KiNgOfGoNdOr1990's Xanga

What To Get Marty For Christmas or His Birthday

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 01:51:52 GMT

As in past years, I'm just making and posting this list to bless you and make your life easier. Don't get me something now if you weren't already going to get me something because that would be making your life harder. It's cool.

a Nerf gun -- particularly a small, sneaky one that would be useful for dominating Jeremy Yuan's FCBC Assassin tournaments.
steel acoustic guitar strings -- I've been using electric guitar strings for Garrett (my acoustic guitar) that are thinner than usual acoustic guitar strings; I don't like it anymore, but I keep putting off going out to get new guitar strings...
a cool belt
compact disks (CDs) -- refer to the list in the prior blog, or get me a copy of your favorite CD (unless you think I already have it)!
Eragon (Christopher Paolini) -- one year for my birthday, my parents got me Eldest (sequel to Eragon); I have no idea why because I never expressed any interest in the series and have furthermore never to this day read Eragon nor Eldest, but I guess as long as I own Eldest, I might as well get Eragon too, and then I an start reading this acclaimed series...
a Greek New Testament -- I'm taking Greek (yes, like, the language) this year, so... let's put it to use!
a metronome
stuff to bake -- In Yukai Daiko (the UCLA taiko team I'm in) we do a lot of bakesale fundraisers. It would be nice to have a hearty stash of things to bake for those.

Music Compact Disks (CDs) "Wishful" List (in alphabetical order!)

Wed, 03 Jun 2009 19:43:38 GMT

Last updated January 3, 2009...

*italics means they're fairly new releases; bold means i want them a little bit more than the rest...

Afters, The - I Wish We All Could Win
Afters, The - Never Going Back to OK (February 26, 2008)
Anberlin - Blue Prints for the Black Market (2003)
Anberlin - Never Take Friendship Personal (2005)
Barlow Girl - Home for Christmas (2008)
Bethany Dillon (self-named) (2004)
Casting Crowns - The Altar and the Door (August 28, 2007)
David Crowder Band - All I Can Say (1998)
David Crowder Band - Remedy (September 25, 2007)
Echoing Angels - You Alone (2007)
Falling Up - Crashings
Falling Up - Dawn Escapes
Falling Up - Exit Lights
Falling Up - Captiva (October 2, 2007)
Foolish Things - Let's Not Forget the Story
Happy Christmas 2005, Volume 4 with Switchfoot, Mae, Relient K, Hawk Nelson and more!
Hawk Nelson - Hawk Nelson Is My Friend
Jonah 33 (self-named)
Jonah 33 - The Strangest Day
Kutless - Hearts of the Innocent (March 21, 2006)
Kutless - To Know That You're Alive (June 24, 2008)
Lifehouse - Who We Are (June 26, 2007)
Phil Wickham - Cannons (October 2, 2007)
Relient K - Let It Snow, Baby Let It Reindeer (October 23, 2007)
Reserved 16 - Reigning Shadows
Reserved 16 - The Mayday EP
Seven Places - Hear Us Say Jesus
Starfield (self-named)
Starfield - I Will Go (March 25, 2008)
Stellar Kart - We Can't Stand Sitting Down (July 26, 2006)
Switchfoot - Oh! Gravity (December 26, 2006)
Ten Shekel Shirt - Risk
Tenth Avenue North - Over and Underneath (May 2008)
The Click Five - Greetings from Imrie House
The Michael Gungor Band - Battle Cry: Worship From the Front Lines
The Michael Gungor Band - Ancient Skies
Thousand Foot Krutch - Phenomenon
Thousand Foot Krutch - The Flame In All Of Us (September 18, 2007)
Three Cord Wonder - The Jesus Rock Show
Unexpected Gifts: 12 New Sounds of Christmas with Kutless, Chris Tomlin, Steven Curtis Chapman, David Crowder Band, Starfield, and more!! (September 26, 2006)
Vineyard - Live Unplugged Worship: Comfort
Veggie Tales: Veggie Rocks! (February 2004)

SUMMER BREAK!!!! ...in four weeks...

Thu, 14 May 2009 08:25:08 GMT

So I was trying to study today (as I do almost every day -- the "try" part, I mean, but not necessarily to exclude the actual act of studying), but despite having set aside every tangible distraction and having isolated myself with my academic texts in a small, plain, rectangular study room accompanied by naught but a table and chairs, I found it absolutely impossible to focus. Though my outward eyes had nothing stimulating to turn to, my contemplative mind made up for their emptiness in a gazillion anxious thoughts about...

SUMMER BREAK!!!

Ah, it stands four weeks away from me. So close, yet so far. And I thought the end of high school would be the last time I would find myself considering such a paradox. What a lie.

