1. Your First Post – My first post on here is one titled The Importance of Something Different. It talks about the importance of having a passion away from your field of work, to allow your mind to have a break.
2. Post you enjoyed writing the most – I think this would be The On this Day… series of posts, which highlighted an important musical event that happened on that day, for example this post on Belgian Composer Gossec
3. A post which had a great discussion – The post which has had the most comments is my Pachelbel’s Canon arrangement, which I’m highlighting below, and they are mostly comments thanking me for the arrangement. So instead, the one in which I had great discussion was A Christian Gamer? which had a couple of really good quality comments on the post.
4. A post on someone else’s blog that you wish you’d written – How to walk through Steel-Enforced walls. A great post that highlights some of the struggles we face every day. We have our own steel-enforced walls, and we have to find ways to walk through them.
5. A post with a title you’re proud of – “Shoot-em-ups” don’t kill people. People keep claiming that First Person Shooters are games that mass-murderers are likely to play, but that’s a long leap of logic. It’s not the games, it’s other issues in their lives. Don’t blame the games.
6. A post that you wish more people had read – Has Twitter decreased our internet safety. I believe that URL shorteners are a huge security problem that hasn’t fully been looked at. Being able to look at the URL in a status bar is a big part of judging the safety of the link. I think more url services need to add something like the TinyURL preview function, or have Internet Browsers filter shortened URL’s to show the URL they are redirecting to.
7. Your most visited post ever – my arrangement of Pachelbel’s Canon for Solo Violin is by far and away my most popular post, having had over 1700 views since I uploaded it, at an average of 108 views per month. I’m very pleased with this arrangement, and glad that so many violinists have been able to get use of it in a variety of situations all across the world.

There we go, 7 links to 7 posts. If you haven’t read them, have a read, there’s some great posts (if I do say so myself.

While I can understand why this is necessary to ensure security, the method in which this is done has drawn criticism. Currently, refugees are sent to Christmas Island, to be held in a detention centre which is, in all senses of the word, a high security prison. The asylum seekers are kept here until their claim is approved, in which they get moved to the main land, or declined, in which case they are deported back to their homeland.
Where this plan is currently failing is that asylum seekers can be held in detention for months on end, in a high security prison, on an island where there is no fresh food available, with no guarantee upon when they will know whether they will get out of the centre – either into Australia or back home. Without that guarantee, they run into mental breakdowns, mental scarring that will affect the rest of their lives.

The craziest aspect of all of this is that the politicians believe this policy change will deter asylum seekers from coming to Australia via boat. However, our policy changes make absolutely no difference on what asylum seekers think, mainly because the news doesn’t get through to them, and conditions in their home country are so bad that anything – even detention in a high security prison are much more preferable.

The solution to this situation is to remove the politics from this issue, for the two major parties to sit down and develop a humane policy for asylum seekers that will treat them like human beings, while still being secure about who enters Australia.
The way I think this will look like is establishing a deadline by which a decision must be made on the status of an asylum seeker. While I would prefer that to be along the lines of 3 months, more likely it will be 6 months. If there are too many claims to be processed, then more workers should be employed to process these claims in the time required. Setting this time period will give asylum seekers the knowledge of when their claim will be processed by, and also ensure that detention centers do not get overcrowded.

Remove the politics. Insert humanity.

Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

I’m sitting in Soto espresso, a coffee shop in Perth, drinking a coffee that tastes fantastic.
Actually, it would probably taste fantastic if they served me international roast, I’m feeling that good at the moment. Well, maybe not. International Roast is horrible.

Anyway, I’ve had a fantastic week that goes a long way to helping me forget the previous six months. Come back with me on a journey, back to January 2010. I’ve gone on holiday and am just outside Mandurah. I get an e-mail from a school that I taught violin at. It’s a week before term starts, and they inform me that they don’t have any students for me, and I won’t be required to teach in 2010.

Fantastic. Way to ruin a holiday. Knowing that a week out from term I was unlikely to find any work as a violin teacher, I turned my hand to looking for jobs in where I had experience – administration. “Surely, with two years experience as an administrative assistant, I should be able to find an admin job” I thought.

Or so I thought.

