Anthony has Lunch with Anthony

 

Anthony 06= Anthony, year 2006

Anthony 16= Anthony, year 2016

Time travel is very complicated. It involves a lot of science and weather and math…it’s just all very boring and uninteresting. So, I’m just going to spare you all of those details and jump right into the meat of this lunch date. Having arrived back in the year 2006, I was looking forward to meeting up with myself from 10 years ago; it had been a long time, I was excited to catch up with him. I pulled my white Hyundai Santa Fe next to his white Nissan Pathfinder, at our consistently favorite place to eat…Jimmy Johns. I walked in. I ordered. I looked around for him. Finally, I saw him in the corner, texting away on his silver and blue Nokia brick phone. This was going to be fun.

Anthony 16– “Hey.” I said as I sit down.

Anthony 06– “Ah, legit! You made it ha. Nice button up shirt; you look all fancy.”

Anthony 16– “Thanks, we wear these a lot now. Nice beanie, but you know…it’s kind of warm in here. You can take that off if you want.”

Anthony 06– “Nah, I’m good. We look fresh in beanies!”

Anthony 16– “Right, I forgot. We wore beanies a lot…even in the summertime.” I said as I rolled up the sleeves on my shirt, preparing to eat.

Anthony 06-“Whoa! We get tattoos? That’s legit! Let me check these out.” He examines my arms. “That’s sweet ha. I think I want to get some piercings. I think that would be so cool!”

Anthony 16– “Yeah, you should meet up with 2009 or 2010 Anthony sometime. We pull them off pretty well.”

Anthony 06– “Nice! So, what’s 10 years into the future like? Is it crazy?!”

Anthony 16– With a mouth full of sandwich and BBQ chips, I proceed to tell my younger self about the years to come. “Well, it’s not too crazy I guess. We’re finally getting a movie with both Batman and Superman in the same film. So that’s pretty cool. Everyone gets offended pretty easy in the future, so just gear up for that. Oh! And you know that girl from that Hannah Montana show that’s getting ready to come out? Yeah…things get really really weird with her.”

Anthony 06– “Well, speaking of girls…are we married in 10 years?”

Anthony 16– “Yup. We sure are.”

Anthony 06- “To who?? I’m pretty sure I know. I’ve been praying about someone.”

Anthony 16– “Well, I’m pretty sure you don’t know. And you know I can’t tell you that. I can’t do anything to alter the time stream because…well I know you’ve heard this before 100 times in movies because I’ve seen all the movies you have!”

Anthony 06– “Just tell me! Is it the girl from Keva Juice?”

Anthony 16– “Um no. It’s not Keva Juice girl. You’ll know who she is because she’s the most beautiful woman you will ever meet. And I can say that as a fact.” I said with a smile.

Anthony 06- “Ahhhh yeah! Ok, do we have any kids? And where do we live?”

Anthony 16– “Yes we do! They’re awesome! (His face reacted to the fact that I said, they’re). And trust me…you would have no idea where this town is even if I told you what its name is.”

Anthony 06– “Where do we work? Like, what do we do for money ha?”

Anthony 16-” Um, well what do you think we do?”

Anthony 06– “I think we ended up writing for tv shows! Dude! Did they end up making our show, Style K: The hoverboard-riding teen action hero??”

Anthony 16– “Well…we definitely write a lot at our job.” I then pulled out my phone to check the time.

Anthony 06– “Whoa. What is that thing? A new Game Boy?”

Anthony 16– “No, it’s called an iPhone. You’ll probably start hearing about these things next year. We still call them (phones) for some reason, but they’re more like little computers in your pocket.”

Anthony 06– “Ah legit!” He said, grabbing my phone and successfully entering the password.

Anthony 16– “What are you doing?”

Anthony 06– “You said this is like a computer right? Well, I need to check my Myspace! I just updated my page layout and I gotta see if I got some profile views.” He looked up for a second and must have noticed the almost disgusted look on my face. “What? Don’t you guys still have Myspace? Oh! Who are your top friends now? Does Taylor Swift still make the cut?”