With that, I recalled how I had dealt with this difficulty in past years. With the prospect of a temporary, three-month liberation close at hand, it had always been a motivating factor, driving me to push through the final weeks of academic torture with my greatest diligence and most expending effort, knowing that salvation and rest were near in coming.

Then I wondered if elderly Christians feel the same way.

As I do consider myself to be a disciple of Christ, I believe that this life here on earth is temporary and fleeting. I personally was at a time separated from my Maker who from the start I had natural reason to love, thank, and obey -- in essence, to worship. But I screwed it up. When my Maker told me not to lie, not to covet, not to lust, I decided I didn't care about what He told me to do. I wanted to do things my own way and forge my own destiny. And as the completely perfect and holy being who my Maker is, in His own perfect nature He could not tolerate coexistence with my iniquities, and the natural consequence of them was death. My death. My eternal death. I was dead. And there was nothing I could do about it.

But for no other reason than His stubborn, irrational love for me, He gave His own son's life for a nobody's life. For a slave's life. For a rebel's life. For my life. I don't know of any other masters who would give their lives for their runaway slaves. But now, through the gracious sacrifice of my Master, our relationship has been reconciled. He's shown me that He is more than just my Maker and my Master, but also my Hope, my Deliverer, my Friend, my King. He's my God. I daily rejoice that our relationship is assuredly unbreakable and that we will forever be in bliss together. He waits for me, His beloved slave, to enter eternity in His presence.

But not yet.

This "good news", the gospel message, about what God has done for me is not meant to be kept to myself. It needs to get out there. It needs to reach the ears of everyone out there who hasn't heard it yet. It needs to capture the attention of everyone's who distracted by the pursuit of things that are passing away and that don't mean diddly squat in eternity.

And how's it supposed to get out there?

God chose me. And all His other useless slaves. No pressure.

And that's essentially the reason why I'm still here on earth. Yeah, that's it. That's it.

Now if only it happened that simply.

Not everyone is so ready to listen to what you have to say. And naturally, you can't really blame them. Really, who wants to admit to being a useless slave with an entire lifetime purposed to telling others that they're also useless slaves? It's much more attractive to think that you can create your own paradise with your own success accomplished by your own hard work done by your own two hands.

Too bad that's a lie.

But again, no one is going to swallow that because I said so. So if people won't listen to my words, I'll just have to show them through my actions. I'm going to set myself apart from what the rest of the world says is good. I'm not going to pursue respect or wealth or attention. I already have everything that matters from God. Then when I'm distinct from everyone else, they'll see me. I'm going to love the way that I've been loved: proactively, ungrudgingly, unceasingly. Then when I love them, they'll listen to me. Then when I share the gospel, the rest is between them and God. But most of all, I'll do all of that with great and exceeding joy (which, as opposed to happiness, is constant) in light of what God has already done for me.

Now if only it were that easy.

Despite being redeemed and reconciled with God, I'm still living in the exact same physical body and life that I was living before I was saved. I still have an innate desire to violate the basic principles that God gave me for my own good and do the very thing that started this whole mess in the first place. By His continued grace, He will forgive me again and again, over and over, but that doesn't make it acceptable. Sin grieves the heart of God and I am repulsed by it. And when I'm not, I'm even more repulsed that I would be so wicked as to take so much away from God, my Friend, and yet still tolerate the very thing He hates.

So I seek accountability. I ask other brothers who share this same frustration in their own relationships with God to encourage me, support me, and spur me to goodness while I do the same for them. But the reality is that they're human too and they can't be around me 24/7. As I daily rejoice in my relationship with God, I am also striving against the desires of my own flesh. This I will do for every day of my life on earth. Every. Stinkin'. Day. Of course, there are good days and bad days, good times and bad times. I'm blessed when someone who's been going to church for his whole life finally understands the gospel for the first time in college. I'm sorrowful when someone rejects the gospel and dies in a car accident the next day. But even though every day poses its unique challenges and even though life is hard, I know I'm not exerting myself for nothing and I know I won't be doing this forever. I'm always mindful of the bigger picture, the bigger goal, the bigger prize once I finally and sweetly die: eternal rest and holy communion with my Lover.

And that's why I wondered if elderly Christians feel the same way. (Get it?)

I hope that when I'm elderly, I will.

