Guest Speaker #2

Dave Rhea, multimedia editor for The Journal Record shared his knowledge with our blogging class Tuesday.

His job naturally includes many tasks that change from day to day and as he was describing it more, I realized that that was yet another reason why I love the mass communications industry.

No two days are exactly alike.

I like structure in my job, but not so much that I do the same thing every day. One day you may be typing up notes to finish a story or interviewing someone who is a professional something-you-have-never-heard of. Then maybe you layout a page in a newspaper and upload the day's content to the web page.

Or maybe that day, you just sit staring at the screen for hours until deadline demands your immediate involvement.

Again, no two days as a journalist are exactly alike.

Rhea emphasized that you in order to succeed in this industry- in order to move ahead- you must love learning, which he later clarified as also accepting change. This is only growing truer by the minute.

Working in the mass comm industry does not lend itself to a leisurely jaunt through the park. It is a full-speed race in which you must learn on the run, think five steps ahead of yourself and clear hurdles.

Don't expect it to unfold otherwise.

Self-Check

One of my Mom's friends on Facebook shared this link to a post on Pastor Perry Noble's blog. Noble is the pastor of a church in South Carolina.

Read through it and see what you think.

As I read through the blog post, one of the several thoughts that occurred to me was that these are some of the most frequent "complaints" others have against Christians. If this is what they see exhibited in a Christian's life, why would anyone find that appealing? I sure wouldn't.

If I've learned anything, it's that for the one person you know is watching you and observing the choices you make, there are about five more people watching that you don't know about.

A life filled to the brim, saturated with joy, peace, purpose, passion and trust in God is so attractive. It is one of the greatest testimonies a person can have.

What would someone who didn't know the Lord find attractive or "different in a good way" about your life?

Food for thought...

The Forever

From a journal entry in December 2010, with some modifications :)

Always.

Forever. 

Our society really misuses these poor words. I mean, we don't really have other options. The English language didn't give us words to denote varying levels of a particular idea or sentiment, like other languages do.

I personally toss these words around without thinking about them.  How many times have you said or heard phrases like these?

"I was waiting for the doctor for forever today!" (Hmm...is 45 minutes more accurate?)

"Like, for real- I was in that line at Wal-Mart forevvaa!" (I think it was probably 10 minutes.)

"Ugh, I was stopped at the light for forever!" (Two minutes, really? Forever?)

Forever is used in these circumstances to denote how long they lasted. It can also be used to declare such unending pleasure in a particular activity as to wish away its unavoidable termination.

"Ohhh, I wish it was always Christmas break!"

"I could just sit here on the beach for forever!"

Etc., etc.

Using this as an example, Christmas Break cannot last forever- we must move on to the rest of our calendar. If it was break all the time, how would we know to enjoy it? There would not be anything significant to let us know that we could and should enjoy this restful period.

These trite phrases are traded fast and furious throughout the day. What got me started thinking about this was eternity and heaven, and how our lives there as Christians really are forever. Our lives there will never end.

Do we really know what always and forever means? Can our brains even process this concept?

Think of how bounded by time our world is, especially the Western world. Everything most definitely has an end.

We finish books, we complete a degree, we consume a meal, we arrive at our destination, the song ends, the party ends, our naps end, the movie ends, the story ends.

Yet in heaven, The End no longer has any relevance. What will that even be like?

Truth is, we don't know yet. We can't know, because our minds are still bounded by time. I'm ok with not fully comprehending yet. 

I'm no philosopher or theologian...I just was thinking, and wanted to get you all to do the same...