Our best friends and our worst enemies are our thoughts.  A thought can do us more good than a doctor or a banker or a faithful friend.  It can also do us more harm than a brick.

–Frank Crane

How true this is!  How many times have I been prevented from doing something simply because of a doubtful or fearful thought?  How powerful and empowering are ‘true’ and ‘right’ thoughts about our self and others!

Here’s a quick update on what’s going on with me:

My wife and I have a new addition to our family!  Woohoo!  That’s probably one of the big reasons I haven’t really been paying much attention to this blog lately.  Our daughter, Fiona, is a wonderful little girl.  She’s spunky like her mom… which is going to be trouble sooner or later!

Professionally, I’ve shifted gears a little bit in the last 9 months.  I’m no longer focusing on SharePoint, but am now working with a few well-known open source projects.  Among them are MonoRail and ActiveRecord from Castle Project.  Working with ActiveRecord means that I’m now using NHibernate as an object-relational model.  I’ve been using NVelocity for web site templating, Scriptaculous for animations and PrototypeJS because it’s incredibly useful.  I’m back to using TestDriven.net for unit testing, CruiseControl for continuous build integration, and NAnt for build scripts and other automated functionality.

Hopefully, I’ll start blogging about some of these technologies I’ve been using.  If nothing else, posts can serve to remind me of trouble spots I’ve run into and how I fixed certain problems.

Peace and Blessings to you!

Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said.  A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made.  Or a garden planted.  Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you’re there.  It doesn’t matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that’s like you after you take your hands away.  The difference between the man who just cuts lawns and a real gardener is in the touching, he said.  The lawn cutter might just as well not have been there at all; the gardener will be there a lifetime.

Keep falsehood and lies far from me;
       give me neither poverty nor riches,
       but give me only my daily bread.

Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you
       and say, ‘Who is the LORD ?’
       Or I may become poor and steal,
       and so dishonor the name of my God.

We lived with Adriane’s brother, Alex for about a month. We really enjoyed spending time with him (watching the tv show Lost). Adriane and I saw at least a million apartments. The good news is that apartments are still a lot cheaper than in Rhode Island. After much agonizing, we decided on a first-floor place near Cedar-Lee… way more space than our last apartment, hardwood floors, and a short walk to a coffee place – woohoo! I also found a great job!

The parable of the sower in Matthew 13 has been on my mind on-and-off for the past 9 months or so. David Bell’s subway performance and Christ’s words are glaringly connected. Let me quote some of the parable to clarify that statement:

He replied, “The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them. Whoever has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. This is why I speak to them in parables:
“Though seeing, they do not see;
though hearing, they do not hear or understand. In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah:
” ‘You will be ever hearing but never understanding;
you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.
For this people’s heart has become calloused;
they hardly hear with their ears,
and they have closed their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
hear with their ears,
understand with their hearts
and turn, and I would heal them.’[a] But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear. For I tell you the truth, many prophets and righteous men longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.
…
The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful. But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”

There were a few haunting comments in the article itself:

“The experiment at L’Enfant Plaza may be symptomatic of that, he said — not because people didn’t have the capacity to understand beauty, but because it was irrelevant to them.”

What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

– from “Leisure,” by W.H. Davies

Maybe we should ’stop and smell the roses’ a little more often…

I rediscovered the CD this summer while I’ve been in the midst of some seriously dry times in the Lord. The honesty of the lyrics was striking and I started to feel like I wasn’t alone in my frustrations. I’ve found comfort in Lamentations 3, especially since Jeremiah’s situation was much more extreme than mine. If you’re feeling like the Lord is behind a fifty-foot-tall brick wall and you’re trying to shout out to Him, you’re not alone! Even the prophet, Jeremiah, has been in the same situation.

Here’s a link to the CD I was talking about. The Amazon.com site has previews of songs as well. Click the ‘more’ link below for lyrics to the song titled Hands in the Air.

Hands in the Air
by The Waiting

If I raise my hands just to lift the shade
Will I reveal a sky heavy and gray?
Will last night be a memory sweetly fading?
How I hate a morning starting out this way
On these lonely, raging mornings I would whip You if I could
But You’re on the mighty side of strong
And the perfect side of good
If I raise my hands will You grab my by the wrists
And will You try to pull me from the fray?
And even if my fingers join together into fists
Will You hold me firmly anyway?
Because I would try to escape You but for everyday I’m sure
That You’re on the huge side of big
And the holy side of pure

Okay
Hear what I say
As I raise my hands in surrender today
Okay
Here I will stay
Hands in the air, singing have Thine own way

If I raise my hands so weak and thin and frail
Will You reveal the light of mercy in Your eyes?
If I cry to You faintly will my feeble whisper fail?
Or will it find its way to a reply?
Because, now that I’m exhausted I think I’m ready to admit
That I have spent all my resistance on someone I can’t resist

Light from my window sill, make my way to the door
I hang my head and still, I know you’re wanting more
Over the threshold now, I move across the yard
All that my will allows, my every step is hard
Now in the garden I carve out six feet of space
There make my will comply, lie down upon my face
Been toe to toe too long, I’m tired of fighting You
I see You were too strong ’cause I am black and blue
But now I understand a loser’s due to win
How every dying man is sure to rise again
So I raise my left hand one, I raise my right hand two
Under the morning sun, my spirit cries to You

Okay
Hear what I say
As I raise my hands in surrender today
Right here
Under the sun
Hands in the air, saying Thy will be done

I’m here
Under the sun
Hands in the air, singing Thy will be done
Okay
Here I will stay
Hands in the air, singing have Thine own way