While I know it is far from the norm for me to stray from a standard column outline made up of one organized thought structured with three points and an odd joke, I will now give a potpourri of Mark Applegate Bizarro-world insight into the Christian experience from my recent trip to the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Structured in a bird-shot shotgun pattern, I pray that God (very) supernaturally helps you find something useful in the process of reading my thoughts, and that somehow He might get infinitely deserved praise from my ramblings. Off we go...
Random thoughts from electronics paradise in Sin’s playground.
1. About Las Vegas itself: If you have never been to Las Vegas, let me summarize the experience with a word...indulgence. There is opportunity for indulgence, or overindulgence, of everything, legal or otherwise, in America today located in one sprawling city. In the process of my diet last year in which I lost weight in 49 out of 52 weeks, my biggest failure came at the hands of the Vegas Buffet monster. Indulgence in food, of course, is not the only option. During the same weekend every year of the CES is the largest pornography convention in the world. In a lovely twist of fate, I was saddled with this convention sharing a convention complex with half of the CES. “CEScool” sharing a place with a “cesspool”, if you will. I wish I had time in this column to share my opinion of pornography, but, suffice it to say, I consider it the biggest problem in the American church today. I work on computers often from Christian brothers and sisters with this garbage on them, and I get both sad and angry. We should know better! It is an incompatible situation to be Christian and view pornography (Please read 1 John 3). I am not one to somehow legalistically attempt to restrict Salvation by adding some sort of works requirement. That being said, being “of the Devil” in this passage leaves one wanting to test himself ala 2 Corinthians 13:5+. As an overview, however, one can certainly tell the difference between the attendees of the CES and the porn convention (insert your own joke here!).
2. As you fly into town from the east, you spend seemingly endless minutes chewing on outrageously expensive airplane peanuts (yeah, they charge for the snacks on the plane...just waiting for the pay-toilet to really get me steamed!) flying over desolate desert terrain. Sure you are blessed with a glimpse of the amazing Rocky Mountains, but they give way to brown, dead soil leading up to Vegas. Within a half hour of town, you fly over the Grand Canyon and Lake Mead, both stunning sites from the sky, as I am sure they are more so from ground. The town of Las Vegas is surrounded by beautiful Mountains and nature that screams “God” like enormous and beautiful natural Evangelists of the highest order. To look around the area from land or sky makes me quake at God’s supernatural Creation. The God that can create a mountain or carve a canyon numbers the hairs on my head (Matthew 10:30). While the job of counting the hairs on my head is becoming easier with each passing day of the financial crisis, it is still amazing that such a HUGE God care for me (read all of Matthew 10). In addition, to quote Todd Friel, how one can believe “that the Earth began with from nothing, became something, exploded, then became an organized everything” requires far too much faith for me. Evolution (and, similarly, global warming...brrrr, have you been outside last week?) one day will be laughed at and mocked in the same way we laugh at those who postulated that the world was flat and you can’t sail too far or you will fall off it. The same One who made the planet will see to it that it doesn’t get snuffed out indiscriminately.
3. While certainly not the reason to become a Christian in any fashion, one of the cool things about being “Born Again” is God’s Plan for Fellowship. I was really down in Las Vegas. My wife called and said the pilot light was broken in the furnace and they were cold, the van was beginning to assume rigor mortis, and my personal finances are a wreck. Being on a business trip “shopping” for the coolest technology on Earth and being broke is a challenging combo in itself. I missed my family and I had just walked a 1.7 million square feet building and looked at approximately 1800 booths, leaving me sore and tired. I had had hundreds of shallow sales pitch presentations, but no real conversation for two days. Waiting in line for a free opportunity to be in the audience of Jeopardy’s Tournament of
Champion taping, I was feeling rock bottom and bummed out. We had been waiting for an hour to be seated so I struck up a conversation with a man in line that turned out to be a Christian couple formerly from Hollister, Missouri on one side of me and a Christian man who lived blocks from the “Applegate Trail” in Oregon (settled by my Great, Great, Great Grandpa). God knew exactly what I needed, and I was thankful! By the way, Alex Trebek is both delightful and real. I asked him of his opinion of the parodies of his show on Saturday Night Live (a show I should repent of), and he said he loved the show and was sad that the star that depicted him took the $22 Million and left the show to make movies. Watch for me on March 18th...I am the cheesy guy waving like a goober from Missouri that hadn’t ever been on TV before.
4. Upon reflection, I find myself not unlike Jonah angrily waiting for God to smite Las Vegas. Sin is flaunted there. Prostitutes and pimps surround the CES show. Porn magazine racks litter the town. Rampant gambling makes financial ruin of many who visit there. What goes on in Vegas may stay in Vegas, but it makes God angry in the process. So I sat (sit) on the edge of the Great City like Jonah (read the whole book of Jonah again...it is short and has one of the greatest miracles in
the Bible located in it...the salvation of everyone in the biggest town in the world...in addition to a story about a big fish) hoping God will avenge His honor with fire from Heaven! Then it hits me. God should smite us too. Sin is sin. The sin I have committed in this piece alone in failing to revere God’s Name in the way I should, puts me in a state no better than Vegas or Nineveh from Jonah’s time (Read James 2:10). Stockton, Missouri is as deserving of a Holy God’s wrath as anywhere else. But He tarries instead...amazing grace! What’s more amazing, He died for us as a substitute penalty for the sins we committed. What an exchange! We get His Righteousness imputed to our account and He takes our sin debt and pays for it in His Blood. How can any of us not bow our knee to someone who loves us that much, and repent of our sins and trust Him for our eternal destiny? Email if you have questions about this process to markapplegate@alltel.net.