Three months in, and not even a glimmer. Not an interview. I eventually asked someone at the salvos if they had a job going, and there was a 0.6 position opening up. I applied, and was chosen for interview. “Fantastic! Finally a chance”
After giving what I thought was a really strong interview, I was really disappointed not to get the job. Like, super disappointed. Since becoming a salvo, I hadn’t missed drinking, but that day I really wanted one. I was strong, somehow, and had a coke instead, but it didn’t help the feeling. And I know a beer wouldn’t have helped either, but sometimes you feel like it can.

So back onto the search, and the jobs kept getting applied to, and I kept not getting interviews. My fiancée and I started to think about getting a house, and after finding one, was about to fill out the application only to discover that we didn’t really have enough to survive. We could make it, but it would be tight.

At this time, I was sending in about 10 applications a week, sometimes more, sometimes less. And still nothing. Until I found this job with the uniting church. It was a fantastic job, doing similar to what I was doing at the council of churches. So I applied, was accepted for interview, and then didn’t get the job. This time, I wasn’t so disappointed. I guess all the rejections had kind of made me expect to not get the job.

Eventually, my fiancée and I decided it was time to bite the bullet and apply for a rental. We found one we loved, and put an application in, not expecting much. How surprised we were to get a phone call later that day, telling us that we got the house!

My good news wasn’t to end there though. God had been with me all the time, and had a plan for my life. Later that day, I got a phone call offering my a job interview for a position at my old church. I accepted, but God had more in line for me, not just a job interview, but a job!

The next day, I got a phone call from the Uniting Church, saying that the person who got the position I applied for earlier didn’t work out, and they were as good as offering me the position pending an interview the next day.
I of course accepted, rescheduling my planned interview time just in case it didn’t work out. I needn’t have worried, after going over the new job description, they offered me the job, and I now start on Monday.

So, in less than a week, I have gone from working two days a week, wondering how and where we were going to live as a married couple, to having a house to rent, and a job which takes me up to full time equivalent! I’m so incredibly happy that I even wrote this long blog post all on my blackberry while sitting under a heater at soto’s getting slightly uncomfortably warm.

And with that done, I think I’ll go, have a bit of a walk along beaufort st, before picking up my fiancée from work (whom I now work close to, three days a week) and start a wonderful weekend moving into our house!

My priorities during rehearsal are also somewhat different to those sitting next to me. I pay attention, sing, run through my part in my mind when the conductor is working with other parts, and stop singing when he requests. Others will muck around, not pay attention, and continue to sing for a little bit after the conductor has finished. We have different priorities, based on what we have experienced.

How do we reconcile different priorities between each other? Also, how do we reconcile when our priorities are different to what God’s priorities are?Jonah had different priorities than God. God wanted Jonah to tell the people of Ninevah that they were going to be destroyed. Jonah wanted to protect himself – fearing that if he went to Ninevah, he would be destroyed by the people there, who didn’t want to listen. He ran to the seas, and the Lord followed, creating a large storm. Jonah realised what was happening, and offered to have himself thrown overboard, where he was swallowed by a giant fish, and the storm calmed. He went to Ninevah and told them that they were to be destroyed. THe people of Ninevah changed their ways, declared a fast, and God changed his mind, and decided not to destroy Ninevah. Jonah was angry, annoyed that after risking his life, God did not follow through with what he had promised.

God’s priorities were different to Jonah’s. Jonah looked only for himself. He ran away because he was scared, he got angry because he saw his efforts as wasted. God had different priorities. Jonah 4:11 says “But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about that great city?” God cared for everyone.

In this example, God persisted at Jonah, and carried through his plans, and eventually taught him (Read Jonah chapter 4). But how do we find out what God’s priorities are? Wouldn’t it be easier if we knew what God’s priorities are, and aligned our priorities to be in line with his?

We find out God’s priorities through reading the Bible. I think that God’s number one priority is what he tells us is the most important thing. Mark 12:28-34 has Jesus telling us this:

“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”

Love. Love is God’s number one priority. Love God with everything that we have, and Love our neighbour – love everyone that you come across. In the same passage in Matthew 22, Jesus states “All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” All of the books of law in the Old Testament, every word that the prophets have spoken, it all comes back to those two commandments to Love.

If we align ourselves to Love, we align ourselves to God. When we align ourselves to God, we open ourselves to bringing his light to this dark world.

Edit – Just wanted to clean up the first paragraph. P.S. My fiancee rocks, and does enjoy Songsters – as we both do.

But a comment following on from my comments got me thinking. Commenter Andre said “You achieve no tangible results by attempting to convert people, and it is frankly crass, disrespectful, and downright insulting.”

