Brant's Blog of Awesomeness

You Can Win an Awesome Trip of a Lifetime! Here are the Details!

YOU can win a trip for two to somewhere really exotic and cool and stuff!  You just have to figure out where I'm being sent -- somewhere far, far, far away.

Listen to the clues, starting at 8:15 a.m. on Tuesday, May 27th.  That's the day after Memorial Day.  You'll get a clue a day, plus -- possibly -- a bonus clue, online, here at the blog.

Put them together, figure out the CITY where I'm headed, and call in Monday morning, June 2nd!  Be the eighth caller when we tell you to call, have the right answer, and YOU WIN!

Some other details...

The trip will be with Compassion International, which will let you pick which "Vision Trip" you'd like to go on.  You can pick one of their trips for next year to Africa, Asia, Central or South America.  I can tell you, this is a trip you will love, and never, ever forget.

This is NOT going to be super-easy to solve.  Remember, we're looking for a CITY name, not a country, not a region.  A city, and maybe one you've never heard of before.  Or not.  You may need to enlist some friends to help you solve this.  Or not.

I'll be (Lord willing) IN that city, far, far, far away, on Monday morning, June 2nd, when you call in to win.  I'd appreciate your prayers as I travel.  We'll be traveling to a place where children are in desperate need of help, and it's our hope that WAY-FM listeners will answer the call to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and be agents of mercy.

 

One Way to Help in Myanmar

Samaritan's Purse is on the ground in Myanmar, trying to bring relief to the victims of the hurricane.

Here's the link, and their phone number is          800-789-1525       .

The numbers are staggering -- maybe hundreds of thousands dead -- but numbers mask the stories, and there are real people, real families, struggling.  Samaritan's Purse is a great means to show mercy.

Here's the "Books of the Bible" Book We Were Yapping About

I really, really like this. 

We talked about it yesterday in our "Brant's Book Nook":  It's the Bible, but with the books in a different order, and without the "additives" -- like chapter and verse divisions.  (Click here to find it.)

Now, there's nothing WRONG with chapter and verse divisions, but there's nothing specially right about them, either.  They can break up thoughts, make ideas disjunct, and confuse context.  They help us locate things, but they certainly weren't a part of the original versions, either -- not even close.

The Books of the Bible publisher (the International Bible Society) re-orders the books to give us a sense of the chronology of the books of the Bible, which I find helpful.  The common ordering of the N.T. is actually based, largely, on biggest-to-smallest.  That's why Corinthians comes before Thessalonians, even though Thessalonians was likely written first. 

Also, this re-ordering gives us a good idea of the literary styles of the books.  The book of James isn't a letter to a church, but many people think it is, simply because it's included with others, traditionally.  It shouldn't be read that way.  It's a wisdom book, written along the lines of Proverbs. 

I think all this is great to keep in mind, because we tend to view the Bible as a puzzle:  We take a verse here, a verse there, another one here, and cobble together an entire theology that may be quite apart from the over-arching message that God is sharing with us in scripture.  The Bible is a gift, a blessing from God, and, as such, we should do our best to understand literary styles, context, and purpose from Genesis to Revelation.  (Hint:  It's all about Jesus.)

Incredibly Awesome Math Trick Thing!

Check this out.  You'll need to use the calculator thing on your computer:

1. Key in the first three digits of your phone number (NOT the Area code...)
2. Multiply by 80
3. Add 1
4. Multiply by 250
5. Add   to this   the last 4 digits of your phone number
6. Add   to this  the last 4 digits of your phone number again.
7. Subtract 250
8. Divide number by 2

Pretty awesome, huh? 

Yep, yep it is.  Pretty.  Dadgum.  Awesome.

Link to Story about High School Baseball Player with Cancer

This is a well-written story by Mike White of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette about John Challis, the young man we talked about this morning.

Good Luck Beating Me at This Awesome Reaction Test

As you know, I look for opportunities -- I relish them, really -- to personally defeat you at things.  One-on-one, mano-a-mano.  Me vs. You.

Now, it's the Tranquilize the Runaway Sheep Game that tests your reaction time. 

I scored a .156 second reaction time.  Good luck!

...chump.

The Best Sports Story You'll See in a Long Time

It's days old, but I found the video of the Sara Tucholsky rounding the bases.  It's not on YouTube, but ESPN has it. 

Sara is proud of her home run, understandably.  But forgive me for thinking Mallory and her teammates steal the show.  Humility, in our culture, is always striking, arresting, and unforgettable.