my hands on the netbook, i noticed the baterry was ajar...see where i'm going here? yep, works like a charm. this acer once aspire netbook is one tough mutha.

ok, so the pics here are of my netbook. the disassembled one was because i took it apart to check for loose wires (which i found one of the wires connecting the wifi modem that was easily put back into place). the other one is the exterior with its many beauty marks.

so........if anyone knows anyone at acer, tell them to look this story up. i'll sale it to them and even star in a commercial or straight to dvd movie about my incident.

(c) 2009 RB Jones