All posts by danBhentschel

Moral Issues, Tell Me a Story

Thank you, Jesus!!

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The event

This article is written as a response to discussion on Facebook about an event that happened in my house yesterday. Here is a quick recap of the event timeline, for background information:

  • 4:59 AM – I receive an email from my server stating that two of my 17 hard drives have failed. Because of my redundancy setup, no data has been lost.
  • 5:00 AM – Marlene’s alarm clock goes off, and I hear a beeping in the basement.
  • 5:02 AM – I find the basement is filled with smoke, and the server is powered off.
  • 7:00 AM – I have disassembled and reassembled the server, and found that the culprit was a SATA power cable (feeding two drives) that caught fire, as seen below. The server is back up and running, and no data has been lost.

DSC_1181

My personal response

I am very happy with the sequence of events. No one was hurt. Nothing valuable was damaged. Because of the specific timing of things, the server (which hosts a number of parts of my life, including this blog you are reading right now) was only down for 2 hours. And I feel that I have learned a valuable lesson from the experience: I now know the hidden cost of using dirt cheap power cables in my system.

On the whole, I am thankful to God that this scenario occurred in exactly the way that it did. I can think of many ways it could have played out worse, resulting in more inconvenience, higher financial impact, and even injury or loss of life.

But didn’t God cause the situation in the first place?

Hmm… Good question! My best answer: I don’t know!

Seriously, he might have. In order to explain further, let me relay my own personal viewpoint of how God works.

DISCLAIMER: This is my own model of God’s influence in my life. I don’t claim that it is true. As with any scientific / mathematical model, I have created it to explain my observations, and find it useful as a predictor, but I am open to revising or rewriting the model as inaccuracies are discovered.

Given: God created the universe. I’m not going to discuss this here, and without this presupposition, the rest of the discussion is irrelevant.

  1. God designed the universe with physical laws that govern the way things work. We have discovered many of those laws, but many of them are still left to be discovered.
  2. God is able to intervene, as He sees fit, to make events happen that are beyond the scope of the laws he put in place. How often He does intervene is unknown.
  3. God has created humans with the capacity to make choices outside of this system of physical laws. For more on my perspective, see Supernatural me.
  4. Sometimes, God allows the results of our choices to play out completely according to physical laws and according to interactions with other humans, whose actions are outside the physical laws.
  5. Sometimes God intervenes, for His unknown purposes, to prevent or to cause actions other than what would otherwise occur as a result of human decision and physical laws.

I don’t always know when God has intervened in a situation and when He hasn’t. There have been times when I was strongly convinced that He had; this is one of those times. I believe that God orchestrated at least the timeline of this event, if not the actual occurrences themselves. The convenience of the timing has exceeded my own personal coincidence threshold.

Why would God cause your computer to catch fire?

I’m not going to get drawn into a deep philosophical discussion on “Why do bad things happen to good people?” That’s beyond the scope of this article, and often involves conjecture and assumptions about God’s purposes and other peoples’ situations that I don’t find very productive.

The best that I can do is examine my own life and try to figure out why events have transpired as they have for me. I know, it’s a bit of a cop-out. By most standards, I live a blessed life. I won’t say my life is easy; I find it quite challenging enough, thank you very much. I can’t directly compare with another person’s life, though, for obvious reasons. We work with what we have.

I feel that this particular situation was valuable to me. Let’s examine the results:

  1. I learned a lesson about computer parts.
  2. My faith in God grew.
  3. I shared my experience with others.
  4. I wrote this blog post.
  5. ???

Hmm… Notice #5? Now this is important. I don’t know all the results of this incident. There is no way that I could. I can’t see what my life (and the life of others) would have been like if my computer had not caught fire. I can come up with multiple scenarios, ranging from plausible to ridiculous, but it’s all just conjecture.

It comes down to faith

We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him.

– Romans 8:28 NIRV

Notice that in this verse, it says that God works in all things. I consider this to be different from saying that God works in each thing. I can’t analyze each individual event in my life and find the purpose of every circumstance. The very concept is meaningless. I liken it to trying to decipher the picture in a 1000 piece puzzle by examining a single piece.

In the end, I see the pieces fitting together in my life, and it is meaningful to me. I can share that with you, but none of you will see it with the clarity that I do. You must come to your own conclusions based on the circumstances in your own life.

I can’t prove God’s hand in my life, nor do I feel the need to do so. I believe it is there: guiding, shaping, comforting, protecting, loving. I thank God both for His intervention, and His lack of intervention, as the situation may be.

