"All of us have inflated views of ourselves, especially in self-righteousness, until we have visited a place called Calvary. It is there, at the foot of the cross, that we shrink to our true size."
- John Stott, The Message of Galatians
- My name is Bill
- I'm married to Jill
- Yes, our names rhyme. Very cute
- I really, really love my wife. She's awesome
- We have four kids. They range in age from 20 to 11
- I can't believe I get to be a parent
- We have awesome kids
- Every one of our kids is different, and each in good ways
- Someone once asked me why I wasn't nervous before giving a talk in front of a few hundred people at work. I replied "I'm a parent. I know what fear is. This isn't it."
- I'm a Christian
- I follow Jesus imperfectly, and am an often timid and tentative disciple
- Jesus has changed my life in ways that take my breath away
- In my life, I've found that things that didn't make sense at the time generally make a lot more sense later on. I've found that the hand of God is generally recognized in hindsight
- I believe that one big purpose of living is to learn humility
- Humility is learned through the cool ways life has of teaching you that you don't know as much as you thought. Getting your rear-end kicked is one of the "cool ways" that life uses to teach you these lessons
- I think I'm learning humility, because I'm a lot dumber now than I used to be
- I'll know that I've arrived, humility-wise, when I no longer notice that I'm learning humility
- I'm not "post" anything (many thanks to Jared for that line).
- I find usages of "post" to be primarily a form of chronological snobbery. I feel a post coming (no pun intended).
- I often have post ideas that never get posted. Probably about one in 10 post ideas I have ever hit this blog
- I like blogging
- Ironically, I'm not a big fan of most of the blogosphere. Too much heat, not enough light
- My wife and I volunteer minister to the College and Young Singles at our church
- It's a challenging ministry. I need to get better at it
- Growing up, I lived in the United States, Japan, Okinawa, and Germany
- We've lived in the same house for the past 16 years. Which is kind of cool
- I'm shy in a lot of circumstances, but not all
- For instance, I don't mind talking in front of large groups, though I don't get that opportunity very often
- Sometimes I find it harder to talk to one or two people than I do talking to a lot of people
- I like Chinese food. Only one other member of my immediate family shares this like, so I don't get too much chinese food at home
- I eat more than my share of chinese food at work
- I've been told in the past that I have a dry wit
- I'm terrible, though, at snappy comebacks. I generally think of them about two hours after the fact
- For many years I worked with junior high and high school students at church. I have a special place in my heart for them
- I don't like violent movies
- Except Lord of the Rings. But I somewhat justify that because the majority of the violence is not human on human
- Does that make any sense? I didn't think so
- But seriously, violent movies mess me up
- If a movie is honestly redemptive, I'm going to love it
- Even if the movie gets bad reviews
- I'm a sucker for redemption
- Although I don't like it too formulaic in movie format. Kid sports movies where the underdog team wins at the end don't do much for me
- One reason The Bad News Bears worked was because it wasn't formulaic. They lost at the end.
- I tend to have a really good memory for what I've seen in movies. Case in point, that last item. I haven't seen that movie in thirty years
- It will come as no surprise that It's a Wonderful Life is my favorite movie
- I like history. A lot
- I tend to delve deeply into subjects I care about. I've learned a lot of minutae about, for instance, the Civil War and the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo space programs
- I like soccer. I didn't used to, but one of my kids plays it a lot and I've grown to really appreciate it
- Soccer is the world's sport
- The previous statement had nothing to do with me and so probably doesn't belong on this list
- I can't park
- Seriously, I'm the world's worst parker. I almost always leave one tire over the line
- I've never been in a wreck
- I'm an extremely defensive driver, because everyone else on the road is tripping on crack and 'roids
- If I had a dollar for every time I've run over a curb I'd be a wealthy man
- I think this all points to me being seriously deficient in navigating through three dimensional space
- I also have a really bad sense of direction. Much of my life has been me, driving around in tight, panicked, lost circles.
- But I'm getting better . . .
- I'm a musician of sorts
- Guitar is probably the instrument I'm most decent at. I used to be better
- I learned how to play bass a few years ago and got decent at it. But not so much anymore. I used to be better
- I was a drummer through high school and college. I also played drums for our church for awhile years ago. I used to be better
- I can make my way around a piano. Never was particularly good, though
- My mind is a much better musician than my hands
- I am really good at computers
- I like programming. I do it for fun. Weird, no?
- I wrote the blog software that you're looking at
- The blog software I wrote is free
- It's called Bloo (stands for BLOg Objects). You should try it out. I'll be your best friend if you do
- I'm a big fan of open-source software
- Computers don't scare me, and I'm usually pretty good at figuring out what ails 'em
- I'm not as handy in real-space. I wish I was better at fixing my house
- I'm learning, slowly
- God is good
- I am his child