Maybe it is. I know for me, I get a little bit annoyed when people try to convert me to another religion. So when talking about our faith with non-believers, should we consider a different tactic?

Christianity as a Band

A long time ago, a friend of mine told me to check out his Cousin’s band, Sounds Like Chicken. We had a listen to the CD, but it didn’t really grab me, so I left it alone. A little while later, while in the local Christian book shop, Koorong, I saw their next EP and thought that I’d give it another go. I had a listen and heard songs such as this one:

I really liked the CD, and started to get into them. Every time they came to Perth, I went and saw them, and really got into their music. They were (and still are) my favourite band, but have since broken up to pursue other avenues.

When we recommend a band to someone, or a movie, we’re telling them that we’ve discovered something we really like, something we’re passionate about, and we think that they might like it as well. If they don’t, that’s cool – we know that everyone has different tastes in their music, and movies, so that’s fine. But also, just like I eventually decided that I loved Sounds Like Chicken, even though I wasn’t really taken by them when I first heard them, we may later rediscover a band and decide that we now like their music, where as we didn’t before.

I feel that sometimes, we need to recommend Christianity much like we do music – especially when we’re amongst our friends. Be willing to tell people about this really awesome thing you’ve discovered – Christianity – but don’t be offended if they’re not interested in it. They may have different values. They may be in a different situation. As is often said – the seed has been planted, and though we don’t know how long it will take to grow into fruition, or even if it will survive, so long as we are planting seeds, the possibilities remain. And remember to allow the recommendations to rest if someone dislikes it. I know for me, the more someone continues to tell me something I don’t like, the more I dislike the idea, and sometimes the person.

For example, I was watching Sunrise one moring, and Howard Sattler, a talkback radio presenter for 6PR in Perth was discussing asylum seekers who arrived by boat. He was saying that we should send all the “illegal” arrivals back to where they came from, despite the fact that Australia has a legal obligation to assess all asylum seekers cases who arrive in Australia under the UN Refugee convention, and that if they are legitimate Asylum Seekers then sending them back to their home country would place them in more danger than they were originally in. The more Howard spoke, the more I disliked his idea, and the more I disliked him – to the point that I’ll switch off if he is on Sunrise now. Likewise, if someone is not interested in Christianity – the more we push it, the less interested they get.

Instead, convert with your actions. Live your faith, in every aspect of your life. People will see how you live and wonder “what makes them so different?” My beliefs brought me many opportunities to talk about my faith on Tour. Because I wasn’t drinking, it gave rise to a number of questions as to why. While I may not have pushed conversion on them, just by talking to them lets them know about Christianity – and the seed is planted. What they do with that seed, that is for the Holy Spirit to work on – whether through myself, or another person, or through the person themselves. The important thing is that we show respect, and not be, as Andre put it, “crass, disrespectful and downright insulting.”

As I have been thinking about it, I have decided to come up with some “Guidelines” – I don’t want to use the word Manifesto or Creed, as these are not necessarily beliefs. These guidelines are just some observations that I want to use to try to shape my gameplay into a more Christian role.

Firstly, I would call my beliefs Moderate to Liberal. I don’t believe that we should abstain from everything that is not in the bible. I feel that there are Christians who take what is written in the bible so seriously that it scares people away from Christianity. Yes, I believe the Bible is the word of God, and that we should read it, and embrace it, and know it fully (something that I am still striving to achieve), but I also believe that we need to read the bible in context – in the context of when it was written, and the context of how we apply it today. I believe that in reading the bible in the context of today, how we apply it to our lives, we must be willing to step back, and take a more general look at the meaning of the passage, of the chapter, of the book, and of the Bible in general.

With that in mind, here are my guidelines.

1. Get my priorities sorted.

Love the LORD your God with all your heard and with all your soul and with all your strength.

