Bob Kaylor

A. J. Jacobs - Official Website

One man. Nine extraordinary quests. On a mission to understand the mysteries of modern life — from love to work to fame — A.J. Jacobs becomes a human guinea pig and immerses himself in a series of radical lifestyle experiments. To figure out how to reclaim his dignity, he follows George Washington’s 110 Rules of Life. To explore fame, he goes undercover as a movie star. To investigate dating, he becomes a single woman. To understand decision-making, he tries to eliminate irrationality from his brain. And many more. The results are equal parts funny and enlightening. Go ahead, immerse yourself in these new worlds. To see the new video, click here.

via www.ajjacobs.com

A.J. Jacobs is one of my favorite writers and I can't wait to read his new book "The Guinea Pig Diaries." Jacobs is the author of another book that I reviewed and mentioned in a sermon--"The Year of Living Biblically." His stuff is interesting, hilarious, and kind of says out loud what many of us would be thinking.

Random Thoughts and Musings on a Tuesday Night

It's been a quiet week here in Park City, where all the women are pony-tailed, the men are on mountain bikes and the children are parking their new BMWs in the high school lot...

• Patrick Swayze's passing was sad, but it's interesting to me that in the list of all his movies, "Red Dawn" gets no mention. That was a classic! I mean a group of high school kids waging a guerrilla war against Cubans and Russians who invade Wyoming? That was totally realistic (in a Cold War paranoia sense, that is)! And did anybody catch that that was the first movie that he and Jennifer Gray were in before "Dirty Dancing?" Gotta be on the list is all I'm saying...
• Was that Charlie Sheen's first movie, too? See, classic!
• A big stink everywhere today about the MTV Video Music Awards and Kanye West's dis of Taylor Swift. Raises two questions for me: 1) Who are Kanye West and Taylor Swift? I stopped listening to new music after 1988, and 2) MTV plays music videos? I stopped watching that in 1986. 
• I bust my kids' chops for watching episodes of "The Suite Life of Zach and Cody" and "Hannah Montana" over and over again, but then I can quote almost every Seinfeld episode from watching it over and over again. Is that hypocritical? I say no.
• Italian sausage chili...definitely making my top 15 favorite dinner list after tonight.
• I am addicted to Dan Carlin's Hardcore History podcast. Listen to it here or subscribe on iTunes. Get the back issues. They are awesome.
• "Death Panel" sounds like a great name for a Chuck Norris movie or a punk band, don't you think? 
• Word on the street is that the Utah subdistrict of the Rocky Mountain Conference of the United Methodist Church may become part of the Desert Southwest Conference in 2012. That would mean that we could potentially have church meetings in Las Vegas. Insert jokes here.
• Well, it's been fun but I gotta go...Seinfeld's on.

The Book of Daniel: Apocalypse Now

This week's sermon audio is up online on our web site.

Daniel is one of those books of the Bible that doesn't get a lot of press, except for during kids Sunday School or Vacation Bible School. We all know the stories of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego and Daniel in the lion's den, but the real impactful message of Daniel that is important in the larger context of Scripture is the apocalyptic section in Daniel 7-12.

This week's sermon addresses that apocalyptic material, but not in the way that many Christians may expect. For generations, people have been looking at Daniel and Revelation and interpreting them in light of events in their own time. What's important to remember about apocalyptic literature, however, is that it is inherently symbolic and politically charged. Think of these apocalyptic dreams and visions as ancient political cartoons, where the symbols mean something very specific to the people first reading the text. In order to understand what's happening, you have to be able to understand what the symbols meant then.

Daniel is also where we see a more overt reference to resurrection of the body, which is an important foundational hope for many Jews by the time the New Testament is written. Daniel's visions are all about the Son of Man coming, not about us going away, and about resurrection rather than a Platonic dualism of body and spirit.

Check out the audio and look for more as we continue our journey through the Bible.