“Yeah, I graduated from UNC Chapel Hill with a 5.0 GPA and got into med school at Duke with a full scholarship.  I’m now the medical director at Johns Hopkins Medicine where I make six figures a year if you don’t count all the bonuses and free swag I get.  Oh, sorry, did I say swag?  That must be your sub-hundred-thousand-dollars-a-year, lower-class vernacular rubbing off on me.  I meant stuff–free stuff.”

We interrupt your regular programming to congratulate Josh Wagner for getting the free copy of The Medicine by John Mark McMillan.

Thanks, Josh, for being cool and reading the blog!

Now to return to your regular programming.

Going dancing in Uptown Charlotte is always an adventure for me–mainly because I do it so infrequently.

I had one of those adventures last night.

It was me and one girlfriend. She was under 21, so I figured I might try to pass her off as being my DD in order to get her in to the club with me if necessary.

The first place we tried to go to was Suite in the Epicenter. They turned us away despite me telling the bouncer she was my DD.

Actually, there were two “bouncers.” The first one was a lot nicer than the second one–and a lot cuter. I think the second one was overcompensating for being short.

Or something.

Anyway, the second place we hit up was the Breakfast Club, an 80s club a few blocks away. They were much cooler about letting her in.

What I liked about the Breakfast Club wasn’t the music the played, but it was because 1) no one cared how they looked and 2) they didn’t have the most attractive crowd there.

You’re probably reading the second point and thinking, “Wait. What?”

There weren’t a lot of good-looking guys there. That means I don’t worry about how I look and what those would-be good-looking guys think of me. That means I got to focus on just having fun.

Yup.

Will I be hitting up Suite in the future? Sure. I’ll probably be at the Breakfast Club a couple more times before I do go, though. It’s like my training wheels for going clubbing.

The veggiemite’s natural predator…is me.

Who cares about religious activity if you don’t get Jesus!?

- Matt Chandler on 1 Cor 1-4

“It’s about faith, about being held, about being forgiven. It’s about finding joy and finding home. We all want that, but nobody wants religion. Why do people turn away from faith? They’re not, they’re turning away from religion most of the time. I’ve yet to meet anyone who doesn’t want to be forgiven or held or find peace or joy in their life. We try loads of other stuff—we think booze or foxy women or whatever will fill it—but it doesn’t fill the hole.”

- Bear Grylls

(I’m still giving away a copy of The Medicine by John Mark McMillan!  Check this post for details!)

So yeah, I’ve been pretty excited about the re-release of John Mark McMillan‘s The Medicine for the past several weeks now.

I like John Mark’s music not because he’s a good Christian songwriter, but because he’s just an amazing songwriter, period (who happens to be Christian).  His songs ooze of quality and I’m not ashamed to blast them out my windows while driving down I-85 in the evenings.

I had already ordered his album via his website, but in an effort to help his album reach the top ten in the iTunes album charts, I decided to purchase an extra copy on there and give it away to someone.

I’m aware that I’m not a super-popular blogger like Jon Acuff or Anne Jackson, but I needed an avenue by which to give away a copy of The Medicine, so this is it.  Plus, I already wrote a thank-you note on the gift certificate that mentioned the blog on it, so it would be kinda tacky if I just went and did it via Facebook, ya know?

So if you want a copy of The Medicine, leave a comment below about the last time a song or album impacted your life.  If you can’t think of the last time that happened, just leave a comment about your favorite song or album, period.  I’ll pick a winner on Monday, July 12th.

During the whole time I was debating whether or not I wanted to keep seeing that guy, the Holy Spirit really tore me up and convicted me over the issue.

When asked about why Jesus was such a big deal in all this, the Holy Spirit gave me the words to say.

Thank you, God, for being with us always.

“I’ve been on dates with Christian women before, and none of them have made as big a deal of the whole religion thing as you have.”

That wasn’t supposed to be a compliment, but I took it as one.

I had been on a few dates with this guy who wasn’t Christian.  I won’t lie–the guy was super dreamy and we would have been awesome together.  It’s just that…well, you know, he wasn’t Christian.

I was really torn up about whether or not I wanted to keep seeing him.  I couldn’t remember the last time a guy was this into me and I actually had fun going on dates with him.  Then there was the fact that I hadn’t kissed a dude in forever (I thank God for not even letting me get that far with him).

But going with him meant going away from Jesus.  I’m already a hypocrite as it is–that is, I do a bad enough job of giving Him the praise and glory He deserves–did I really want to intentionally walk away from Him (again)?

Doing both wasn’t an option, either.  My attention would be dedicated to one or the other.  Sure, I would have been forgiven if I went with that guy and came back, but it just didn’t make any sense to do that.  I had been down this road before.  I knew how things would turn out and it wouldn’t be pretty.

I knew I needed a guy who could worship and love Jesus with me.  This guy wasn’t it.

In response to what he said to me about making a big deal out of Jesus, all I had to tell him in response was the Gospel.

God gave me a gift I didn’t deserve.  Jesus died on the cross for sinners and criminals like me.  Because of Jesus’ sacrifice for me, I can be presented before God as sinless and blameless.

He loves me more than this guy ever could.

I couldn’t walk away from that.

When temptation sorely presses,
In the day of Satan’s power,
In our times of deep distresses,
In each dark and trying hour.

By thy mercy, O deliver us, Good Lord

- Matthew Smith – By Thy Mercy

I just got Magnetic North and Taiyo Na‘s new album Home:Word in the mail yesterday and I absolutely love love loooooove it.

Normally, when I think of hip-hop, “cute” isn’t exactly something that comes to mind, but their music video for Summertime just melted my heart.

A lot of times, I’m afraid of asking God for stuff because I know I’ll get exactly what I ask for.

In this case, I asked for humility and God took away my source of pride by making me next to useless at my internship.  I’m forced to depend on other people to teach me the things I need to know.

I actually have to ask for help.

Thankfully, there are a lot of people there who are more than willing to provide some guidance to a hot-headed kid like me.

I accidentally ended up binging on Asian internet content today.

First, it was Michelle Phan’s YouTube channel.

From Michelle’s YouTube channel, I was led to the 1040 movie page (also, check out their YouTube channel).

The 1040 blog had a link to an article in the Christian Post about 1040 and Jaeson Ma.

Jaeson Ma and MC Jin were in the article, so I went to go see what they were all about.

In the midst of getting all jazzed up over Asian hip-hop artists, Magnetic North came to mind, so I went to their website to see if they had done anything new lately (which they have–they just released a new album this month).

Oh, and I pre-ordered the 1040 DVD.  I have literally watched every video on their YouTube channel, and I am super excited about seeing the entire feature film come October.  God is doing something big over in Asia, and I can’t wait to see more of it unfold.