 – danBhentschel

Tell Me a Story

I am Mr. Dan

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The King will reply, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”

—  Matthew 25:40 (NIV)

20150301_122054 (2)At the beginning of 2009, Nora was in the 2-year-old Sunday School class in our church, taught by a beautiful woman named Desiree Holliman. Desiree had been masterfully teaching toddlers at Victory for many years, and we greatly appreciated her. Unfortunately, she decided to step down soon after Nora “graduated” to the 3-year-old class.

 With Jacob’s 2-yer-old birthday around the corner, and no replacement imminent, Marlene and I started to consider teaching the class ourselves. It wasn’t an easy choice. At the time, we had been active in the adult Sunday School class for more than 10 years, and we were concerned that our relationships in that group would suffer if we were to leave.

After a period of deliberation and prayer, we eventually decided to volunteer for the position, and I can tell you that it was one of the best decisions of my life.

Teaching a room full of toddlers isn’t the most glamorous of jobs. When asked to list pivotal roles in a congregation, few people would mention the 2-year-old Sunday School teacher. And yet for a certain segment of the population, a safe, engaging, and fun environment for their young ones is an essential element of a church’s repertoire.

Classroom essentials

The following factors contribute to a classroom that caters to the needs of 2-year-olds and their families:

A safe environment

This is absolutely essential. The classroom not only needs to be safe, but also needs to feel safe to both parents and children. This includes not only the obvious things such as age-appropriate furniture and toys, but also the more subtle things like drop-off and pick-up procedures, and good security practices.

Parents should feel confident that:

  • Only approved adults will have access to their children while they are away.
  • The staff can and will contact them in an emergency.
  • The teachers know and can support their child’s needs including:
    • Diaper changes and / or potty breaks
    • Food allergies
    • Special comfort items

Consistency plays a big part in creating an environment that feels safe to children. If they see the same faces and do the same activities every week when they come to church, then they will feel more comfortable when their parents leave them.

An engaging environment

Many 2-year-old classrooms substitute babysitting for teaching. Adults frequently underestimate what 2-year-olds are capable of. Marlene and I have made age-appropriate-learning one of our teaching goals.

In the 75 minutes that we have the children in our room, we incorporate a wide variety of activities that provide learning opportunities, including:

  • Sing songs – Some songs are Bible-related, some are generally educational, and some are just fun.
  • Prayer – We pray at least twice during every class.
  • Tell a Bible story – The story is always very short (just a couple minutes) and has a very simple moral, repeated multiple times.
  • Review – We are always sure to recap some of the morning’s activities, to help with retention.
  • Simon says – It’s a “dumbed down” rendition, but even the youngest in the class are able to copy a leader’s actions.
  • Coloring – Each week we color a very simple picture related to the Bible story we discussed earlier in class.

A fun environment

Toddlers require fun. It is absolutely essential. If they are not enjoying themselves, then everything grinds to a screeching halt. Two-year-olds are not able to patiently wait for the conclusion of an uninteresting activity.

In order to keep things running smoothly, it is a good idea to switch things up frequently. Alternate between periods of activity and quiet. Limit each organized segment of the class to about 5 minutes. That’s about as long as their attention span will endure.

Here is a rundown of our class schedule:

  • Free play (30 min)
  • Clean up (5 min)
  • Circle time (15 min)
    • Prayer (30 sec)
    • Sing sit-down songs (5 min)
    • Stand up and stretch (30 sec)
    • Sing stand-up songs (5 min)
    • Story (2 min)
    • Prayer (30 sec)
    • Review morning (1 min)
  • Snack time (5-10 min)
  • Simon says (2 min)
  • Coloring (2 min)
  • Free play (until parents arrive)

Attitude is key

Of course not all children are the same, but the majority of toddlers respond well to an adult who is:

  • Confident
  • Cheerful
  • Excited
  • Affectionate

It’s important to be constantly monitoring my attitude, and its effects on the class. For example, if I’m overly enthusiastic, I could scare some of the more reserved children.

Have a backup plan

Children are full of surprises. Some classes go quite smoothly, but some weeks are so disorganized that I wonder if maybe I should throw in the towel.

It is essential to be prepared for disaster. Then, when it inevitably happens, I am better equipped to deal with it. Some situations to consider are:

  • What to do if the children who need attention exceeds the number of adults in the room? This includes unhappy, hurt, and naughty children, as well as children who need a potty break or a diaper change.
  • What if an unhappy child simply won’t calm down?
  • What if a child gets seriously hurt, or goes missing?
  • What to do if a child has a bathroom accident or gets sick?
  • What to do with an overly aggressive child?
  • What to do if you are unable to cope with the class for whatever reason?

Reaping the rewards

Teaching young children can be very rewarding. I have met many lovely families in our church through my teaching position.

