'k, bible verses included for you to ponder; actually, this was pretty fun; maybe in the future i'll tackle other contraversial issues that God has seemingly showed me in the scriptures, like why free will's not supported by the bible, or why israel will NOT be restored in the endtimes, more in-depth why the roman catholic church's the antichrist, but it took me a while to write all this, so i'll just sit back now:

jesus calling simon as 'peter,' then saying upon this rock will i build my church...
Matt:16:17-19
17And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.
18And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
19And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

roman catholics take this verse and assume that peter built the 1st church.

and from the wording of the bible(check it; it's the same for all versions), it would SEEM to suggest that the church is built upon peter(although, i might add, kjv has no footnotes stating that peter means rock, which helps ease off the confusion).
look at the NIV footnotes, then try the KJV version

but wait... there's numerous other references to a so-called 'rock' in the other parts of the bible... do they apparently seem to refer to peter as this rock, or jesus as the rock?
Deuteronomy 32:4
4He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he.
1st Corinthians 10:4
4And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ.

the 'rock being cut out not by human hands' in daniel, is this peter, or jesus?
Daniel 2:34-35,44,4-5
34Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces.
35Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.
...
44And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.
45Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure.

the foundation that the wise man builds in jesus' parable ON THE ROCK, think this is peter, or jesus?
Matt 7:24-25
24Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock:
25And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.

the capstone that the builders have rejected; is this peter, or jesus?
(this is also the stone that was cut out not by human hands that is described in daniel)
Isaiah 8:13-16
13Sanctify the LORD of hosts himself; and let him be your fear, and let him be your dread.
14And he shall be for a sanctuary; but for a stone of stumbling and for a rock of offence to both the houses of Israel, for a gin and for a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
15And many among them shall stumble, and fall, and be broken, and be snared, and be taken.
16Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples.
Psalm 118:22
22The stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner.
Matt 21:42-43
42Jesus saith unto them, Did ye never read in the scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner: this is the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes?
43Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof.
44And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.

the statement that 'their rock is not our rock,' think this refers to peter, or to jesus?
(this passage, based upon the ebook that i was reading, interprets this this verse to mean that Protestants' rock is Jesus Christ, and the Catholics' rock is Peter, since he "supposedly" founded the church, since he is the head and replaces Jesus, he is THEIR rock)
Deuteronomy 32:31
31For their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges.

if peter is the head of our church, then why doesn't the epistles state that peter's the head of the body of christ, and we are the body(we know that the body of christ is the church)?
Ephesians 5:23-24
23For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body.
24Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing.
Colossians 1:18
18And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence.

what does paul say about being divided in the body of Christ?
1 Corinth 1:12-15
12Now this I say, that every one of you saith, I am of Paul; and I of Apollos; and I of Cephas; and I of Christ.
13Is Christ divided? was Paul crucified for you? or were ye baptized in the name of Paul?
14I thank God that I baptized none of you, but Crispus and Gaius;
15Lest any should say that I had baptized in mine own name.

does peter even seem to like the idea of being revered as a saint? the italian man who invited him to his house bowed down to him, but peter made him stand right back up, telling him, he was only a man himself.
Acts 10:25-26
25And as Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him, and fell down at his feet, and worshipped him.
26But Peter took him up, saying, Stand up; I myself also am a man.

furthermore, there is no reason to suggest peter was even an apostle TO the gentiles; that role was fulfilled by paul, and the main powerhouse for the jews was peter. when paul greets all the christians in rome in his letter "romans", nowhere is it seen that he greets peter. NOWHERE.
Romans 11:13
13For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify mine office:
Galatians 2:7-9
7But contrariwise, when they saw that the gospel of the uncircumcision was committed unto me, as the gospel of the circumcision was unto Peter;
8(For he that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the same was mighty in me toward the Gentiles:)
9And when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given unto me, they gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship; that we should go unto the heathen, and they unto the circumcision.
read this, and tell me if paul ever greets peter in his letter to the romans

according to the game show espn teammates:

billups keeps teasing rip about his fur coat, the one w/the fox heads on it...

rip, surprisingly doesn't like rooming w/rasheed the most out of all the pistons; says he's "always blasting his music"

amare's favorite drink is red kool-aid...