Deuteronomy 6:9

I have heard, in relation to becoming a priest, that your priorities should be “God First, Family Second, Church Third.” This way, you serve God, you provide for your family, and then you look after the church. It’s a matter of determining where your priorities lie, what you feel is important. This is reflected in the scripture above. Jesus said that this was the great and first commandment. Love God first, then your family (Ephesians 5:25; Proverbs 22:6), then the Church (Galatians 5:13). For me, while I enjoy Gaming, it shouldn’t come at the expense of more important things. If I haven’t spent time with God today, then surely my time can be spent better than playing some game. If I haven’t spent time with my family, then gaming surely can wait.  This then leads onto the second guideline:

2. Don’t  Get Obsessed

You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God

Exodus 20:4-5a
I have heard all too many stories of people becoming obsessed with games, particularly MMORPG’s such as World of Warcraft. I have even heard of Game Addiction Rehab Clinics in places such as Amsterdam. If I am not careful, I could be drawn into these games, and not realise it. Therefore I must remain vigilant so as not to become obsessed. Exodus 20:4 talks about false idols. In the context of the day, these were idols, statues that the people would make and worship, believing them to be gods. But in today’s society, our idols are much more secluded in nature. We don’t have physical golden idols, but we do have TV, computers, magazines, celebrities – things that take our focus away from God. The first guideline helps with this, ensuring that I remain focused on God and Family. I will never rush home to play my game (this includes searching for a computer because I forgot to water my Farmville farm – which won’t be a problem as I don’t play that).

3. Game in Community

Now we ask you, brothers, to respect those who work hard among you, who are over you in the Lord and who admonish you. Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work. live in peace with each other. And we urge you, brothers, warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, heal the weak, be patient with everyone. Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and to everyone else.

1 Thessalonians 5:12-15
One of the great things about gaming is that it brings you into a community. For me, I have a group of about 4-5 friends that meet up semi-regularly to play. For some of these guys, they might not go to Church regularly. By gaming with them, it opens up opportunities to chat with them about Christianity, and also to maybe invite them along to church one day. Gaming by yourself is fun sometimes, but that community aspect is one of the real joys of gaming. At the end of Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians, he gives the final instructions above. It all boils down to respect in your community. Verse 14 says “And we urge you, brothers, warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone.” For me, in relation to gaming, this verse is vital. For in community, we can chat to others about their issues, we can encourage the timid, be patient with everyone. We can make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, and try to be kind to each other and to everyone else (Verse 15). It is in community that we can follow God’s word. Hence, when we game, as often as we can we should try to aim to do so in community.

This also goes into helping others make sure that they don’t get obsessed with their gaming. Remember, the reason why this issue spoke to me was because there are people out there who are affected by games. People who do get obsessed, who can’t distinguish the difference between a video game and real life. By gaming in community, we can look out for the signs of these people, and – as Paul writes – “help the weak,” we can help them through any issues that they have, either through a chat, through possibly bringing them to Christ, or through getting them in contact with people who can help.

Conclusion

As I said, these are by no means a manifesto or creed – just some guidelines. So I would encourage others to suggest things that I might like to include. I haven’t tackled in this edition what games to play, as I feel that by following the above guidelines that it’s not so necessary – but perhaps you disagree. Does “Thou shalt not murder” include killing in video games? Comment. Discuss. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Easter Camp 2010 Poster

Over the weekend, I had the amazing blessing of being a leader on the Salvation Army Easter Camp. Running from Thursday Night until Monday Morning, we had an awesome time having fun, learning about God, and making new friendships. The theme for the weekend was Torn, based on the part of the Gospel story that when Jesus died on the cross, the curtain of the temple that shielded the Holy of Holies was ripped in two from top to bottom.

After arriving and registration, we had our first worship session. The worship team was rocking all weekend, and we belted out some fantastic songs. After some ice-breaker games, we separated into our small groups that we would be spending the rest of the weekend in. There were 9 small groups, based mainly in Corps groups, but some had to be split due to numbers. Eventually we started attempting to put the campers to bed. I’m not sure how the girls went that first night, but the guys were particularly difficult to get to bed. But hey, it’s the first night, you’re excited, you want to talk, you’re still finding out what makes your dorm-mates tick. Thankfully, the guys were rather tired after the next days activities.

