If you can't teach it, don't code it

A lot of my code is way the heck too complicated. I need to write things that are easy enough to understand that I can explain them to someone else.

Heh. Someday, someone's going to look at my code, and look at this post, and laugh. And laugh and laugh and laugh. And then cry.

Joy in song

We just had a group sing in chapel today, and they were full of joy. You could hear it in their music and see it in their faces. Our CR band has joy, too, but it has a completely different sound.

I need to have joy in my programming job too. Inspired by good music, I'm going to try to write especially joyful if-than-else blocks today.

Our Environment affects our behavior

I've been reading "The Tipping Point" by Malcom Gladwell. He said there was an extreme dropoff in crime in the New York subway after they started cleaning up Graffiti and going after people who snuck onto the subway without paying the fare. Before they did this, every car was covered with graffiti from top to bottom. Homeless people would jam all the coin-operated gateways into the subway, and then stand next to the overflow gate and demand that people give them their tokens in order to get in. Some people would go though the overflow gate, and some would just jump over the broken turnstiles. It was chaos, and crime was rampant.

After they cleaned this up, crime dropped dramatically, because people no longer felt that they were in a dirty, awful place where nobody cared. (And if nobody cares, why shouldn't I steal from my neighbor). The same people who would steal and mug people on a dirty, filthy subway would be law abiding on a clean one. Environment affects our behavior.

I was thinking about how this relates to Holiness, or cleaning up our spiritual lives. We might think that this would be a minor change, compared with other things we might do to change our condition. But what if the cleanliness of our soul, like the cleanliness of the subway, changes everything?

God exists in the space between where I am, and where I'm going

I was reading Malcom Gladwell's "Tipping Point". He tells about a study of seminary students at Stanford. They were told to write a short sermon about the Good Samaritan for a contest. They also wrote out their reasons for going into the ministry. They prepped in one building, and gave the sermon in a second building. Half were told they were in a hurry, and half were told they had extra time. Between the two buildings was a man who was coughing, and obviously ill, leaning against a building in an alley.

13% of the people who were in a hurry helped the man.
65% of the people who had extra time helped the man.

This means that being in a hurry affects our actions far more than our principals, and what we believe. If I'm in a hurry, I'm going to miss God, no matter what I believe.

Phillip Yancey

Phillip Yancey, a known Christian author, came to NNU on Friday and spoke in Chapel. He is also an excellent speaker, and I'm writing down some things that he said so I can remember them later.

You're a part of this world, as well as the next one. Enjoy it.
He talked about taking cookies to a 90 year old lady who always talked about going to heaven. She lived in a dark house, and all the blinds were shut.

I am filled with the holy spirit, but I leak
(I thought this line was clever)


Don't be afraid to get dirty
He talked about how our skin is amazing, and protects us from all sorts of stuff, and told a story of a surgeon friend of his who saw stained glass windows of saints with their hands pressed together in prayer.  The only time the surgeon did this was before surgery, after he had cleaned his hands, and he wanted to make sure he didn't touch anything and contaminate his hands.  He said this isn't the proper picture of a saint, who should be out doing stuff.