A Saturday mixture

Last Updated on September 30, 2010 by Dave Farquhar

Luke again. As I was making the video about Luke, another member of my church was putting together a Bible study to wrap around it. I delivered that study to my small group last night. It was the first time I’d ever taught–to this group at least–using someone else’s material. I write my own and teach others to write their own, because there’s no way that a book written by distant authors can be in touch with a group’s particular needs. The Bible itself plays by a different set of rules, but taken in its entirety, it’s a pretty intimidating book. But a human taking poignant bits out of it and showing people how to use them–that works.
So last night I delivered the study, and near the end, I played the Luke video. Luke talked for five minutes on how it feels to be Luke. (The transcript appeared here originally–what I played was edited only slightly from that.) The group’s reaction?

Silence.

Video professionals have told me that’s good.

Finally I broke the silence. “Luke is grateful because he has so much. And when you look at the ‘so much’ he has, there isn’t a one of those things that I don’t have. I’ve got great friends. I’ve got a great, supportive family. And I’ve got so much more than that. And yet, Luke’s a lot happier than I am. Something’s wrong here.”

More silence. One of the girls, who has a remarkable story in her own right to tell, looked like she was going to cry.

And how to follow that? You don’t. So I’m not gonna try. Segue, schmegway.

Roll your own mail server. Linux guru extraordinaire Nick Petreley just published a five-part series on setting up an IMAP server in Linux. It’s the best I’ve seen yet. It doesn’t talk about everything one would like to do with a mail server, and I prefer Courier IMAP over Cyrus IMAP, but if you want your own spam-filtering mail server, this is a great start. About the only thing he doesn’t cover is using Fetchmail to pull in mail from foreign accounts.

An interesting take on intellectual property. I’ve told you about Rick Prelinger before; he’s the one responsible for the Internet Archive’s movie archive, which is destined to endear him forever to small-time movie makers around the world. Here’s an article on IP from him which takes a unique take. Worth a read.

If you’re in need of free (and, more importantly, royalty-free) film footage, bookmark this page. Getting MPEG-2 video into Premiere is difficult; Prelinger offers some advice he’s been given.

If you found this post informative or helpful, please share it!

3 thoughts on “A Saturday mixture

  • April 13, 2002 at 6:16 pm
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    Might wanna fix that hyperlink… :o)

    P.S. The secret to being as happy as Luke is, without all the superfluous extras that we think are essential to a "happy" life, is found in Philippians 4:12-13.

    oops.. I guess it’s not a secret anymore… well.. actually… I had read and heard that passage for years before the full weight of it hit me. So it’s probably still a secret. :o)

    WATYF

  • April 13, 2002 at 10:47 pm
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    Phil. 4:12-13 is still a very well-kept secret. People tend to focus too much on the "I’ve learned to be content" part (popping back to verse 11, and, indeed, in part of verse 12) and thus totally ignore the "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" part in verse 13. (Phil. 4:13 is often quoted on its own, but I rarely see verses 11-13 quoted. It’s 4:11-12 and 4:13. They might as well be in seperate books!)

    The secret is that we don’t do it. Christ does it through us. So what we need to learn is how to get out of the way, not how to be content.

    That was a tough lesson to learn. I spent far too much time being beat over the head by Phil. 4:11 by someone who didn’t want to learn how to get out of the way. It wasn’t until years later, when a seminary student gave a sermon titled "The Secret of Thanksgiving," and he zeroed in on that part of verse 13, that it made sense.

    He’s now a pastor in Minnesota, and I’m sure he’s thriving.

  • April 14, 2002 at 4:30 am
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    Oops.. you know.. I meant to put vs. 11 in that reference… lol. Sorry aboot that.

    But I know what you mean… years ago, if you had told me that "I know how to be abased" and "I can do all things" were right next to each other, I woulda called you a heretic… :op (OK.. well.. probably not) But in any event… you’re right,… taking it as a whole is what brings it into proper focus. I’m a very content person and I don’t have some of the things that many people consider fundamental to living a "happy" life.

    Luke 10:38-42 is another insightful passage along these same lines.

    WATYF

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