Mario and Sonic at the Olympics

http://www.aussie-nintendo.com/?v=news&p=12172

...?








Mario and Sonic in the same game = must buy... this is a historical event!



But... at the Olympics? Could this possibly get any more random?!? (Its random in a very good way though!)

A Big Thank You to my Readers!

A few people have told me that they are reading my blog! Thanks heaps everyone, knowing that people are reading it really helps me to keep doing them. And as this is something that they recommend for Year 13 it helps me with the course.

If you have been/are reading the blog, I'd love you to leave a quick comment so that I know who's reading! You can do that by clicking the 'comments' link at the bottom of each post.

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Two Friday's ago two of the girls from one of my scripture classes came to our kids club! (I help teach scripture with one of the ladies at my church). It was heaps exciting and they seemed to enjoy it.

THEN last Friday, not only did they come back, they also brought another girl along! On top of that, a guy from my other scipture class came along as well! All four seemed to enjoy themselves, its really exciting to see them forming friendships with the other kids and leaders there.

My prayer is that these friendships will continue to grow and that they will learn a lot from the talks as well, and that God will be at work in their lives so that they can come to know Him.

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I really enjoyed church tonight, I feel really blessed with the church family I am in. I really enjoy being a part of the Youth Church congregation (although its as a leader - it really doesn't feel that different to being part of the youth at all!) Its so encouraging to see all the youth growing in their faith. Today Rob's talk involved them thinking through the passage themselves and picking out some of the main points, and I was very excited to see them all working through it enthusiastically.

I'm also really blessed to be part of Evening Church - there are many people who I look up to in the congregation. There are also a great bunch of my year group as well - quite a few of us actually. Got to spend some time with them at our youth camp earlier this year which was awesome. Haven't had heaps of time to chat with them much lately as I usually seem to find myself running around after church looking for people I need to speak to about certaint things, but I'm hoping there will be a few more opportunities soon. One such opportunity is that Mark offered me a lift home from supper next week, which assuming it all works out, should be quite awesome. Thats another thing I've been really blessed with - people willing to give me lifts. Its amazing how many people are willing to give me a lift home from various things even though it will take half an hour each way for most of them.

Overall, I think our church is doing great with showing God's love to each other as brothers and sisters in Christ. As always, there is room for improvement, unfortunately there are probably some people who aren't feeling as welcome or loved as they should. I know I definately feel very blessed though - and I think it was the awesome display of everyone's love and drew me in all the way back at the youth camp in 2004. And to think... if it wasn't for that, there's a very good chance I wouldn't be doing Year 13 at all! The way God works is amazing.

Current Thought Bubbles

Hmmm... its nearly a week without posting, I think I've been fairly tired most nights that I've actually been home to do a blog. I am also fairly tired now, but here are the current things on my mind:

* I've got my first Year 13 assignment due in soon, its about the Christian view of work... should probably start looking into it soon!

* Tonight Pup asked me if I'd like to try running a full Clay night, seems pretty scarey but I might try the one in two weeks...

* I also had a thought in the middle of Evening Church tonight: maybe we could have a 'pre-Kyckstart' meetup where we start thinking about the theme of Kyckstart this year (the website says that they are going to put discussion questions on soon, so they could be quite useful.)

I was thinking that this could be done at normal Youth Church time, then maybe we could go grab dinner before Evening Church. I mentioned the idea to Rob which then sparked the idea that this could be something for Youth Church in the holidays:

A time to hang out casually at normal Youth Church time, maybe have someone give a short devotional message, maybe some time of discussion and prayer, before getting dinner and EC. I'd be heaps keen to give this a try, I always thought it was a shame that YC had to stop during the holidays. The leaders having a break is fine - I fully think they should have a break - but it'd be cool to have something small where the youth can still meet up together.

Don't we look pretty?

Check it out, on the right side of the screen, I present to you, Year 13! (Assuming the picture works).

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Had the first 'real' bible study today, I'm in Peter and Rachel's group. I really enjoyed it, we are looking at Collosians. I just realised that I haven't really been in a bible study for a few years now, I'm really glad to be in one again.

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I was reading the book for Biblical Theology and I found something quite interesting... but I think I'm too tired to explain it at the moment. Maybe tomorrow!

The 12 Hour Church Experience

I was at church from 9:30am till between 9 :30pm and 10pm today.

9:30am - Set up and meet for Kids Church

10:00am - Help with Kids Church

11:30am - Hang out with a few YC people who are also at church, includes going down to Maccas. (*)

1:30pm - Help get ready for gospel chior practice.

2:00pm - Gospel chior practice

4:00pm - Music practice for Youth Church (**)

5:00pm - Youth Church (***)

6:15pm - Dinner at YC, hang out

7:15pm - Evening Church

8:30pm - Hangout

9:45(ish)pm - Leave


(*) - It is quite remarkable how girls can instantly be amused for hours if they have a camera.