the one part of barry zito's body which doesn't match is his "womanly curvy hips"...

zito said brynes doesn't like being called t.a.b.(stands for tired ass brynes)... brynes guessed incorrectly, but said they called him spicolli... which also sounds just as bad...

i'm watching the show, and i have to say, everytime i see a women's team, they always seem to do worse than the guys(ex: team usa swimming does TERRIBLE, team usa volleyball ie misty may and kerri walsh do TERRIBLE); strange eh? aren't women considered to be more social than men? you'd figure they'd know more about each other...

on a side note, but sports related:

wonder if this means wizards aren't gonna be as strong compared to last season... they still have arenas and jamaison... but it's really too bad hughes wanted to play w/lbj. i guess for some, winning > friendship. cavs look like they're going to actually be somewhere in the next season; mike brown, the defensive coach which was so instrumental to the pacers' success is here... hughes, who is one heck of a defensive player, and a good shooter, is also going to be at the cavs. personally, though, i like hughes, but i have a feeling the two play too close alike for this to work. redd was a better fit, but heck, i like redd too; hope bucks become a good force again next season.

they showed the classic boxing upset last night; buster douglas vs mike tyson last night on espn2. if i had known they were showing the thing the whole night, i would've stuck on espn2 and watched the whole thing. instead, i watched the last 2 rounds. indeed, it was one of THE worst upsets ever. tyson was picked 42-1 to win this thing. but all night, it was basically this: douglas was faster, had a longer reach, and dragged the match out, and did not let tyson finish this early. not to say tyson didn't get some good hard hits in, but douglas was just wailing on tyson in the head with that left jab poke of his. this was basically the match:

douglas goes for a series of jab pokes at tyson's head.
tyson tries to get close to "clinch" ykno, hug douglas so the ref can break it up and reset the momentum; it's a common thing if you've ever watched a boxing match.
douglas pushes tyson off himself before the ref gets there and gets a couple of hard, fast hits at tyson's head.
rinse and repeat.

after a while, douglas was just all over the place and went for broke on tyson's head with hooks, straights and uppercuts. tyson's left eye looked swollen-closed. tyson went down for the very 1st time that night in the 10th, and stayed down.

it's too bad buster douglas never tried to really make a name for himself; after he stole the championship from mike, he put on a LOT of weight and never ever boxed again; today he looks like a fatass, not like the brilliant fighter that took down the person nobody thought could be beat that night.

you wanna be able to research all the various bible topics like i do? does it seem intimidating?

the thing you should do, is always see if ppl on the web misinterpret the bible verses they are quoting.

that's i think key. amongst other things, but that's key.

for instance, are there other bible verses that refute/support this idea? does the idea they try to conclude match what's going on in the real world?

i'm kinda busy, as i'm supposed to be writing a paper that's due in about 1 hr or so, so i'll get back to you on this tonight, but off the top of my head, here's a classic one(i'll find the verses tonight if i can remember; i've read this before):

jesus calling simon as "peter," then saying upon this rock will i build my church...

roman catholics take this verse and assume that peter built the 1st church.

and from the wording of the bible(check it; it's the same for all versions), it would SEEM to suggest that the church is built upon peter(although, i might add, kjv has no footnotes stating that peter means rock, which helps ease off the confusion)

but wait... there's numerous other references to a so-called "rock" in the other parts of the bible... do they apparently seem to refer to peter as this rock, or jesus as the rock? the "rock being cut out not by human hands" in daniel, is this peter, or jesus? the foundation that the wise man builds in jesus' parable ON THE ROCK, think this is peter, or jesus? the capstone that the builders have rejected; is this peter, or jesus? the statement that "their rock is not our rock," think this refers to peterr, or to jesus? if peter is the head of our church, then why doesn't the epistles state that peter's the head of the body of christ, and we are the body(we know that the body of christ is the church)?

does peter even seem to like the idea of being revered as a saint? the italian man who invited him to his house bowed down to him, but peter made him stand right back up, telling him, he was only a man himself.

furthermore, there is no reason to suggest peter was even an apostle TO the gentiles; that role was fulfilled by paul, and the main powerhouse for the jews was peter. when paul goes to rome in acts, nowhere is it seen that he greets peter. NOWHERE.

