Last night a woman yelled across the deli case to me “Could you come over here and help me please?” It wasn’t a patient request, it was rather demanding. Since I was in the process of cutting a roasted chicken in half for another customer, I yelled back, “I’ll be with you in one moment, I’m helping another customer right now.” Impatiently again, she replied, “You are?” Patiently again, I replied, “Yes, ma’am and I’m almost done, I’ll be there in a second.”

The challenge comes in how you respond to someone like that when you get to her. At first I was frustrated and wanted to drag my feet getting there. But I remembered something they told us in training. Some people come to Whole Foods Markets because they like to shop there. They’re into organic products, they like the atmosphere, whatever. But some people come there because they have to change their eating habits for medical reasons. Perhaps that grouchy customer just came from the doctor’s office where they were told that they had something wrong with them and that required them modify their diet. That kind of person, one who has just brushed up against their own mortality, might not be the most pleasant person to be around. They don’t need guff from the supermarket, they just need some time and patience.

I think the woman I dealt with last night was just impatient and grouchy. But you never know. It’s best to be nice in case they are carrying bad news. I was kind and courteous to that woman, as much as I am with anyone. I don’t know if it made a difference or not, I just keep in mind the advice a friend once gave me: Don’t let little people live inside your head for free.

Since Raffy brought it up, yes, I did sign up for .Mac and got the nice discount. Was it worth it? I think so. I didn’t have the time to contact everyone and update my e-mail address. I didn’t think I’d use the ‘free’ stuff that comes with .Mac but I am. Alchemy is a cool game to play when you have a few minutes. I’m staying clean and clear with Virex (nope, I haven’t found one single virus yet!) I started using iCal and iSync even though they are beta. No problems noted with iSync except that it doesn’t interface with the Mail app (yet?) However, iCal is slow as anything. I’m assuming that it will improve as time goes.

School? School you ask? I am sooo far behind. I did get an A+ on the first review of my Greek Exegesis notebook (we’re doing Colossians). However, I got a C on my first major quiz and flunked both of my vocab test. What is that supposed to tell me? I take it to mean that while I don’t know the technical details, I can still get the work done. Don’t tell me otherwise, the sun is shining brightly here in Timland.

BTW, I have to do a exegetical paper on Colossians. I picked Colossians 2:11, specifically the phrase “the circumcision of Christ”. I’m going to try to prove that it is a subjective genitive phrase (the circumcision Christ performs) rather than an objective genitive (the circumcision performed on Christ, that is, His crucifixion). I did a bunch of historical research and it looks pretty good but the hard part will be the linguistic stuff.

Speaking of Steve Ballmer, I saw a commerical the other night for the NASDQ and it starred big Steve (they kept cutting off the top of his head in the shots ’cause he’s bald) and the CEO of Starbucks. The volume was down so I couldn’t hear but they kept flashing up words like “innovate” and stuff. That made me laugh; I mean what has Steve Ballmer ever innovated? The next commercial was a youngish black woman standing in front of an all white background. I smiled as I went to the TV and turned it up. I recognized the music immediately. Yup, an Apple switch commercial. I just loved the timing of it all.

After whining about fonts acting up on IE 5.2.1, I just downloaded the IE 5.2.2 upgrade (it only mentions security) and guess what? No, Steve Ballmer didn’t call me to say ‘thanks’, when I turned the Quartz font smoothing back on, everything seems to be working. Thank you Mircosoft!

Oh, by the way. I had a problem with IE 5.2.1 when I upgraded to Jag (OS 10.2). Chuncks of text would just disappear for no good reason. Only happened in IE (a Mircosoft product may I remind you). I turned off Quartz text smoothing in Preferences and things are just fine now. If you have that problem, now you know the cure. Hope Microsoft comes up with a patch to fix this soon.