I have also formed some strong bonds with the children of Victory. Many of them remember me and say “hi” or give me hugs in the hallway several years after they have moved on from my class.

My favorite blessing, though, is when parents tell me about what their children have learned in my class. I am thrilled when I hear that a  child is able to recount parts of a Bible story, or sing songs about Jesus to their family.

– danBhentschel

Moral Issues, You Call That a Board Game?

My life, a game

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Gamification is huge. Corporations have found that people respond well to (i.e. can be somewhat controlled through) games. Is this good or bad?

A generation of gamers

Right now there is a conjunction of two factors in our society unique in the history of humanity.

Raised on video games

The majority of the population in the United States was raised in a post-video game era. Pong was released in 1972. The Atari 2600 home game system was released in 1977. I propose that anyone born in the USA on or after the year 1970 is likely to consider video games to have influenced their development. According to US census data, that is well over 50% of the populous.

Availability of games

The abundance of games available today is staggering. The Android Play store is full of thousands upon thousands of games, and a huge percent of them are even free! We could debate how many of those games are actually worth playing, but I assert that even the worst games (for the most part) would have been considered great fun when I was a child. Handheld electronic football anyone?

Ignoring video games for a minute, there’s also been a huge explosion in my own hobby of choice: board games. According to Board Game Geek, there were more than 700 board games released in the year 1985. Jump to the year 2000 and that number increases to just shy of 1,200 games released that year. But last year, in 2014, there were apparently more than 2,800 board games released.

Conditioned to play

The verdict is still out on specifically what impact games have on our society, though there are plenty of opinions ranging from more scientific studies to pure speculation. I, backed by the full authority of my superior speculative abilities, assert that games have conditioned our society to seek play. I recognize and freely admit that I am personally more motivated to do something when there is a game involved.

You know, there’s a game for that

In my third article on losing weight, I talked about the phone app, Noom, which takes a weight loss program and turns it into a game, complete with points and levels. There are countless apps available to transform just about any task into a game, including household chores such as sweeping the floor and doing your laundry!

Not only are there apps designed to make your life more fun, but there are games built into many applications that are ostensibly for a completely different purpose. When my company, Windstream, recently rolled out a new social media site for their employees, based on the Jive platform,  I could earn points, badges and levels for doing things such as telling my coworkers how I’m feeling right now.

Another example is the Audible app on my phone. In a recent update, it added statistics and achievements. If I listen for another 121 hours, I will level-up from Scholar to Master! I have earned 9 out of 15 badges (4 at the gold level), the most recent being Mount Everest, which I earned for listening to a book that is longer than 20 hours. Yay! Go me!

The reputation game

A situation where I have found gamification to be quite helpful is when it is used to build a reputation. A good example of this is the website Stack Exchange.

Stack Exchange is a vehicle for answering questions. You can ask for “expert” advice on various topics including computer programming, cooking, politics, and Japanese anime. Most questions that I have asked receive an answer within a couple of hours. But how trustworthy is that answer?

The solution comes from gamification, in the form of points and badges awarded to Stack Exchange members who have answered questions correctly in the past. If a user is active on the site, and people find their contributions useful, then they will have a high score.

Am I playing, or am I being played?

If a company can get you to use their product more by making a game out of it, then who benefits? The company or the consumer?

It doesn’t really need to be an either/or question. As long as you are aware of the tactic, and its effects on you, then you are in control. Keep some guiding principles in mind:

  • Is the game motivating me to do more of something that I want to do anyway, or am I letting it dictate how I spend my time?
  • Is the game tempting me to spend money that I would not otherwise spend?
  • If the only benefit from the game is entertainment value, would my time and / or money be better spent on another option that better fulfills that role?

Gamification success stories

I’m not going to start listening to more audio books just to earn badges in my Audible app, but I can relate some instances where I have greatly appreciated the practice. As mentioned before, I lost over 80 lbs using Noom, and I attribute much of my success to the gamification provided by the app.

Another example of beneficial gamification is the website CodinGame. I have been spending a good amount of time on CodinGame recently, trying to solve computer programming puzzles to improve my rank.

As of this writing, I have 1890 points, have earned 72 out of 156 achievements, am classified as a “Guru”, and am ranked number 718 out of 66,285 members on the site. While the accomplishments and accolades are fun, the time spent at CodinGame is more than just entertainment. It’s also good practice for my job at Windstream.

Care to share?

Do you think that gamification is beneficial, just an annoyance, or outright manipulative? Have you had any good experiences with gamification? Any bad experiences? Feel free to share in the comments below this article.

 

– danBhentschel