God at Work

God prepared Paul for his ministry by changing his view completely. Now that he can understand both sides, he got to make a valid argument. Another thing is that he had dual citizenship and that would help him get out of trouble. I think that God can use me by sharing my knowledge in his word because I go to a Christian school and I have an opportunity to go to church every weekend.

Christian Persecution – Parker Fenton

We did a project and presentation on Christian persecution. I had a lot of fun working with Kyle and Zack. We had the country of Yemen where many Christians are persecuted because of what they believed and I learned a lot about it. It is really sad that they are persecuted for what they believe.

 

Here is part of our presentation 

Science Tower

Our tower is pretty good. We ran into a little trouble when Zack broke one of our supports but we fixed it. I am a little concerned about it staying up and supporting the egg but I think our tower will do well. Overall our tower is pretty good.

Jerome’s Problem

We came up with the problem because Micheal had the same problem with his phone.  I was not surprised by the result because the screen protector was for an iPhone 6 and he tried to put it on an iPhone 8. So there was pretty much no way it would fit and he should just get a screen protector for the right phone. 

Chain

I think that we have a good chain and it will work well. I think the best part of the chain is the pipe cleaners because they are the strongest and they do not snap easily. I think the weakest part is the string because that snapped a few times in testing and the pipe cleaner held the weight pretty well. We did not use the craft sticks because we could not really make links out of them.

Beginning of the Year Reflections

One thing I have enjoyed so far  in 8th grade is the MS Chapels I really enjoy when a speaker comes in and or we get to worship God in a lot of cool ways. One thing I am looking forward to this year is basketball in the winter  I really enjoy playing and I hope we have a good season. I love playing with my friends and by myself. One thing I have learned is that we are the leaders of the school and we need to set a good example to all the other kids in school and have integrity to the right thing all the time.

Our Boat

In science class we made boats out of materials in the project room. We got race them against our classmates to determine our grade. We used a pontoon type boat with two sails out of index cards. Our best time 9.26 seconds and our second trial time was 11 seconds. Our idea worked pretty good and got the second best time in our class.

My Summer

This summer was a lot of fun I really enjoyed it. I went to Canada with my family and I enjoyed it so much we saw a lot of cool things. We went to a lot of state parks there we went to most of them. We got to climb up a side of a waterfall and it was really cool. I also got to go white water rafting which was a lot of fun. I also played a lot of soccer this summer. I played on a really good team and had a lot fun. We won a lot of games and came in second in our league which is pretty good. I went to Traverse City to hang out with my Grandparents at the beach. The water was pretty cold but I enjoyed it a lot because it was hot outside.  Overall I really enjoyed my summer and did some pretty cool stuff.

Invictus movie reflection

I saw reconciliation in the movie when the black and white community, in the end, found a way to get along with each other in rugby. I think that is really cool considering that each community disliked each other at the beginning of the movie. I

 

I think one character in the movie that changed was one of the bodyguards when Nelson Mandela hired professional bodyguards to help them but in the end, they started to become friends and get along as they did not like how they did their jobs differently. But in the end, they met the trained professionals learned to do it the way the original bodyguards did it.

Africa reflection

My thoughts on Africa before doing the lesson was that everyone had to walk to get water and there was always civil wars breaking out. I now know that Africa is a very diverse continent with some very poor countries and very rich countries as well. I learned that a lot of the children in Africa have a hard childhood as many die before age one. Many people don’t own cell phones in a certain country and many people do not have internet like the most of us do in the United States. I also learned that there was also segregation in Africa similar to like what it was like in the United States. In South Africa a small part of the population was Dutch and they took control of the country by putting limits on the native people of South Africa. I really learned a lot about the continent of Africa today.

WTWW project

Police Violence

 

Police violence is a problem today and it was 64 years ago when the civil rights movement started. Although it has gotten better it is still a big problem in the U.S. as this problem killed 1,147 people in 2017 alone (Mapping Police Violence ). That is a lot of people in one year and I am going to tell you a little bit more about this problem.

   There are solutions to this problem as more and more police stations are banning chokeholds and strangleholds and are requiring their policemen to warn before shooting. Which could potentially lower the death rate. This points out that there is a concern about this problem and the police stations and local government is trying to fix it.