(**) - Panic started as we thought our sound system had stuffed up again. The awesome sound guys quickly set up a back up plan with lots of amps. The problem ended up being that the speaker leads weren't fully plugged in...

(***) - I led the service at Youth Church today, apparently it went well, despite the fact that I was feeling fairly exsausted and stuff.


So overall, good day, just heaps tiring.

An Alternate Reality

Semi-Day Off Blog:

I just watched the second episode of a documentary on the history of video games. It supposedly covered the period of the NES to last generation consoles. I say supposedly because, while it did rest on some truths, it didn't quite reflect what actually went on in that time period.

First off they started by saying that Miyamoto was one of the first people to create videogames that centred around a hero - namely Mario in 'Donkey Kong' and 'Super Mario Brothers', and Link in 'The Legend of Zelda' and that was all well and good.

After that was when things started going downhill.

The 16 Bit Era

Their view: Video games then needed to be more 'mature' and powerful. So Sega brought along the Mega Drive which was much more powerful than the NES. Along with it they brough Sonic the Hedgehog - a character that had much more of an edge than Mario, and would apparently be more likely to 'give you the bird'. Nintendo was then virtualy forgotten. This generation was also driven by adult content.

Reality: Both Sega and Nintendo improved on their previous consoles with the Mega Drive and the Super Nintendo. Mario and Zelda have continously kept selling millions of games. Sonic did have a bit more of an attitude than Mario, but saying that he would give you the bird is a very very very very big overstatement, and Sonic was just as colourful and "childish" as Mario. Nintendo actually came out on top in the battle against Sega this generation.


The Playstation Era

Their View: Video games needed to be more realistic and powerful yet again. So people started playing more realistic games, and non-realistic games ceased to exsist. Sega and Nintendo were both long forgotten (the show then constantly made jokes comparing these realistic characters to Mario.) Playstation single-handedly brought a new 3D world to gamers, where they could live a completley new experience.

Reality: People played both 'realistic' and 'childish' games throughout all console generations. Both Sega and Nintendo kept going through this generation. Nintendo actually brought the 3D world to life with, ironically, 'Super Mario 64'. More Mario games came out this generation than any before it. Realistic games aren't always superior to the 'childish' ones. Although Playstation did come out on top this generation, Nintendo deffinately weren't forgotten, and their Handheld business was still alive and kicking.


The Playstation 2 Era

Their View: Now that players had gotten really realistic games (and of course, that was all that they were playing as well), players wanted emotion. So games became more... emotional? Nintendo is non-exsistant, and the thought of controlling a moustached man collecting coins is laughable. Playstation and X-Box are all there was.

Reality: Emotions being the big drive of this generation?... Riiiiiiiight. While Nintendo defiantely didn't do all that well on the console front, they were still dominating the Handheld market with ease. They actually exsisted. And people didn't just play Grand Theft Auto all the time. It was a very popular game... but you know... other games did exsist as well.


Phew, I feel a bit better now.

I can't say I had very high hopes for the program, the site for it said that his favourite video game character was Master Chief from Halo... come oooooooooooooooon. And while I can't remember what his favourite old-school game was, it all added up to scream that all this guy cared about was "realism", and "mature games". And of course this view defiantely showed. Though I'm still finding it hard to understand how he forgot that Nintendo didn't actually stop exsisting 20 years ago and that Mario, Zelda, and even Sonic are still alive and kicking now, hardley forgotten. While Master Chief... I'm sure he's pretty cool, but honestly, I really doubt he will last the test of time.

Shoes of Readiness

Wow, Clay (yr 6 - 8 youth group) went really really well tonight.

I've been stressed for the past few days about the talk I had to do for it. It isn't the first talk I've done there, I did some last year, but I was really struggling with it throughout the week.

It was about the 3rd piece of 'Amour of God' found in Ephesians 6, - Shoes of Readiness for the Gospel of Peace.

The power of prayer really worked - quite a lot of people were praying for me at Year 13 and stuff. I defiantely wasn't feeling too good about it beforehand - even had trouble printing it! But God prevailed and it was defiantely through him that the talk actually went pretty good!

They also seemed to respond quite well - many of them were asking very good questions - even touching upon some of the things the world has been saying about Jesus recently (such as 'finding his body'). And a lot of them seem keen in the recently started up junior girls bible study and the 'coming real soon' junior boys bible study.

The rest of the night was good fun - the theme was 'Lost' so we all boarded the plane made out of chairs, Gogs and Kate were the air hosteses, Mark was the pilot, Biar was the navigator. The plane crashed, Kate and Gogs subsequently 'spilled' drink all over Josh'. Good times. The kids then got lots of 'injuries' (such as not being able to use their left leg) and then play lots of challenges as a team.

Also tonight was Youth Church going to Putt Putt Golf - I was a bit dissapointed that I wasn't able to go to it, but Clay was still a fantastic night anyway!

The Real Genesis

As I've continued reading through the book of Genesis, something has really stuck out to me in a way much unlike a needle in a haystack. (Unless of course I had just taken a seat on the said needle in the haystack, at that point it would probably be a whole lot more noticeable.)

