Bros United

warning: this blog is slightly post-dated...

So some buddies of mine have taken the time and effort and funds to come to my home and share a little time just to love the surroundings and "be". I loved it. It was a little check up time with relationships, Christ's and ours. The beauty of hundreds of fish jumping in a lake just meters from where we were sitting... it was quite an anomally of nature :) I think that in those times it's very easy to see people care about you. Sacrifice and commitment are traits that people show those they love.
So now when we're all in our seperate corners of the country and distanced by hundreds of Kilometers is when that brotherhood of friendships is tested. Love stands the test of time. Because we share the love, our genuine concern and interest in eachother will be proven through the littlest of things that are going to mean so much more. It's a little harder now to visit eachother so it makes our communications that much better. It's as though there's a thirst to hear from friends and the longer that thirst is dragged out the bigger it gets and the sweeter and more meaningful the smallest thing can be.
I hope you all are doing well and falling deeper in love with Jesus.

Improving your Morale

Up till this point in my life I have (subconciously or not) subscribed to the idea that morals make a certain person "better" than those around them. Now I would never tell people this out loud or even think it was right in my head, but what we practise is in the end what we have in our hearts isn't it?
This one time I recieved a very nice note saying how much this person respected me because of the high moral standard that I uphold. This made me very happy about myself and how well I was doing in my goal of becoming a righteous man of God. (shudder at my arrogance)
Now there is nothing wrong with holding to a high standard of morals, in fact it is awesome if done for the right reasons. That is not to feel like you are a better person than someone else, but because you love God and you love people! Having an intensely personal relationship with your Creator spawns a desire to obey Him and to follow Christ's example. It's all about the love you share with your God and Saviour. Morals should not be stressed as a basis for Christian faith (abortion, gay marriage, fornication etc.) but rather that because of a love of Jesus Christ we are driven to read his love letter and to follow his example... morally, and not. Be careful that Satan doesn't lead your morality into complacency.

PS. some of you may be thinking by now..."man he miss spelled his title..." IT'S A PUN!!! :)

A Long Long Time Ago... (AKA. I have no clue)

So today began my Natural History course... and apparently the world "began" 4.6 billion years ago and somehow (unbeknownst to my instructor) they know exactly when oxygen "arrived" on the earth and just when certain mountain ranges were established and just when the dinasaurs appeared etc. But the course isn't about evolution it is all about the natural world around us... I guess we just needed to understand the "scientific" knowledge surrounding the timeframe which it all arose from. I sort of sat at the back of the class and was a little bit sad because this really great instructor had fully bought the lie that evolution is fact and that people KNOW the earth is really old... because they don't, otherwise there would be no debates and everyone would accept the facts, but the fact is there are none... but we do have this handy little book called the bible.

(just for you dave :))

Yay, Birthday

Ok I just wrote this awesome blog about how great my birthday was... and then the stupid computer erased it. So suffice it to say my birthday was great.

i'm going to go be responsible for myself now... cause I'm 18 or something.

See you all later.

Birthday Celebration

So yesterday was Dan Dejong's birthday. I think that our instructors planned a special day for him... or at least that's what it seemed. We started off the day about 30 minutes later than normal (woohoo, sleep!). So our class met at the parking lot of a park on the Mamquam River where we were given back our quizzes from the previous day (Dan and I both did very well). We then progressed into the woods along the shore of the river to learn how to tie tarps up properly. It was sooo cool and simple and efficient and effective that I don't think that I will ever go on big trips without my own tarp and lines. A few simple knots, some proper technique and a nice light tarp gives you a dry place to cook, a dry place to sleep, a dry place to be dry in etc. I loved it.
We then progressed to building debris huts which generally consist of debris... lots of it. Dan and my group built a sweet hut that you could look inside of and not see any light in. It was solid (sticks, leaves, moss, ferns, dirt, logs) and I think I would have even trusted it to keep out water. This opened up the possibilities for taking a little bush survival trip in the future. So cool.
Next we moved on to rigging up food caches. We learned how to use proper technique and how to tie your ropes so that you can suspend fairly large amounts of weight across a gap that is at least four meters from any trees and four meters up from the ground without even thinking of climbing a tree... ok so Dan had to climb a little bit but theoretically speaking... no tree climbing.
After this little adventure we set out to cross the gushing, glacier fed, frigid Mamquam River:) Oh the excitement was tremendous. We built pyramids of people so that we could break the water for those behind, and at the same time those behind supported the people in front of them. It worked very well until the River was over our heads and then we all got swept away in gales of laughter and shrieking. The best part was that after the second group watched our group get washed down the river because we couldn't even touch the ground, they decided that they could probably do it "better" than us so they got swept down the river as well. Good times.
So then we went over how to sharpen axes and knives and how to light fires even in the pouring rain and we were recommended to read the instruction manual on "How To Shit In the Woods", which deals with all the reasons that people fear going out into the backcountry related to personal hygiene. For example, the book dispels the rumors that bears are attracted to menstruation etc. (who'd have thunk it eh?):)
After a long hard day at the books, we ended class by rafting down the Mamquam river in inflatable dinghies that people like Aaron Richards had the brilliance and foresight to purchase for such events. It was amazing and Cory found a five hundred dollar digital camera abandoned on the beach with no pictures on it or anything! All in all we had a blast, and to top it all off when Dan and I got home, Dan's family was coming out to Squamish to take us out for supper in honor of his birthday! Free meal at Whitespot, no dishes to worry about and the incredible comedy of Steffen Dejong:) That is a recipe for a good evening.

PS.sorry for the lapse in postings... when we're out in the field I don't have lunch hours to write these things up cause I don't have internet at home and I haven't purchased a USB memory stick yet! Enjoy your summer guys.

Ahhh Squamish

Wow. I'm in school!!! I Spent my first night in a tiny little strange house that will soon be like home to me and I had a very good sleep (Ok... I woke up once cause I had the window open and I only had a sheet on me... besides the point). I woke up and had a grand breakfast with my good buddy Dan and we set out for our first day of classes. These people are sweet. There's such a variety in background and it's so interesting to get to know them all. Our first day was pretty mellow, we had orientation, some snacks, free Nalgenes, group lunch, and then a pizza dinner at the brewhouse pub (with lots of drinks for everyone except me :)). Uncle Andrew also took Dan and I out sailing on monday which was awesome! I can't wait to go again and he said that he usually goes once a week!!! The first time I almost tipped the boat horizontal because I didn't catch the helm in time but it was pretty intense. I haven't taken any pictures yet because I'm planning to wait until I get to know these people a little better before I start snapping pictures of all of them. It turns out there's a little bit of an ultimate fetish throughout the group as well but that hasn't been fully explored yet. Well break is over... back to topographical maps :) (tough stuff)