Nerdiness rears its head!

I think that this is the first time that I've posted a picture to my blog. And what a picture to start with!

I'm taking a intro to microbiology class this semester, which has both a lab and lecture portion. Lecture hasn't been anything special, but in lab we've been learning some basic techniques. Last Tuesday I made this plate, and I let it incubate at 37 degrees C (that's body temp). When I pulled it out today, I was really excited with what I had found! Look at that--four different colors! How cool is that? And they all started with stuff too small to see with the naked eye.

The translucent one in the top left is E. coli and the yellow in the top right is a strain of Staphyloccocus (aureus? I forget), both from cultures provided by the instructor. The bottom two came from streaking the bottom of my shoe.

The streak from my shoe made a plate that had tons of different kinds of bacteria. I chose two of the colonies that I liked, and made a "pure culture" streak on two different plate, isolating the white and reddish/brownish strains. It's fun when this stuff works. Not only that, but my KOH string tests and Gram staining all worked today! That's a lot better than my ordeals with the staining on Tuesday.

A Weekend of New Experiences

I tried a few new things this weekend. On Saturday morning, I had my first experience with yoga. While I agree with Brian Regan about some of the things he says from what I've seen of it ("now take your leg, and throw it around your neck like a scarf"), it turns out that the beginner stuff is not so bad.

Mostly yoga is about stretching and breathing. I can do both of those. So Jess and I followed along with a DVD that she's got (Yoga for Dummies). And it was nice. My body felt good, and I felt like it was a good experience. Then my muscles had their say this morning. I think that I used some muscles in my back that I hadn't in quite some time, and they let me know. I was surprised that just stretching could cause some soreness. But that's not going to stop me from doing it again tomorrow night--hello FHE activity!

Another new thing this afternoon was parsnips. They sound like scissors, but they're more like carrots. White carrots. That taste pretty darn good when fried in butter and have some seasoned salt on them. Mostly because anything tastes good when fried. I don't know that I would like them as much if they were just cooked, but we can find that out later. The important thing is that I ate healthy.

One other thing, not so related, is that I have to write a personal narrative or essay by Wednesday. I was trying to think of experiences or stories from my life that could fill up 4-6 pages (double-spaced). Any ideas?

Follow-up

Sorry for the delay in posts, everybody (all three of you...). It's been a busy week.

Jess taught a great FHE lesson on Monday night from Preach My Gospel. She found a quote that we felt explained some of the things that I said in my last post in a much clearer way. It's from Elder Dallin H. Oaks, and it's on page 9.

"We do not preach and teach in order to 'bring people into the Church' or to increase the membership of the Church. We do not preach and teach just to persuade people to live better lives.... We invite all to come unto Christ by repentance and baptism and confirmation in order to open the doors of the celestial kingdom to the sons and daughters of God. No one else can do this."

So I guess my points are these--1. The Church is not important for the Church's sake, but rather because it is the only source of the fulness of the Gospel of Christ and the authority to perform the necessary ordinances. 2. Mormons aren't the only good people. We need to love everyone and work to understand them regardless of what religion they belong to.

Hopefully that's clearer than last time. I've had more time to think about the concepts and my ideas are becoming better formed. As I read in a book for my writing class, "writing is another form of thinking."

Question.

Alonzo Gaskill, my World Religions professor, asked us a question yesterday in class and it has caused me to think and think and think (a sign of a good question, I think, but that's a post for another day). Here it is:

Does God want every mortal to be a "Mormon"?

Wow... We discussed it as a class for a bit, and the answer we came up with was that no, God doesn't want every mortal to be a "Mormon". Some people wouldn't be able to do the good that they do/have done if they were members of the Church. Take Mother Teresa, for instance (Bro. Gaskill's own example). Could she have done so much good for so many people as Relief Society President of the Provo 138th ward? Probably not.

So this got me thinking. Why have the church, then? If God isn't going to allow us into heaven based on our "Mormon-ness" :), but rather on how we've accepted Jesus Christ and lived his commandments as best we can, why does it matter to have the true church anyways?

Quick side-note: My testimony is not shaken at all--have no fear. :) I'm not having doubts about it, I know that the Church is true and that we need it, but I was trying to think about why.

Jess and I went to the temple yesterday, and while I was waiting I grabbed a triple combination and decided to read in D&C. I chose section 109 because we were in the temple, and that section contains the dedicatory prayer for the Kirtland temple. I figured it would make an appropriate read. Only a few verses in, WHAM!, one of the scriptures really stood out to me. I felt like it was an answer to my questioning and thoughts throughout the day.

V.4 states that in Jesus Christ's name alone "can salvation be administered to the children of men." Bingo. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints won't save us. The Gospel of Jesus Christ will. Parts of the gospel are independent of the church (though benefited by it): our character, our relationships with others, etc. Other parts are not, for the following reason. One of the first principles and ordinances of the gospel is baptism by immersion for the remission of sins (AoF 4). That baptism must be by the proper authority. That authority is only found in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. There was the connection!

The Church is the legal executor (in the sense of law, not like the guy with a black mask who cuts off people's heads--that's "executioner") of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is the only place where the gospel is had in its fulness. Yes, other religions contain truth. That's why Pres. Hinckley has invited everyone to come and bring the good that they have and see what more we can offer them. We also have the advantage of a prophet who communicates directly with God and lets us know how we can live the gospel better. We know more of what God wants from us. We have priesthood blessings, the temple, the Book of Mormon and other modern revelation. It's awesome!