Good Friday came and started with an awesome breakfast, from the CYC team. They provided awesome food all weekend. We then went off for morning worship, and heard from Edwina, an Intern with the Salvos, who shared her testimony. Then into small groups to discuss the subject of “Personal Access to God” The idea was that before Jesus died, the Jews believed that God was kept behind the Curtain in the temple in the Most Holy of Holies, and only a priest could go in there once a year to make an offering to God. But when Christ died on the cross, the temple curtain ripped in two from top to bottom, allowing us personal access to God.
Then it was onto Morning Tea, followed by an Adventure Journey, a number of short activites which allowed the small groups to get to know each other more, work as a team, and have some fun. There were activites such as Hoop Ball/Netball, Messy Games, Low Ropes, Chair Games, and more. Lunch interrupted these games, and was ended with Afternoon tea. We then headed into the Water Games, where we could see how far we could throw/catch a water balloon without it bursting, see how far we could slide on the water slide, and try dunk someone, or get dunked on the dunking machine. This was capped by a capture the flag style water balloon frenzy.
After some free time and dinner, it was time for the Evening Worship session, where guest speaker, Rowan Castle, Territorial Youth Secretary, would speak. Entering in silence, the Worship team kicked us into action with the tearing of the curtain, and pumped us up for an amazing night. Rowan preached on how much God loves us, and that there’s nothing we can do to stop him loving us. After the sermon, we split up into small groups for a quick discussion, and then when everyone was finished, they departed to get ready for the movie – Up.

Beach Volleyball on the Rockingham Mission trip

Saturday, and the theme was God Escapes. Again, breakfast and Morning Worship where we heard from my mate Christian. It was so awesome for me to hear his testimony  and to hear what God is doing in his life. We don’t often speak about how we’re doing spiritually, and it was great to hear where he’s struggling, and where he’s being incredibly blessed. Again, small groups, where we talked about what sort of things we could to to let God escape into our lives. Morning Tea, and then the Big Game, where campers had to go around completing different activities to get marked off, while a group of leaders could come and make them do one of those activities again if tagged. After lunch, we split up and headed into the community for Mission Trips. There were a number of different mission trips, including a Backyard Blitz at a lady’s house in Gosnells, Beach Mission in Rockingham, Car Wash in Mandurah, Tree Planting in Warnbro, and a letter box drop in Baldivis. I did the Letter Box drop, and it was great to be able to spread word of this Church in a new developing area. We had a lot of fun doing it, and completed our assigned areas in such a short amount of time that we went and did another area.
Free Time, Dinner and then our evening Worship, where we shared what we did on the mission trips. It was great to hear what the campers felt of their own mission trips, to see how something so simple can make a difference in peoples lives. Worship was followed by another movie – Astro Boy, as it was a bit wet and we couldn’t do the night games that were planned.

Sunday Morning arrived and I was up very early. I woke up at 4.30am to get ready for the Dawn Service. The Dawn Service script was written by Paul Marion (as it has been for a number of years) and this year it was looking at how the disciples felt between the period of Jesus’ rising and his ascension. Matthew, the tax collector and apostle, had gone back to collecting taxes. He felt rejected from his own people, but it was the only thing he knew how to do. Andrew likewise had gone back to fishing, and felt that he couldn’t see a way forward. Simon the Zealot had taken on the idea of Jesus’ revolution, but turned it slightly violent. Jesus appears to them and tells them that he had never left them, that he would always be with them. He sends them to Galilee, where he will send them out and give them a helper – the Holy Spirit – to be with them always.
Breakfast and then Worship with testimony from Jordan, who shared what God was doing in his life, and how he has been challenged in past Easter Camps. Small Groups then split up and discussed how we are sometimes torn in the decisions we have to make, and how we can turn to God to help us out. Then, being Easter Sunday, we had an Easter Egg hunt after Morning Tea. After Lunch, the guys and Girls split up into different sessions to talk about specific issues. Guys talked about stuff that makes being a Guy difficult, and Girls talked about stuff that makes being a girl difficult. It was during this session that a lot of people started asking questions, and thinking about God. Little did the leaders know what we were in store for.

Electives followed Afternoon Tea, where campers got to choose from different activities. I ran the Guitar Hero elective, where we played Guitar Hero (funnily enough). There was also Craft, cooking, rock climbing and Facebook Chat – in which the group chatted about the good and bad things about Facebook Chat. They later challenged everyone to step out and be different on Facebook, be positive and encouraging always.Freetime and Dinner, and then Evening Worship when Rowan was preaching to us again.

The Worship Team in action

The worship team was awesome and really pumped everyone up ready to hear Rowan. Rowan spoke about how being a Christian is often portrayed as being all easy, soft and fluffy, an easy ride. However, in reality, it’s actually a battle, and quite difficult. Often we get confronted with the choice between Good and evil, and the evil choice often seems easier. He called on us to be dangerous in our faith, to be living out there on the edge. He highlighted three things that keep us from God – Sin, Idolotry and Injustice. He then called on those who were willing to stand and agree to fight against Sin, Idoloty, and Injustice. I’d say 90% of the campers stood. The leaders went to pray with them, and afterwards, Rowan asked who made the decision to follow God for the first time tonight – around 10 campers stood, an awesome decision and so wonderful to welcome these youth into the body of Christ. Everyone, including a lot of the leaders, were on spiritual highs, being encouraged by the words that Rowan spoke, and the decisions that these youths made that night. A disco followed, where we could party, and have some fun.

