I gotta do what?

I got this idea for a post from my friend Chris' blog. Kind of a spinoff of my response to one of his posts. So props to Chris.
It's not like there are any secrets to Christianity. It may take a little effort to find out what you need to know, but it's all there for us to learn for ourselves. Kind of like algebra. Man, it takes forever to learn it but there are no tricks or secrets to it. You just pick up a textbook and read and learn.
If you wanted to pick at nits and argue a point, you could ask,"What about the people who have never seen a bible or died before they got the chance?"
Consider this, would you hold it against a first grader if you asked him to solve a simple algebraic equation and he couldn't? Would you call him stupid or tell him it was his own fault that he didn't know? Of course not. At least I hope not.
So my short answer (and that's all you get today) is that I believe that there is Grace in this situation.
Sorry about the digression but there are a couple in every crowd.
Sure it takes Gods timing, alot of outside help from others and surrounding ourselves with strong faithful followers of Christ, but come on, in the end we are responsible for our own decisions.
That thought alone is enough to scare me straight. Because you know and I know there are going to be a buttload of people at judgement saying stuff like,"Yeah, my mother told me about God and the Bible but when I left home she never came and picked me up for church." Or,"I went to church once and the preacher never came up and talked to me or told me how to be a christian." Or,"I thought all I had to do was show up."
It's our lives, our salvation and our eternity. Not moms, not the preachers. Our very own. No one will do it for us.
The good news is that all we are fortunate enough to live in a country where all we need to know is available to us at any time. God has provided us with information, resources, and the freedom to be able to use them.
I pray we use the brains God gave us to take advantage of that provision.

Things that make you go hmmm #1

There was a song in the eighties titled "Things that make you go hmmm". The line really caught on because people realized there are a lot of things in this world that make you stop and think. And go hmmm. Usually with a furrowed brow. For example, I was watching an expert in back to schol stuff for kids being interviewed on a morning news show yesterday. She explained in earnest the importance of stretchy book covers and the wisdom of a backpack that had an ipod holster on the strap. Now so far I've counted four things that "make me go hmmm" in this story.
Let's see if we're together on this.

1. There is such a thing as a back to school expert
2. It was on a supposed "News" show
3. The necessity of stretchy book covers
4. The wisdom of an ipod holster on a backpack "so kids can listen to it on the bus or walking to school" (an actual quote) because we all know that kids would never listen to them in the actual school building and MY child would NEVER listen to it in class. I don't care what the teacher says. Yeah, I'm kinda fixated on number 4.

The glittering jewel in this collection of mind numbing tripe was when the host - interviewer made the startling revelation that "You can get these anywhere they sell them." I am NOT making this up.

Alright, now that we understand what can make you go hmmm and the type of people we're dealing with, here's my thing.

When the price of gas started going up about seven weeks ago, every media institution kept us up to date of every one cent rise in the price of gas. Every day we were told the highest price per gallon in the country.

Well, if you haven't noticed, over the last two weeks gas has gone down forty cents, at least in my area. If you drive you've probably noticed this.

Have you noticed the media coverage on this? Neither have I. Hmmm. So gas goes up thirty cents in five weeks and it's the worst conspiracy not proven in the history of man. Gas goes down forty cents in two weeks and it's not worth the medias time to cover it. Why would that be?

That's my hmmm this time. I would really like to hear other peoples thoughts on this matter.