But it's ok that not everyone is going to join the church. We still need to love and respect them and be their friends. And help them get closer to God which may mean that we help them live their religion better, even if it's not ours. God still loves them. Just as much as he loves us. I feel like it's our job to live our religion and do it well--if we hold up Christ as the light, people will see it and may ask for what we have. But we won't force it down their throats.

I recognize that some of these thoughts may be a little controversial. I know I've done a lot of thinking over the past day or two about it. But I don't think that thinking is bad (maybe shouldn't have used the same word so close to itself...). I'm grateful for the church and the light that we have.

Thoughts? Questions? Comments? Do you agree or disagree? Let me know!

Seeking truth

I read the first assignment for my Survey of World Religions class, and I have to say that I'm pretty pumped about the class. It might end up being a lot more work than other religion classes have been in the past, but it will also be a lot of new, exciting information.

The first chapter of the book talks about why we should even bother studying other religions. Some might ask, "if we've got the restored gospel, what need have we of looking elsewhere?" It helps us to be better prepared to share the gospel with them--Ammon-to-King-Lamoni-style. It also helps us better understand others so that we can love and respect them more. It gives us an idea about why they might do some of the things they do.

But the biggest thing that I got from it, or the main reason to study other religions, is that we can find truth in the things that others believe, and then apply it to ourselves to help us in our journey towards perfection. I look forward to finding the good in others and discovering how I can make it a part of myself.

First day of school

So today we started classes again. Drag. I'm taking 17 credit hours, and as I worked through my first 9 - 5 day on campus, I grew a little intimidated at my load. The homework hasn't even started yet. Yikes. Add to this the fact that I'll be working 15 hours per week in a research lab on campus, I figure I'm gonna be a busy little beaver.

*WARNING* THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPH DISPLAYS EXTREME NERDINESS

I did some calculations, and this is what I discovered. Teachers (and "University Policy") state that for every hour you spend in class (credit hour), you should be spending two hours outside of class. 17 credit hours x 3 hours per week = 51 hours total per week. 51 hours of school + 15 hours of work = 66 hours of stuff that needs to be done.

24 hours per day - 8 for sleeping = 16 hours for stuff per day. 16 hours per day x 6 days for non-Sabbath activities = 96 hours for stuff each week. 96 hours for stuff - 66 hours of stuff that needs doing = 30 hours for everything else. Everything else = showering, eating, other morning and evening routines, shopping and other errands, leisure, wife, etc.

Guess who's stoked for the new semester?

P.S. My o-chem teacher is also nerdy and mentioned to us that she did the calculation for a dessert at Bennigan's called "Death by Chocolate" to find out how much energy would be released if you could release all of the calories in it at once. It's the same as a lightning strike. Awesome.

Happy New Year, etc.

What a great way to start out the new year! I went to work this morning. It was a blessing that I was able to wake up on time and be to work by 8, considering last night was New Year's Eve, and our landlady is a grandma with a lot of family over for the break. With lots of little kids. That stomped around and pounded on the piano around 12:30. Sweet. Fortunately, by the time we crawled into bed, they had all done the same. Phew. Though I complain a little bit, double-pay is pretty sweet. And Jess had lunch ready when I got home. What a great wife!

Sunday was super-relaxing. Because we attend a student ward, and most of the students are out of town, we just had sacrament meeting. So church started at 9, and finished at 10. Mandy and Paul came over for lunch (tons of fun!) and then we took a 3 hour nap. Followed by like 6 hours of reading. I finished 3 books and Jess finished two. Holy moly.

Yesterday we watched a couple of movies: Masters of the Universe (that's He-Man, for the uninformed) and then My Big Fat Greek Wedding (MBFGW). The He-Man movie was truly awful. Even loving the cartoon and toys when I was little was not enough to redeem that waste of an hour and a half. MBFGW was a lot of fun, though, and enjoyable. It had good humor, and it was interesting to watch the collision of two cultures. Naturally I was drawn to reflect on my own Mormon culture, and thinking about how similar parts of it would be in a parallel situation.

"The Dark is Rising" has been a fun series, and I'm now on the last book. Once I got past the first book, everything has been fairly fast-paced and exciting. I think the only reason that anyone might need to read the first book would be to get familiar with some of the characters that reappear in book 3. Meh. At least it's all been uphill from there...

Also, I had to shave my beard off last week. Sad stuff. I had a week's worth of scruff, and it made me kinda happy. At least we got to play with it when it was time to shave it off... I may post pictures soon. If I get around to it.

I'm discovering that I have a lot to talk about...

I'm working on reading the entire Old Testament. It's the only one of the standard works that I haven't read all the way through, and I want to change that. I'm trying my best to look for principles that are applicable to my own life, or things that help me better understand the gospel. Some parts are more difficult to find connections than others.

I finished Exodus today, which had a lot of neat stuff, especially at the beginning. Towards the end, we see that the Lord really cared about his temple-on-the-move (the tabernacle) and gave very specific details about how it should be built. And Moses recorded those details. In case you want to build your own at home? I'm not really sure why.

Chapters 1 -7 of Leviticus are the handbook for sacrifices--it gives you all the hows and whens of what kind of sacrifices to offer. Sweet. Biggest thing I pulled from those chapters: the Lord asked for sacrifices that were "without blemish." For a farming/nomadic society, it would be really easy to sacrifice the weak or broken animals that were going to die anyways. But the Lord deserves better than that. If we sacrifice more, he can also bless us more. Cool stuff. Also, Aaron's sons? Very foolish. See Leviticus 10. They died.

Enough for now, right? Ok, I'm done!