that's the idea. the other thing is to throw away all fear; in that, what you find, if it's bibically sound, is what you find. if a scientist finds something extremely contradictory to what the rest of the scientific world believes, but it is sound, then he must believe his results, and not what the world tells him. now, obviously, you tread really shaky ground when you do this, that's why you should always pray for guidance when you do stuff like this.

finally, i'll conclude that when looking up prophesies, it's tempting to say something you found, which matches, is "coincidence." however, the more prophesies you find on something, the more it matches, compared also w/what the early church believed, etc, may show you otherwise. like, for instance, the accusation that the roman catholic church IS the antichrist.

i'll post later.

if i was black, i'd go stand in front of a tanning salon and then look at my hands and go

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!?!?!??!?!!?!?"

*got the idea from black comedian lewis ramey*

i should rename the nba showtime character i created from jrich to billups...

i'm:
top ten in steals/game... (maybe 4/game)
top ten in 2 pt percentage... (60%)
top ten in 3 pt percentage... (40%)
top ten in lowest points allowed/game... (55)
top ten in rebounds/game... (7 i think)
top ten in best defenses...
one of the most experienced players(ie won most games)... (39 games?)
one of the best shooters; ie takes the most 3s TOTAL, not per game...
and maybe one or two other top lists...

i don't have top ten in blocks/game(midway bball is SO HARD to block shots), but i average about 2.6 per game... ben wallace-like.

does THAT sound like jrich to you?

i rarely dunk too...

i don't get how espn can list kobeyashi in the same sentence as lance armstrong when describing winning streaks...

i'm not saying eating 50+ hot dogs w/o puking is easy... certainly not when you do it and win 5x in a row...

but the tour de france really sucks the life out of you.

ever tried biking up a hill before? it's a killer. fastest way imo for you to feel the pain is get on your ten speed, set your gears to the hardest setting, and then climb an incline. it'll make a believer outta you. the tour de france is basically riding up a HUGE incline.

simply put, lance armstrong is a beast. his lactate levels in his blood during exercise are so much lower than other bikers, and his muscle fibers have just toned themselves to perfection over the years. basically, imagine never getting your muscles sore during intense exercise, never ever feeling like you're running outta air. that's lance. ever watch clips of the tour de france? it's like lance is going for a solo bike ride through the park; he's that much better than the rest of the comp.

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2005-06/aps-lat061305.php

http://my.webmd.com/content/Article/107/108551.htm

http://www.utexas.edu/opa/news/2005/06/education15.html

(snippet from the last site i listed)
"As Coyle points out, the best way to absorb the magnitude of Armstrong’s physical power and endurance is to compare him to others. In one hour of bike riding, Armstrong can cover 32 miles as opposed to the 21 miles a top runner could cover on a bike and the 16 miles an average cyclist could cover.

Armstrong possesses a large, strong heart that can beat over 200 times a minute operating at maximum capacity and pump an exceptionally large volume of blood and oxygen to his legs—only around 100 other men on earth, who have been tested, have comparable abilities and only two other competitive cyclists that Coyle has tested in the past 20 years have even come close to Armstrong’s 200 heartbeats per minute.

If a normal male college student were to train at a grueling pace for two or more years, the student’s maximum oxygen uptake would not increase above 60 ml/kg/min—Coyle estimates that even if Armstrong became a couch potato, his would not dip below 60 ml/kg/min."

simply put, he had the genetic makeup to already be such a formidable athelete. but he took it one step further and simply did NOT stop training each and everyday. genetic makeup + natural body adaptation to strenunous constant workout = BEAST.

you want something similar to what lance has? no secret: exercise hard and long each and everyday; do something that completely sucks the life outta you for more than 1 hour and then come right back for more. well, you won't get a 200 bpm heart, but i wouldn't be surprised if you develop a really strong heart.