It was an amazing trip, as it is every year, but I am glad to be home. We have it good in Cedar County! Join me in being more thankful for Grace this year! God Bless and happy Inauguration week!
Random thoughts from electronics paradise in Sin’s playground.
1. About Las Vegas itself: If you have never been to Las Vegas, let me summarize the experience with a word...indulgence. There is opportunity for indulgence, or overindulgence, of everything, legal or otherwise, in America today located in one sprawling city. In the process of my diet last year in which I lost weight in 49 out of 52 weeks, my biggest failure came at the hands of the Vegas Buffet monster. Indulgence in food, of course, is not the only option. During the same weekend every year of the CES is the largest pornography convention in the world. In a lovely twist of fate, I was saddled with this convention sharing a convention complex with half of the CES. “CEScool” sharing a place with a “cesspool”, if you will. I wish I had time in this column to share my opinion of pornography, but, suffice it to say, I consider it the biggest problem in the American church today. I work on computers often from Christian brothers and sisters with this garbage on them, and I get both sad and angry. We should know better! It is an incompatible situation to be Christian and view pornography (Please read 1 John 3). I am not one to somehow legalistically attempt to restrict Salvation by adding some sort of works requirement. That being said, being “of the Devil” in this passage leaves one wanting to test himself ala 2 Corinthians 13:5+. As an overview, however, one can certainly tell the difference between the attendees of the CES and the porn convention (insert your own joke here!).
2. As you fly into town from the east, you spend seemingly endless minutes chewing on outrageously expensive airplane peanuts (yeah, they charge for the snacks on the plane...just waiting for the pay-toilet to really get me steamed!) flying over desolate desert terrain. Sure you are blessed with a glimpse of the amazing Rocky Mountains, but they give way to brown, dead soil leading up to Vegas. Within a half hour of town, you fly over the Grand Canyon and Lake Mead, both stunning sites from the sky, as I am sure they are more so from ground. The town of Las Vegas is surrounded by beautiful Mountains and nature that screams “God” like enormous and beautiful natural Evangelists of the highest order. To look around the area from land or sky makes me quake at God’s supernatural Creation. The God that can create a mountain or carve a canyon numbers the hairs on my head (Matthew 10:30). While the job of counting the hairs on my head is becoming easier with each passing day of the financial crisis, it is still amazing that such a HUGE God care for me (read all of Matthew 10). In addition, to quote Todd Friel, how one can believe “that the Earth began with from nothing, became something, exploded, then became an organized everything” requires far too much faith for me. Evolution (and, similarly, global warming...brrrr, have you been outside last week?) one day will be laughed at and mocked in the same way we laugh at those who postulated that the world was flat and you can’t sail too far or you will fall off it. The same One who made the planet will see to it that it doesn’t get snuffed out indiscriminately.
3. While certainly not the reason to become a Christian in any fashion, one of the cool things about being “Born Again” is God’s Plan for Fellowship. I was really down in Las Vegas. My wife called and said the pilot light was broken in the furnace and they were cold, the van was beginning to assume rigor mortis, and my personal finances are a wreck. Being on a business trip “shopping” for the coolest technology on Earth and being broke is a challenging combo in itself. I missed my family and I had just walked a 1.7 million square feet building and looked at approximately 1800 booths, leaving me sore and tired. I had had hundreds of shallow sales pitch presentations, but no real conversation for two days. Waiting in line for a free opportunity to be in the audience of Jeopardy’s Tournament of
Champion taping, I was feeling rock bottom and bummed out. We had been waiting for an hour to be seated so I struck up a conversation with a man in line that turned out to be a Christian couple formerly from Hollister, Missouri on one side of me and a Christian man who lived blocks from the “Applegate Trail” in Oregon (settled by my Great, Great, Great Grandpa). God knew exactly what I needed, and I was thankful! By the way, Alex Trebek is both delightful and real. I asked him of his opinion of the parodies of his show on Saturday Night Live (a show I should repent of), and he said he loved the show and was sad that the star that depicted him took the $22 Million and left the show to make movies. Watch for me on March 18th...I am the cheesy guy waving like a goober from Missouri that hadn’t ever been on TV before.4. Upon reflection, I find myself not unlike Jonah angrily waiting for God to smite Las Vegas. Sin is flaunted there. Prostitutes and pimps surround the CES show. Porn magazine racks litter the town. Rampant gambling makes financial ruin of many who visit there. What goes on in Vegas may stay in Vegas, but it makes God angry in the process. So I sat (sit) on the edge of the Great City like Jonah (read the whole book of Jonah again...it is short and has one of the greatest miracles in
the Bible located in it...the salvation of everyone in the biggest town in the world...in addition to a story about a big fish) hoping God will avenge His honor with fire from Heaven! Then it hits me. God should smite us too. Sin is sin. The sin I have committed in this piece alone in failing to revere God’s Name in the way I should, puts me in a state no better than Vegas or Nineveh from Jonah’s time (Read James 2:10). Stockton, Missouri is as deserving of a Holy God’s wrath as anywhere else. But He tarries instead...amazing grace! What’s more amazing, He died for us as a substitute penalty for the sins we committed. What an exchange! We get His Righteousness imputed to our account and He takes our sin debt and pays for it in His Blood. How can any of us not bow our knee to someone who loves us that much, and repent of our sins and trust Him for our eternal destiny? Email if you have questions about this process to markapplegate@alltel.net.It was an amazing trip, as it is every year, but I am glad to be home. We have it good in Cedar County! Join me in being more thankful for Grace this year! God Bless and happy Inauguration week!
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