This is for you, Kent

I found this article today on engadget.com.  Can't say I'm into all that techie stuff, but some of the comments people left were hilarious.  I've included my favorites below.

Inventors claim to turn 300 microwaves into megawatt energy weapon

Posted Oct 23rd 2006 3:20PM by Cyrus Farivar
Filed under: Misc. Gadgets, Household

If you happen to have say, 300 microwaves kicking around between you and your friends, it turns out that you'd have a large part of the ingredients necessary for a pretty substantial weapon. That is, according to two New Mexican inventors, who recently filed a patent for a "high-power microwave system employing a phase-locked array of inexpensive commercial magnetrons." Translated into English that basically means that these guys claim you can combine the magnetrons (the bits that generate the actual microwave that cooks your popcorn) from a bunch of consumer-grade microwaves and tweak 'em a bit to develop a megawatt-level death ray, or in military/legal parlance, a "directed energy weapon system." Yeah, we've seen energy weapons (or tools, if you prefer) before, but this is probably one of the first times that we've seen ordinary kitchen technology more complicated than a knife turn into a seriously lethal weapon.

It's amazing what a little editing will do to a picture sometimes.  I took this very uninspiring picture last fall.  Yesterday, I decided to play around with it to see if I could make it look good in black and white.  Here's the result.

Before...

After...

I wish I could make the pictures bigger but I haven't figured out xanga's new photo system yet.

We've Got it all Backwards

There's a common teaching in the church today that says God often leads us by closing doors.  I agree with that wholeheartedly, just not the way it's taught.  Basically the idea is there's two options we're presented with and God closes one door.  We should take it as a sign that God doesn't want us going through that door; instead we need to go through the door that He's left open.  That's a great theology if our God is a god of the possible.  But our God is a God of the impossible.  It's great theology if we walk by sight.  But we don't; we walk by faith.  This doctrine is the result of human logic, not the Word of God.  It's unredeemed thinking.  When I read the Bible, I find a pattern that shows the promises of God behind the closed doors, not the open ones.  Look at Sarah - God's promise to her and to Abraham was behind a closed door, or rather, a closed womb.  And what about the Promised Land?  It was behind a series of closed doors.  Pharoah and his army were a closed door.  The Red Sea was a closed door.  The wilderness was a closed door.  The Jordan River was a closed door.  The giants living in the land of Canaan were closed doors.  So were the walled cities.  See the pattern?  The promises of God are contained behind the closed doors, not the open ones!  Yes, God leads by closing doors.  He closes them to highlight them as the door we're supposed to go through!  We've had it backwards; we've been the wrong door.  Those who base their lives by what's possible die in the wilderness.  It's the generation that lives by faith that inherits the Promised Land because the Promised Land is only entered by faith.  I don't think this rule applies 100% of the time.  God probably closes doors sometimes because He doesn't want us going through them.  But to say a closed door is a sign that God is leading us away from something is a faithless statement that puts no trust in the power of God.