Anthony 16– “She wouldn’t. And…umm well most of your friends are married now and most of them have kids. So I guess you could say we don’t really have much time for Myspace anymore.”

Anthony 06– “Lame!”

We continued on with our time together. We talked a lot about the future of LA Lakers, our ever growing love for and relationship with God, why Anthony 06’s frustrations with Blockbuster Video would soon disappear forever, what direction the last few seasons of Scrubs take while I encouraged him to check out a sophomore show called The Office, and we wrapped up by discussing his current transition of Nikes shoes to Vans.

Anthony 06– “Ugh. I’m so hungry ha.” He finally said.

Anthony 16– “Wait, you haven’t eaten yet? I just assumed you ate before I got here.”

Anthony 06– “No I haven’t. Taco Time hasn’t given us our paychecks yet. You should use some of that…what ever you do…money to get me some food! Feed yourself!”

Anthony 16– I forgot how much of a mooch I was. “Fine,” I said getting up from the table.

Anthony 06– “Wait! Before you get in line, I have to ask one more question.”

Anthony 16– “What is it?” I asked with curiosity.

Anthony 06– “Umm…do we still think Pokemon is cool?”

Anthony 16– I looked around to see if anyone was listening. When I saw that the coast was clear…I replied with a whisper “secretly, yes.”

 

 

 

You Will Do What You Want

 

 

 

What the heart wants, the will chooses and the mind justifies– Ashley Null

At the end of the day, I’m a firm believer that you (assuming you’re a mentally healthy, functional member of a 1st  world, progressive society) will do what you really want to do. “But Anthony! I want to fly, I can’t fly!” “But Anthony, I wanted to win the lottery; I didn’t do that!” you may be preparing to write in the comment section. But slow those typing fingers down. When I say “you will do what you want to do” I’m not saying “If you really wanted to, you could overcome all of the laws of physics, beat any odds, or defy common reality itself.” What I am saying is, your actions will have reflected the true desire of your heart in that given day or time.

For example, let’s talk about work. I’m sure, there are many days when you don’t want to get up to the sound of your alarm clock, put on pants, and stroll off to another 9,10,12 hour day at the job. So, if that’s not what you want to do…why do you go? Because, even though on the surface you didn’t want to go to work, on a deeper level there was still a “want” that got you out the door. You wanted to earn money for whatever reason. You wanted to avoid getting fired. You wanted to provide for your family. You wanted to maintain the lifestyle you have now etc. You see, by going to work you still did what you wanted to do. Odds were that nobody came to your house, held a gun to your head, and forced you to go clock in. Nobody says you can’t leave all that you have and just go live in a cardboard box at the end of the street. For whatever reason, you went to work because you wanted to.

I’ve been involved with a lot of Bible studies throughout my life and most of them have taken place in the evening after we got off work. I (or someone with a connection to the group) would invite people. Some would come check it out and some wouldn’t. Some of the one’s who didn’t come had a lot of different reasons behind why they weren’t able to make it (hey life happens, no harm no foul). Some of the reasons would be “I can’t find a sitter for my kids” or “I just got off work and I’m tired.” The interesting thing was, these same people always seemed to be able to find a sitter when there was a party or cool event going on. I would run into the same people who said “I just got off work and I’m tired” coming out of the new showing of a superhero movie at 10:30 pm on a work night. Now, I’m in no way making a point to say “I was judging these people” or looking to shame them for not coming to a Bible study, not at all. These examples simply got me thinking, “what was the real reason they didn’t come?” And I believe one of those reasons was, they simply didn’t want to. The things we truly want to do, we make happen.