Well, here I am on Mac OS 10.2. It is really pretty slick. Mail has been updated with a spam filter. Since I seldom give out my .Mac e-mail address I don’t get much spam so hopefully I won’t get a chance to try that out. I do get iChat which is an AIM client. Haven’t have a chance to try it yet but I can’t wait. Other than that, the OS seems quicker. They changed the little whirrling color disc you get when the system is busy to one that looks pretty slick. You just don’t get to see it that often now. They did something with the Quartz graphic to make it take better advantage of you graphics card’s capability. This seems to have worked well because the display seems sharper to me. Maybe that is just Steve Jobs’ RDF (reality distortion field) at work on me. Whatever, I like it.

Next question, do I pay $50 for my .Mac subscription or just let it expire? Then I have to let everyone know my e-mail address has changed. Time or money, time or money.

Been working at Whole Foods for about two and a half weeks and I got a promotion and a pay raise. I’m now the night shift deli supervisor. The security company I was interviewing with hasn’t called back with a job offer so I guess I’ll stay where I am. The hard part is that I don’t get enough time for studying and family when I have to work 40 hrs on top of school.

Still, I feel like Joseph. He get sold into slavery and next thing you know, he’s running the house. Then he goes to jail and he’s running the place. Then he meets Pharoah and he’s running the nation. I figure at this rate I should be CEO of Whole Foods Markets in about six months! :)

Really, God has been very good to me and my family. We have not had to do without much. We’d been praying for a second car and a guy at school loaned me his truck indefinately! I know not to presume on the Lord and am enjoying the bounty while He grants it. Like Joseph, there may be years of famine ahead of us but I know that He is working all things together for His glory and my good. And I will praise Him still.

Got a package from Zondervan today. It was a info packet on the Today’s New International Version. They set it to all ETS members trying to drum up some support since the translation has been getting badgered by some evangelicals. It is an interesting translation but not one that I would use for study (and that is what I do most of the time). I understand their desire for a “gender appropriate” translation but I think they goofed a few verses. None that prevert core doctrines or anything.

This is an incomplete thought but I thought I’d blog it anyway:

A guy in Theology I asked Dr. Vanhoozer “Is the canon of scripture infallible? If so, how do you know?” and followed up with somthing about councils, etc. Dr. Vanhoozer wasn’t flustered by the question and I could tell that he had more to say but felt the time crunch so he gave a rather simplistic answer and said that we’d cover canon later in the course. It got me thinking on the subject once again. Here’s part of my thought process.

This is an irrelevant question. Why? Because the canon is inerrant, whether that is infallible or not does not matter since it is a fait accompli and it isn’t open to question as to whether it could have gone wrong, it didn’t. How do I know this? How do I know anything to be true?

What is at stake here is whether councils are infallible. We know that they aren’t. For example, the Jerusalem Council (Acts 15) said things that were later overturned. They prohibited meat sacrificed to idols (v 29) which Paul, under the inspiration of the Holy Sprit later pronounced to be okay (1Co 8).

We do not need an infallible council to formalize the cannon of the NT. What we do need is a council who was inerrant on that point. And councils have made statements that are inerrant. In the Jerusalem we find that they said that Gentiles need not be circumcised (v 19). This was later upheld by the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:2-6).

The next question then is how we may know when a council has spoken inerrantly? The question becomes even more pointed when they speak on a subject that is not in the Bible. On the question of the cannon the point is illustrated most clearly.

We may know that the NT cannon is correct because of two witnesses, 1) the Holy Spirit and 2) the holy catholic and apostolic Church. First, the Holy Spirit provides subjective internal witness to His Word in the heart and mind of believers who ‘hear’ His voice in the text of scriptures as they read it. But we are not left alone with only this subjective experience; the Church has, through the centuries, authenticated the canon and upheld the canon. There is no reason to add or remove books since the Church has not, historically, recognized them. The Didache is a wonderful, ancient Christian document that is helpful in understanding the teaching of the Church Fathers, but it is not inspired scripture.

More could be said but time prohibits.