I don't think I ever noticed the ammount of corruption there is in the family of Jacob. I've read through Genesis at least two or three times before (in some of my attempts to read the bible cover to cover - which usually ended at Leviticus or Numbers). But I don't remember noticing it.

First of all, Jacob ends up taking two wives (though not all his fault - he was tricked). It isn't long before the double-marriage shows its toll as Leah and Rachel start fighting, because Jacob loves Rachel more, yet Leah is the one giving him sons. In the race for providing more sons than the other, they each give Jacob their maidservants so he can father more children.

Many years later, Jacob's children end up murdering an entire village, granted the reason they ended up doing this was a fairly major one, but that isn't an excuse for it at all.

It kind of makes it come as no surprise when they sell Joseph to the Egyptions later... its actually kind of a surprise that they do that instead of murdering Joseph like the villagers.


Yet through all this, God still remains faithful to the promise he gave Abraham. And it is through this bloodline that the ultimate fullfilments of God's promises are seen in a man.

Falling Up

Today is my day off. I thought that on my days off I would blog about something unrelated to church or Year 13.


One of my favourite bands at the moment is Falling Up. They're a Christian 'Alternative Rock' band, so far they have released three different albums.

I actually just got their first album, 'Crashings', last week. I've been listening to it a lot in the time I've had it, and I've found it interesting how each of the albums offers something unique compared to the others. (And I will attempt to explain how they sound different and stuff)

'Crashings' seems to have what I would assume is your standard rock setup, it has your electric guitar pumping, your drums, your bass, all that stuff. It's done in what I would describe as a slightly heavy manner, not heaps heavy like when you can't understand anything that is being sung, but still fairly heavy. The lead singer has a pretty unique voice, and he seems to have recorded quite a few tracks which contain many different harmonies, but the harmonies aren't done in a way that they are immediately obvious. In the lyrics booklet each song is accompanied with a passage from the bible to help explain its meaning. The topics of the songs range from the need to rely on God's love instead of the broken love the world offers, to the danger of being mislead by false teachers.

'Dawn Escapes', their second album, keeps many of the main features of Falling Up, yet shows that they have matured since their first release. Although I do quite like the more raw feel of 'Crashings', 'Dawn Escapes' brings with it an atmosphere that gradually makes its way through the album. Many of the songs are driven by simple piano melodies that last only a few bars, yet add a lot to the song. Some of the songs even stray from using the traditional electric guitar setup. Their song lyrics have also matured since their first release. While each song is again provided with a bible passage to accompany it, it isn't always obvious what the song's message is. For many of them I'm still not quite sure what their message is, but I have found it interesting to think over the lyrics every now and then to give it some more thought. Overall I think the album's message is need of living with Jesus as our saviour, and the need for God as a solid foundation in our lives. The cover of the album supports this, as it shows a house built on sand gradually bring destroyed by the waves of the ocean.

'Exit Lights', their most recent release, is actually a remix of some tracks from their first two albums. Three tracks are from 'Crashings', seven are from 'Dawn Escapes', one is a completely new song, and there are also two instrumental interludes. The album contains a lot of diversity in the approaches taken in remixing the songs, some remain in largely the same arrangement with a different take on the music accompaning it, while others are changed dramatically. While it does provide a very different feel to Falling Up's usual style, I really like this album too. Part of the reason may very well be because it makes it sound kind of similar to video game soundtracks...

The First 'Killer Friday'

Today I had my first 'Killer Friday'. A Killer Friday consists of:

* Waking up at College, breaky at 8, classes start at 8:30.

* College finishes at 2, go straight to church.

* Friday Hangout (yrs 3 - 6) starts at 4. Finishes at 6.

* Clay starts (yrs 6 - 8) starts at 6:30, finishes 8:30.

On top of that, today after Clay was the last part of Erin's bday party, which was good fun. It was all good fun actually, just really exsausting. As a result this blog probably won't be very comprehensive.

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I'm really enjoying the studying aspect of college so far - kind of surprising given my track record! I actually am geniunely interested in pretty much all of it, and find it very easy to listen and take notes. I'm interested to see if I can keep this up - and to see how I perform in comparison to last year where I pretty much had no interest at all in anything except software.

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Erin's party was heaps good fun (the part that I was at anyway - Clay overlapped some of it). I'm really excited to see the people of Youth Church so excited about hanging out together, and organising their own times to hang out as well! This is something that this year's Eclipse (youth camp) seemed to encourage. Youth Church has always enjoyed each other's company. But Eclipse this year seemed to being Youth Church together even more as a whole group, and its really exciting to see the results God is bringing out and continueing to use.

One of the worries I had of leaving YC and becoming a leader was that I wouldn't have that same connection with everyone there. I am very pleased to say that the connection hasn't gone, and I still feel like I am part of the group. I am really thankful to God for that! Its an awesome bunch of guys and girls, I am really excited to be able to continue hanging out with them this year, and also working with them as part of Year 13.