Wednesday, May 06, 2009

Wed, 06 May 2009 21:31:04 GMT

So like most of my past summers (and maybe even more so now), I don't have any major plans for this upcoming summer: no summer school (because it's an oxymoron), no mission trips, and basically, lots of open time. Usually I procure a list of things I'd like to accomplish with my abundance of free time and succeed in accomplishing about 5-10% of it, which of course, on a straight grading scale qualifies as an epic fail. So here's my plea for someone to help me change that. If there's anyone else out there reading this that's finding themselves in a similar predicament to make the summer vacation looming just beyond the horizon the most productive one yet, I propose we be accountability partners! I don't have any specific demands about what exactly that might look like or entail, but something is surely better than nothing, so don't hesitate to click that "Add Comment" (or whatever it says) so we can keep each other accountability for a productive summer today!

...

All right, we'll see if this actually works... What!? I'm still typing!? Dope!

Monday, March 02, 2009

Mon, 02 Mar 2009 08:08:06 GMT

*lets out a giant sigh after reading all the happy birthday posts on my wall. wheww!!

I was basically MIA on Facebook this whole weekend until just now, and I come back to 99 notifications (it might actually have been more but FB just couldn't display more than two digits in that little notification-displayer thing). I had to hit the "Show More Wall Posts" button twice. I was so overly overwhelmed. I smiled. I laughed. But I didn't cry... because I'm not that manly. I realize that this is my first birthday with a Facebook (I didn't want to get one until I knew what college I was going so as to honor its original intended purpose to be used by college students) so this might just be an overreaction, but... too bad! But seriously, especially hearing from people that I haven't seen/talked to for a long time or even those that I never talked to that much at all was a huge treat. I genuinely wish I could write individual notes to each of you thanking you and catching up with you (and at the same time sleep tonight and not fall asleep in my Chem and Math lectures tomorrow morning), but unfortunately, this will have to suffice.

In the past few months I've gotten a new perspective on birthdays. Typically, I usually viewed birthdays to be a day when everyone appreciated the respective "birthday-ee", period. I still absolutely think that should be so, and you might even take a spiritual perspective on that (as I do) and more specifically appreciate how God has blessed that person and used her/him to bless others (like yourself). But what about from the angle of the birthday-ee? Mostly since growing into adolescence and dying to selfish ambitions of the flesh, I starting looking to the day of my birthday less and less as a 24-hour period to be on a public pedestal on a day that in reality is no different from the other 364 days in the year, and I started replying to "Happy birthday!" wishes more and more with barely mumbled variations of "Thanks..." that are more like groans. Is this making you depressed reading this? Yeah, it's making me depressed writing it. Ha!

Luckily, I was inspired to make this prospect of my birthday not about me at all, but, on the contrary, about EVERYONE ELSE who has been a blessing to me, who is being a blessing to me, and even who have yet to be a blessing to me. I have so much to be thankful for (we all do) and I never take enough time to reflect on it all and give credit (or glory) where credit is due. So I want to make my birthday one more opportunity to stop, be still, and be thankful. And you all just made that so easy by coming to me! So... THANK YOU UBERLY TO EVERYONE WHO WISHED ME A HAPPY BIRTHDAY whether it was in person, through a phone call (even if I missed it and haven't called you back yet... hehe), through a text, through Facebook, through Email, or through whatever else because there's so many ways to do it these days! I LOVE YOU ALL!!!

I probably could've have said all of that in far less words, but you know I just wouldn't be the Martin Thurman Fong that you all love enough to wish a happy birthday if I had. :)

Tired, hungry, and needing to pee.

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 00:53:53 GMT

That's how I felt in my math lecture this morning. Ugh, Mondays.

My harmonies always sound better when it's just me and my iPod.

I hate my History of Science class...

Pet Peeves... and then some.

Thu, 05 Feb 2009 06:36:19 GMT

I can never remember my pet peeves when I need to (usually for random ice breaker games), so I'm going to write about a couple that I remember now in the hope that when I actually need to remember one or a few, I will. (Why the heck are they called pet peeves anyway? I remember the first time I heard that term... I was so confused to say the least.)

Sitting in the back of a minivan while trying to have a conversation with someone in the front (or vice versa). Especially when you're moving on the freeway, you just can't hear half the things being said without shouting and straining to hear. Eventually, you just keep your responses shorter than you normally would because it's just more convenient that way and the conversation fades away. Boooo...
Having too many open windows at one time (on your computer, not actual windows, haha). I always try to keep them to a minimum and close a window as soon as I'm done with it. Other people (who don't) constantly pile up their open windows every time they're on the computer until you can't even read on the bottom what each one is anymore, and it drives me crazy!

OK, that was technically a couple (2). So now, a few just random things about my life:

Stuart visited me yesterday! It was super random. But super awesome!
I've only been back home once so far this quarter.
I am so procrasinating writing my midterm paper for my "Introduction of the History of Science" class right now because I HATE IT!
I was going to write more things, but I can't remember them now.

Aiite, back to work now...