This is why, I believe, the Bible talks so much about God’s concern for our hearts. Throughout scripture, you see the Lord warning us to “guard our hearts.” Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it– Proverbs 4:23. The “heart” basically represents our spiritual centers. Who we are, our desires, motivations, and affections stem from this part of ourselves. A lot of people believe the Bible is a book all about actions…the “do this or don’t do that book.” In reality, this is false. The Bible is a the story of Jesus and how we willingly came to live, die, and rise from the dead (not to solely redeem or actions) but to ultimately redeem our hearts. Because from the lake of our hearts flows the rivers of our motivations. This why you may see Christians do certain things that could seem a little weird. As Christians, we willingly give up some football time to go to church on Sundays, we give away our money, we read and believe in the validity of an old book, we close our eyes and talk to someone we can’t physically see, we gather with some other weirdo Christians and hang out. I know it’s odd! But here’s a secret, most honest Christians (there’s some who pretend just to seem super holy) will tell you that sometimes, on the surface, we don’t always want to do those things. We don’t always, want to go to Church, pray, read our Bibles, etc. It’s true! So, why do we do it then? Well, because we have a deeper want that we desire to full fill. This want is to bring glory and honor to our good and loving God. We go to church because our deeper want is to worship Him with others, we read our Bibles because our deeper want is to know Him more, we give our money because our deeper want is to live in obedience to Him, we pray because our deeper want to be in relationship with Him, we gather with other Christians because we want to live out God’s design for us to be in community. We do those things because we want to…when God gets ahold of your heart, it changes what you want to do.                        Love God and do what as you please– St. Augustine

So, at the end of the day…you will do what you want to do (what you deeply want to do). What does this look like for you? Take a look at your motivations for what you did today. Why did you do what you did? Think about it. Or don’t…either way, you’ll do what you want 😉

 

Star Wars, what’s been the big deal?

 

Let’s talk about records for a second. At the time this blog was written, Box Office Mojo reports that Star Wars: The Force Awaken (the 7th film in the franchise) currently sits as the number 1 grossing movie in the U.S. at $819,687,937 and climbing ever week! It stands as the number 3 highest grossing movie of all time at the worldwide box office at just under 2 billion dollars (about 400 million behind Titanic and a billion behind Avatar). It was the fastest film of all time to reach a billion dollars (12 days). And those are just a few of the many records this movie has broken.

But forget about records, if you haven’t been living in the stomach of a Tonton for the last year, you’ll know that this movie has been everywhere! People have been going crazy about this film! I know many people who’ve never seen a Star Wars movie in their life but marathoned the other 6 (God bless you for getting through the prequels) just so they could head into the most recent movie and be a part of the action. Heck, I went to a Wednesday afternoon, WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON, showing of this movie with my siblings, two weeks after the movie premiered, and we had to to sit in the very front row in a nearly sold out theater! It was crazy! So, with all that in mind, I’ve been asking myself a question…why exactly has this movie exploded the way that it has?

Now, before I get all deep, let me just say that I know there are a ton of factors to consider when talking about this movie’s success. A lot of people grew up on these films; they’ve played a big part of people’s lives and our pop culture for a long time. That’s all very true. Also, I have to recognize the fact that it was an overall good movie! It currently sits at a 93% on Rotten Tomatoes, and if it was up to me…I’d give it a 4.5 out of 5 Croz’s (maybe one day I’ll actually do some Croz Blogz movie reviews). But a lot of people really liked this movie as a film! There are plenty of other reasons as to why this movie has had the success it’s received…but I think there’s another big reason which has contributed to all of this:

People long to be a part of something.

You see, many industry analysts have described this film as more than a movie…they describe it as an event! Being a part of the conversations meant that you were a part of what the world is talking about! Many people wanted to see the film as soon as they could because they simply didn’t want to be left out of the hype. This is way many people have begun to get into Star Wars, marathoning all of the movies and familiarizing themselves with all of the lingo, because nobody wants to be left out of the water-cooler conversation. But we see this not just with Star Wars…we see this in many different ways every day! Remember the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge? It was a great cause and I’m thankful for all the money raised for those with sclerosis; however if most people were being honest, a lot of their motivation behind participating wasn’t to raise awareness for an illness, as much as it was to be apart of the latest social media craze. It’s been reported that teenagers spend up to 14 hours on their phones every day! Many people (teens and adults) literally can’t put down their cell phones for more than ten minutes without developing this subconscious fear of missing out on the latest Facebook, Twitter, News outlet, or Snapchat post. A lot of us simply can’t bare the thought of being left out and left behind.