...

but i could JUST be all wrong about this, and maybe kobeyashi is up there with lance...

i just think the numerous competitions that are shown on sportscenter now are just getting ridiculous. you might as well put evolution on sportscenter after it happens... i mean... hey... now they're doing it in las vegas now, instead of in some lecture hall at a california college.

according to one of my roommates' friends, who's taking ss1 up here instead of ucla, la is NOTHING compared to davis heat. i wonder how san diego matches up? davis is further inland...

but anyways...

happy 4th of july, my american christian brothers and sisters.

while the usa is now a far cry from what a christian nation should be, at its birth, i do believe it was give or take everything that a christian nation on earth should be.

it was the 1st nation which did not have single leader presiding over the entire country; the highest authority is(much like christianity) based upon a stack of papers we call the constitution of the united states of america.

the government, a country's highest authority, was supposed to be the states', and hence, the people's servants.

because of this extreme difference in authority, and because the roman catholic church could grasp a single leader by the throat in order to control a country, it stood as the biggest threat to catholicism; there were no leaders to grasp by the throat. and even if they did, they could not infringe upon the constitution, which guarenteed many rights and priviledges to the average american citizen.

unfortunately, i have not really done my research too much on this subject so far, so i should say no more, at least for now.

so i'll just end today w/this:

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain;
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood,
From sea to shining sea.

(i remember singing this in elementary school each day for a bit)

jeff dunham's an excellant comedian...
he's also a ventriloquist.
if you've ever seen his acts on comedy central, you'll crack up. perhaps the funniest thing was the crack about giraffes throwing up.

ever wondered what happened to kendall gill, the nba veteran? i actually saw him last night boxing against a 5-8 white guy; won. wow... at first, when i saw his name come up while he was boxing, i was like, "kendall gill... hey, didn't he used to play in the nba?"

i guess that means we'll be seeing a transition for shaq to the nfl... hey it COULD happen. or maybe tractor trailer's better for that job.

because i'm not really a baseball guy, i really am ready for the nfl to start. watched the "gridiron stars" thing yesterday; y'kno, how espn pits 5 national football players vs 5 american football players in a variety of different events; it seriously makes everything they're doing look fun. i would love to race against someone in an obstacle course. but we all know football players are built for short, but frequent spurts, not long runs. that's why you see them tank out a lot for like long endurance stuff.

the kjv is translated as best to the ability, word-for-word, because it IS the will of jesus christ. when a court needs to hear the last will of a person, translated to another language, because their descendants can't understand the dead person's native tongue, they use word-for-word translation, not thought-for-thought. because if done by the 2nd, there is a slight chance that the interpreter will inject his bias of what the will means; then when the judge reads it, it will not be the will of the dead person; it will be the will of the dead person intermingled with the thoughts of the interpreter. in fact, interpreter is a better word than translator in this case. and as you might guess, all other bible translations are done thought-for-thought.

everytime i hear u2 - vertigo, i think of ben wallace blocking a shot.

they're pulling an "vf4 evo" for tekken 5... which is KINDA good, cause steve was just retarded, and the same w/bryan, and to a smaller extent nina, but it's also bad, because now i essentially might've wasted 15 dollars getting 3 cards i might not ever use anymore, esp if they change all the tekken 5 cabinets in the us to tekken 5.1 cabs. but i have vf4 evo, so i guess i won't really have to care about that(just gotta hope jerm and jon try to pick up the game)... although come sept, i'll probably have to prove whether i'm better at tekken or eugene.

i have no idea where i'm headed in life... i see the potential in myself to earn something through genetics, or to be a person who unearths a heap a crap that satan has against the body of christ(in other words; conspiracy) and then spends his life trying to awaken others, or both, but all i know is that god will be there with me as it all unfolds. apart from that, i really don't have an idea as what will occur.

revelations clearly identifies rome, specifically, the roman catholic church as "mystery, babylon the great, the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth."

would it surprise you if i told you the early church did NOT celebrate christmas? go ahead and look it up. i'm not saying the birth of christ never occurred. i'm saying that christmas was originally a pagan holiday, and that the early church refused to celebrate it, much like the attitude we should carry towards halloween. guess who originally brought christmas to christians? that's right; the roman catholic church.

my room finally looks a lot more organized now. and neater.

i need to watch the entire movie of "harold and kumar"

i watched maybe about 30 mins of it, and i couldn't stop laughing. particularily the suspect sketch at the end of the movie.

my room's so messy... i'm cleaning it now... might take a while though.

vf4 evo's so fun... so challenging to play on a pad though, it sucks.

characters right now i'm pretty comfortable using: sarah, lau

characters in the process of learning: pai

"all around the world" was on sale at bereans for 6.99