Friday, January 02, 2009

Fri, 02 Jan 2009 07:11:06 GMT

I apologize to all authorities of Hi Koi who held an opinion that I was in any way disruptive, misplaced, or plainly out of line coming back to visit your Friday night meetings the perhaps one too many times that I did. I certainly did not intend for any harm, mayhem, or disapproval to result from my presence and observation, but it simply brings me joy and excitement to be able to glimpse on a Friday night upon which I find myself unoccupied how God continues to bless Hi Koi by allowing it to operate as a fellowship that brings our high school students closer to God and to each other in ever creative fashions. Nonetheless, in hindsight, I understand any concerns, voiced or not, about my current lack of belonging there and its repercussions towards the Hi Koi body and would like to again apologize and clear up any conflict of interests, giving my word that I will no longer visit your meetings without a clear, significant, and approved purpose.

I do not want this statement of mine to become more public than it should nor do I desire to pinpoint specific indivduals as recipients of this message and (in either case) risk causing more unnecessary commotion than I may already have. This is largely why I decided to use Xanga, with its general yet dwindling audience, as my medium of communication for this apology. In that same spirit of discernment, Reader, I ask that you might bring this apology to the attention of anyone you know of who held or holds a relevant opinion on this issue who would not otherwise likely come across this. Thank you.

Best wishes for the remainder of the Hi Koi year!

Saturday, December 27, 2008

Sat, 27 Dec 2008 07:25:19 GMT

So I managed to put this continuation blog off until after Christmas, which is just as well, because I'm certainly not about to conclude and insist that we should stop exchanging Christmas gifts, although I did find a number of people on various on-line discussion forums about this very topic who have resorted to the total abandonment of this tradition, and so for their sake and others who are similarly minded, I'm certainly not going to insist that everyone must exchange gifts either. I believe that everyone has their own convictions so that there is no one correct interpretation or response to Christmas, and that the motive is more important and telling than the actual action (or lack of action). All I really want to urge in conclusion is that we don't let the holiday custom of exchanging gifts become a mundane habit that we instinctively stress about every year, but rather annually rediscover a meaningful reason to do so. I still don't quite understand how the wisemen's gifts over two thousand years ago led to a solid tradition celebrated in multiple nations throughout the world (although I'm sure the answer is somewhere out there and I will keep looking for it), but as long as the practice is here, it is nonetheless an opportunity to show appreciation to those in our lives who have blessed us and a possible means of sharing the Gospel with those who have not yet embraced the hope, peace, joy, and love brought through the Christ child. Maybe the real conclusion then is that, like many things in life, we don't have all the answers and we don't need all the answers to act purposefully with what is given to us.

Saturday, December 20, 2008

Sat, 20 Dec 2008 00:46:23 GMT

Dude, I do not know what to get anyone for Christmas this year... (a slight exaggeration, but very slight indeed) a dilemmic situation which forces me to ponder the possible futility of the whole notion of gift-giving at Christmas without realizing its roots and its purpose. If I'm not mistaken, the first incident of gift-giving at Christmas from which today's widespread, traditional practice is derived from, is the presentation of gifts from the wise men (gold, frankincense, and myrrh) to the newborn baby Jesus. (The idea that God gave us the greatest gift of all during this season (His only Son, Jesus) is used to illustrate salvation using the concept of gift-giving because it's now a common cultural practice, but that's not the actual archetype from which the cultural practice of gift-giving at Christmas is derived from.) But in fact, the Magi who paid homage to the Christ child did not show up at His manger-side (like bedside, haha?) the very night He was born together with all the shepherds as the classic Nativity scene falsely suggests, but instead, they actually visited Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus days later, supposedly on the day of "Epiphany," twelve days after Christmas (from which the carol "The Twelve Days of Christmas" originates from). Perhaps I digress. But the ponderment remains: how does the giving of gifts to Jesus from some number of humbled wisemen (because don't really know how many there were; it's just a folly assumption that there were three because there were three gifts) translate today into giving gifts to each other? It appears to be a selfish embellishment of a righteous gifting and a subtle distraction from the One who is truly deserving of our time and effort -- altogether a practice that has been developed and mindlessly adopted over the years. Honestly, we justify that it's okay to exchange gifts by insisting that we want to appreciate and show our love for one another, which of course is nothing wrong in and of itself, but I wonder if we spend too much of our time, our thoughts, our money, ourselves appreciating each other and not enough appreciating the true "Reason for the Season." Or as my tagline atop that has remained unchanged for quite a few years now puts it, "It's not until the good king is removed that you can see the greatest King of all."

So where does that leave us?

You'll have to wait until I blog again to hear my conclusion.

But in the meantime, I'd love to hear your own thoughts and also have any of my information corrected. Comment away!