Monday morning comes around, and it’s time to pack up. Small groups cleaned up certain areas, and then had some time to discuss about what happened this weekend and what they’re going to do to continue in their faith. We then had the wrap up final session to tie things together, and to encourage us on our way back into the world.

For a first time Easter Camper, and a first time Leader, Easter Camp was an amazing experience. Some of my highlights were meeting my small group, and seeing them grow over the weekend; taking part in the Dawn Service (including shooting the Dawn Service in 30 seconds); and having one boy share with me that he wants to become a Soldier of the Salvation Army, his decision to follow Christ, and to share that time with him was an incredibly blessing.

To all those that came on camp, I pray that you will be encouraged in your faith, and that you will not be shaken – as Frizz said “Faith that can’t be shaken, It’s unshakeable, that means you try to shake it but it can’t be shaken” And remember that if you need to chat, your small group leaders are always available, and always willing, and if not – I’ll always be willing to have a chat.

Because of Christ, you have put your trust in God. He raised Christ from the dead and gave Him great honor. So now your faith and hope are in God.

1 Peter 1:21

However, with the increased use of Twitter, has this lead to a lapse in Internet Security practices?

My main concern is the use of shortlinks, or URL Shortening Services. These have sprung up over the last year or so, and now there is a large number of these services out there – and often you can run one from your own website with very little technical knowhow. Even WordPress has one now, so that this page address which is

http://benclapton.id.au/2010/01/19/has-twitter-decreased-our-internet-safety/

becomes:

http://wp.me/pve12-55

Much shorter, and easier to put into a twitter message of 140 characters.

However, has this service made us lapse about our own personal internet security practices?

Prevention is the best form of Protection

Most people these days are aware of the need to protect themselves from nasty stuff on the internet by using Virus Scanners and Firewalls. While the best virus scanners will hopefully pick up a virus before it enters your computer, and hopefully most scanners will pick up the virus once it’s in your computer, and a firewall should prevent it accessing the internet to spread further, the best way to prevent viruses and trojans doing any damage to your computer is to build safe browsing techniques.

The first, and most important, skill is to know where viruses are likely to come from. E-mails with attachments that you’re not expecting, e-mails from people you don’t know – these should always be treated with suspicion. But websites are also potential virus traps. You should only visit websites that you trust, and Porn sites cannot be trusted. Also never click on pop-up ads, as these are often links to viruses.

One of the techniques I often use is to look at the address of the link that I’m heading to. Hovering your mouse over this link, you will see somewhere on your browser what address it is linked to. In this case, it’s a link to my site, which I hope you can trust. However, if I was to see that it was a link to http://somepornsite.com when I was expecting a link to a news article, then I’d be avoiding clicking on that link and probably avoiding going to the site I was on again.

What does all this have to do with Twitter Shortlinks? Well, as I’ve already said, twitter needs these shortlinks to fit within their 140 character limit.  However, when I view http://ow.ly/4hw9b I have absolutely no idea about the content of the page that it links to, and can’t see what the address is to gauge whether I trust it or not.

With the growth in popularity in Twitter, and the increased use of URL Shorteners, the average internet user will stop checking the address of pages to gauge the trustworthiness of that site.

So What can we do?

I’m always more welcoming to click on links shortened by TinyURL, as they have an option that you can set using the cookies on your own computer to always have TinyURL shortlinks redirect to a preview page which will say what address it will redirect to. Bit.ly has an extension for Firefox and Chrome that will display the page linked to and other selected data. However, While it is the responsibility of the internet user to do what they can protect their own safety, I feel that it should be the responsibility of those that run these URL shorteners to have an opt out of the preview page to ensure the security of their users.

But for now, here’s my 5 tips for users to Practice Safe Browsing.