So, if this is all true… why are we like this? The Bible tells us that we as humans were created special and wonderful by God in His own image (Genesis 1:27). And we see that God Himself is a God of community. He is one in three persons (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) and His heart’s desire is to be in community and relationship with us. Even when sin came into the world, God chose to bridge the gap between our rebellion and His perfection through Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. He truly longs to love us! He also created us to be in community with others. He often describes the uniting of His people as a body, a family, or even as stones being built up together. This is where a lot of the desires of our hearts come from. A lot of secular studies have even come to the conclusion that loneliness and isolation can end up being unhealthy and deadly to the human psyche. We were created to be in relationships with others and ultimately God; this is what our hearts are longing for.

Unfortunately, because we live in a world of brokenness and lies, a lot of us have fallen into the trap of thinking we need to work to be accepted by others. “We need to keep up with the latest trends, otherwise, we’ll be left out!” “We need to act and look a certain way because this is what society says!” “I may not know it, but I need to see Star Wars because this is what my friends, the media, and the world is talking about! If I see this movie, maybe in some small way, I’ll be accepted.” I understand that this may not be the case for everyone when it comes to this flick (this movie just got me thinking about this topic). However, I think if we’re all honest with ourselves, we all do/act/feel certain things out of the desire to be a part of something. Thankfully, even though this effort often feels like a tiring day of chasing after the wind, God remains open to us with a heart full of love. He desires to fulfill this need we all have, and He does it in a way that says “I love you, accept you, welcome you, and want a relationship with you, not based on what you’ve done/seen/look like/…I welcome you into community with me simply because I truly do love you.” This blows my mind every day, especially with how counter-cultural this is for us.

So, go and enjoy the galaxy far far away…just remember that you are loved and accepted unconditionally by someone really really close.

The Pajama Interview

This was it. The interview of a lifetime. This was my chance to sit down with the great and awe-inspiring Sawyer Supp, on the week of her 4th birthday no less! The moment was here! She arrived still in her pajamas, her hair still affected by a long night’s sleep; this woman knows what it means to command a room with her presence. I welcomed her into a chair at my cool, gray interview table. She sat. She waited. I exhaled all of my anxieties away. It was time; I began asking my questions.

“Question one,” I said strongly to show some sense of my authority to Miss Supp, “So, you just turned 4…what are your big goals heading into this new year?” She took in the question. She thought over it slowly, with great patience. She was like a  wine connoisseur taking in a fine sip of Cabernet Sauvignon. I sat waiting for her answer with great anticipation. “Um, to give this beautiful girl a kiss!” She finally responded as she leaned over and gave her little sister Evaleigh, who was also present at the time of the interview, the best Eskimo kiss I’ve ever seen. I was so blown away! What humility! What compassion! I had never seen such selflessness in my life. It was no wonder the past three years of her life had been so lucrative

“Question two, who is your favorite person?” She sat there, not answering the question, for a great deal of time. You could tell this question interested her very little. It seemed like even the curtains on the wall were more attention grabbing than my interview skills. I began to sweat. Was I blowing this opportunity? No, I couldn’t end it here. “What person would you want to be like when you grow up?” I said, rephrasing the question…hoping to land a bite. “Um, my mom!” She finally answered. Yes! She took the question! Now time for a quick follow-up. “Why?” I quickly asked. “Because she goes like this…” she said as she got up from the table and began to shuffle her feet. She was doing some kind of dance! It was pure art! There were so much history and culture in every step; I couldn’t believe my eyes!