This is not the only side of the problem as most of the victims are unarmed and are 30% of the cases of police shootings and many of the cases went without punishment or jail time. This is a big deal because in some of these cases of police violence they killed an unarmed person. That’s a big deal because some cases they little to know reason to shoot at them one example is Quentin Barksdale’s story  who lived in Arizona, was shot by an off-duty state officer for being a “suspected burglar” then his family is pleading the case because they claim that he was fixing his old car with a ski mask on. He was found unarmed and the off-duty officer was not charged with anything for killing Quentin for no reason.

   This shows a lack of justice in our world as there are many other cases like this. I have respect for police officers as they protect us from crimes and disasters but I think that they need a more strict system about how they use their guns and how they restrain criminals. Because it just isn’t fair how some people are being treated by officers.    

 

Credits:

Mapping Police violence

WZZM13

MLive

 

Europe Simulation

The tough thing about being a tourist is having to go through customs everytime you had to pass through a country.  Another problem I faced was getting to the U.K. which meant I had to go to France to do that and that made no sense to me. As a worker, it was kind of frustrating when there was a lot of people at your desk because they were all talking to you at once. I think the benefit to controlling your own country and having control of their own situation is you do not have to worry about the other countries laws or rules and you can do it however you want.

Something is Rotten

I choose an apple because That was the start of sin and Adam and Eve tried to hide it. That only made it worse and they were sent away from God. I feel like we can be like Adam and Eve sometimes and hide our sins. We try hiding our sins by blaming other people or lying about it. That only makes it worse and gets us into only more trouble. So we should ask for forgiveness and take the blame for what we have done wrong.

A Symbol of a Lamp

I chose the sun because God’s presence is an ever-burning lamp. Just like the sun because we rely on the sun for food and warmth. It is there all the time for us just like God even at night time when we don’t see it. God can be like that too sometimes we feel like he is not with us but he is. He is constantly watching over us and guiding us in the right direction.  I feel like this fits in with the Israelites because God was always present in their lives leading them through rough times and good times. So we just have to remember that God is always with us.

Sinai Law

 

I chose a soccer ball because that can be a distraction from God for me. I feel like I always need to be getting better and always working on how I can be the best but, I need to be more focused on God. I need to see what he want me to do to honor him whether that be hanging out with family or friends or leading someone in the right direction. I feel like this fits in the with the Israelites because they had golden calves and it distanced them from what they were supposed to be doing. I feel like soccer does that to me sometimes. So the lesson of this is to make sure you remove any golden calves and set time aside for God.

Slide to Destruction

I chose a snowball rolling down a hill because something little can turn out to be something big. This can be a good thing or a bad thing. Whether a good or a bad thing the little things add up so if you are doing small sins they can lead you to get into big trouble. If you do little good things it can put you in a great spot. It can lead to you being successful or being a bad person. I feel like this fits with the Israelites because they did a lot of little bad things and it led them into exile. So you can choose your own path and you should be aware of what you are doing.

 

Conflict and Doubt

 

I chose the Bible because I when I doubt God sometimes this is where I go. I also pray because both of these things brings answers to your doubts. I feel like this fits in with Moses when he doubted God because God always came to save them or fulfilled the promise in the end. This also fits with fits with Abraham when God did not fulfill the promise until

Covenant

 

I chose a Christmas tree because

I believe the best covenant is Jesus. I think that he was the ultimate covenant and he saved us all and brought us closer to God. I think this fits in with the covenant because God made a promise that he would send a savior. Jesus was one and he is coming back and that was the promise Jesus made.  I also think this fits in with the Covenants the God makes because he always fulfills his promises. That’s what makes God great

Call

 

I chose a lightbulb because I feel like God calls me to be a good example and give good ideas. Not ideas that will get people in trouble or that are bad but that will lead to good things.  I feel like this fits in with our Bible lesson because God calls us to be in his image. Sometimes, we do not really do that to get to a spot where we Think that we are in a more popular or better spot but really when you look back you feel stupid. I think that we should have the standard to be more like God and act like he would.

Density Column

 

This is my density column

This is the liquids from bottom to top:

  1. Corn Syrup (clear)
  2. Dish Soap (Blue)
  3. Water ( Green)
  4. Vegetable oil (yellow/Clear)
  5. Rubbing Alcohol (red)