5 Safe Browsing Practices

1. Ensure that your Virus Scanner and Firewall are always up to date and active.
2. Check to make sure your Virus Scanner has an active scanning function that will protect you from the majority of viruses trying to enter your computer.
3. Have a spyware scanner such as Spybot S&D installed and run it regularly.
4. Get into the habit of checking the address of links and judging their trustworthiness before clicking on them.
5. When Clicking on shortlinks, visit the shortlink host site (EG: http://ow.ly/dhf4k host site is http://ow.ly) to see if there is a preview function that you can use, or use something like the bit.ly preview extension for Firefox or chrome.

What do you think? Has twitter decreased our Internet Safety? What are some safe browsing tips that you use?

We were called down to the lobby around 6.40am, being told an accident had occurred. After we were told the news, we were told to call our parents to let them know we were ok, as names had not been released. At that point, I realised that the only thing I could do was pray. I had a quick prayer in the lobby, then headed up to my room to call my parents and fiancee. I then sent a message to a number of people in Perth, asking them to pray. I then prayed myself.

For about half an hour, I prayed forhealing for the boy still in hospital, I prayed for the boys families, I prayed for everyone on tour. Over the course of the day, I felt God’s arm around me continuously, feeling strongly his presence with each prayer sent his way from Perth.

I would pray often through that day, each time feeling a strong sense of peace through Christ.

It cemented in my mind that prayer works. Whether petitioning for healing, or other concerns, or just entering into communion with God, prayer can have incredile effects – sometimes what we want, sometimes what we need, sometimes an answer in a different form.

I will continue praying about this event, and would ask that you do as well.

I hope that you all had a wonderful Christmas, remembering the real reason for the season – Christ was born, who came to die for our sins so that we can have a full relationship with God.

However, I’ve been challenged in my thinking just recently. It was all sparked by the refusing of classification in Australia of Left 4 Dead 2. I was discussing this with my mum, arguing that I felt we needed an R18+ rating for games, especially considering that the average age of gamers in Australia is towards the mid-20′s and growing older all the time. I was saying that the people of are affected badly by violence in video games are in the minority, and generally have some underlying mental illness. My mum then used an argument on me that I had used to help me understand some new commitments in my faith.

I’ve recently become a salvo, and will become a soldier in February. As part of that decision, I have given up drinking Alcohol. Personally, having been drinking for a number of years now, I do believe that if used in moderation, alcohol can be fine, and can actually improve health. So for me, I needed a good reason to help me justify this decision – even if I didn’t find that reason for a little while after I had stopped drinking. The reason I found that responded with me the most was one of solidarity. I went to a lecture by a Lt.-Col from England who was saying that the reason Salvos don’t drink is as a stand – while people are harmed from it, then as a stand against it, we won’t partake in it. Likewise with Cigarettes, Drugs and Gambling – while there are people being harmed by it, we won’t take part in it. He postulated that if society came to such a place where people weren’t harmed by such things, then the salvos might review their decision, but in today’s society, that doesn’t look likely.

So how does that relate to games? Like with alcohol, many people are not harmed by it. Just like many people will drink responsibly, and only have one or two drinks, many gamers game responsibly, knowing the difference between games and real life, and many of them would never harm anyone in the same way that they do in the game. However, just like there are a minority of people who cannot handle alcohol responsibly, there is a minority of people who can’t determine the difference between gaming and reality. So as a Christian, do I take the same stand with my gaming as with my alcohol? The founder, General William Booth didn’t mention anything about gaming, because it wasn’t around back then. Like so many issues in today’s modern world, the bible isn’t specifically clear. When God said “Thou shalt not kill” did that apply to digitally created computer characters as well?

In doing a quick search for articles that might be able to help me, I found a site that did Christian game reviews. Great, I thought, until I started reading them. The only games that got positive reviews were games that were outwardly Christian. Obviously games such as Call of Duty and Left 4 Dead got reviews of 0 stars, but what drew the line for me was when it gave one of the world’s most popular games a 0 rating. What was this game? Tetris. It claimed that the game was designed to diminish the trinity, by having all the pieces having 4 blocks each, and it was designed to be impossible to finish. This makes it unsuitable for Christians? I don’t think so. Are Christian gamers relegated to playing games that are biblical based, and often with production standards far below the more popular games?

I don’t know the answer, and I’d love to hear some comments. For the moment, because I’m gaming for fun, and I know the difference between gaming and reality, in my mind my gaming is fine. I am open to hearing other opinions, and would love for this to stir some good discussion.

I’ve since published an update to my thinking. Check out “A Christian Gamer’s Guidelines”