Stuff That Matters in Life

I remember having heart palpitations since junior high. As an adult, I asked my doctor about it, wore a 24-hour heart monitor, and was determined to have Premature Ventricular Complex or PVC. Whenever I go see the doctor and my pulse routinely checked, the nurse is often baffled by my irregular heartbeat. The doctor would say it’s nothing to worry about.

According to About.com PVCs are extra electrical impulses arising from one of the cardiac ventricles, usually the left ventricle.

Sometimes the presence of PVCs indicates an inherent electrical instability in the heart, and therefore indicates an increased risk of sudden death. These dangerous PVCs are generally limited to patients with significant underlying heart disease.

More often, PVCs do not indicate any inherent problem with electrical stability, and are completely benign.

I’ve always been told that my PVCs are not a cause for alarm. However, the last few days, the PVCs have been especially strong, resulting in headache and fatigue. They say that the anxiety associated with feeling the PVCs causes more symptoms as well.

In case I have the dangerous kind of PVC and die suddenly, I want you to know I love you all, and hope I’ll see you all in heaven with Jesus.

I’m sure everyone is writing about 9/11 today; I’ll add some of my random thoughts about life.

I believe that war and violence is a part of this life. Our hearts are full of selfishness, impure motives, and wickedness; there can be no peace. Whether it is global peace, national peace, or inner peace, there is no utopia. We are always on the edge of another tragedy -bombing, fatal car accident, terminal cancer, child abuse, rape, murder, the list goes on.

However, I am glad to have grown up where war and personal violence has not touched me. I live a suburban life with Little League and air conditioning. I cannot stomach blood and gore of any sort, real or Hollywood. I stayed away from watching The Passion and Saving Private Ryan (except for those few scenes always shown as an illustration for sermons).

Yet, I still take many of my comforts for granted. Heck, I complain when my internet connection is down for an hour, and when I can’t find good Mexican food for lunch.

I think I’ll stop here and go do something positive.

The post at Trey’s blog about church being a jerk factory made me sad, sad because it’s all too true.

Why do we see quarrels within the church? Why is there gossiping and bitterness in the church? Shouldn’t the church be a place of refuge from the “jerkness” in the world?

One of the comments on Trey’s post made a poignant point – “There seems to be a jerk in any group of people. If I am in a group and cannot find a jerk, it just could be that I’m the jerk in the group. (This was not a direct quote, but Rick Warren has said something like it. I thought it was both funny and true–at least in my case.)”

“Waking up trying to be a little more kind, more generous, more interruptible, more forgiving, more humble, more civil, more tolerant. Do these things and prayer and worship will come alongside to support us.”