After trading chairs (I made the mistake of sitting in a red chair at the start of the interview, everyone knows Miss Supp loves red! It was a rookie mistake) it was time for question 3. “What is your favorite animal?”This time, she quickly responded by saying “a giraffe!” I went right to the follow-up question that landed me previous success, “why?” She squinted her eyes. You could tell she was in deep, deep thought. I couldn’t wait! The anticipation was killing me! Would she bring up the beauty of a giraffe’s long and majestic neck? Would she marvel at the fact it’s the tallest land animal in the world? Is she amazed by the fact that giraffe’s tounges can reach over 45cm long? What was her reasoning? I had to know! “Why?” I spoke out with anxiousness, “Why?!” You could tell I had worn her down with my intense style of journalism because she came out with her answer. “Because, they go like this…moooooo!”

It was time for our another question. “Why do you love Jesus so much?” She simply smiled; I could tell this was an easy question for Miss Supp. She calmly replied by saying “because He loves us!” I too joined in with a smile after hearing this response. It was a great answer.

Finally, I was down to my last questions. I was gearing up to ask Miss Sawyer her thoughts on the current situation involving America’s economic climate, but before I could get another word out…she had to make a statement, “ok that’s it! No more!” She dashed away from the table faster than the average giraffe (which some are known to get up to 37 mph if you didn’t know). She had decided the interview was over. She went and poured herself a nice piping hot teacup full of imaginary coffee. As I sat at the table, wondering if I should consider that interview a success or not, I heard someone calling out to me from the distance. “Come on and have coffee with me!” I couldn’t believe my ears! It was Miss Supp; she was inviting me over for a beverage! I hurried over and sat down. She poured me a cup, and I have to say (off the record of course) it was the best cup of pretend coffee I’ve ever had.

 

 

 

Croz Blogz…ok, but why?

 

As I look at the Christmas tree I still need to take down, I start to think….

“Hmmm, trees.”

“Squirrels live in trees.”

“Squirrels are kind of like chipmunks, right?”

“There’s a new Alvin and the Chipmunks movie in theaters right now.”

“Movie Theaters have popcorn.”

“Popcorn is food.”

“I’m really hungry. I want eggs.”

This is a typical example of how my brain operates. Personality exams, I’ve taken in the past, would describe it as a brain of a creative, original, and unique person. They would say this is a good thing because “you can see and interpret the world in a different light, resulting in innovation and the ability to bring a different perspective to things.” I agree with these analyses. I believe God created us all unique, with different giftings and personalities…all for the sake of bringing a different piece of the pie to the table of collective worship of Him and loving others. That said, even with all of those positives of a mindset/personality, because we live in a broken world there’s inevitably going to areas where there needs to be personal growth. For someone with my personality, a lot of my growth is going to come from the fact that I can get so stuck in my own”originality.” I trick myself into thinking there’s nobody else who can understand and relate to me because heck, I’m so original…who could?!(Lie) And this can cause problems because I can get so stuck in my head I forget to allow myself to relate with others. I want to grow in this!

The Bible talks/shows often how growing in the Lord personally is an essential part of the Christian walk. Sometimes trees are used to illustrate this point (we grow, we produce fruit: Ps:1, Jer 17:7). And because my desire is to always seek growth as a Christian, husband, Father, Pastor etc. I took a lot of time to pray about how I could push myself through this particular area of being fine with just camping out in my own head. I want to be that tree that grows to produce a lot of fruit. Hence Croz Blogz!

Croz Blogz is my way of looking to open myself up with you all! I want you to think about what I’m thinking about! I want to relate with you and I want you to relate with me! I’m dedicating myself to sharing with you what’s on my heart and mind every week until God says I need to stop at least! One week I may talk about something I’ve been praying about for awhile, the next week I may want to share my thoughts on how awesome it is going to see Batman and Superman in a movie together for the 1st time (March 25th, my calendar is marked!) I might even talk about why I chose a lighthouse from my logo (there’s good reasons behind that). My goal isn’t to win a Pulitzer. My goal isn’t to have a million readers or to become the next Perez Hilton (that would be weird in a lot of different ways) My goals are to grow myself, relate with you all, and heck…maybe even have some fun in the process!

So, Planet Earth…stay tuned for Croz Blogz. I promise it will be anything but normal.