Category: Inspirations

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Inspirations MetaV Personal stories The Christian

Startup Conversation

I love exploring new technologies, especially the ones still in “startup mode.”  Sure, I like the newness of it, but they also give me ideas that help some of my projects.  Lately I’ve been beta testing a technology that has led me to expand my thoughts on how to codify the conversations among biblical characters.  As an added bonus, I learned of it through a former roommate of mine who is now the lead developer.  That means I not only get to play with a new toy, I also get to help out an old friend.

One of their ideas is to re-imagine the way people navigate online discussions.  I’ll spare the details for now; just know that my experience has shown this encourages conversations to go on and on with multiple participants.  However, it shares a limitation common to almost all such tools: you can only directly reply to one person at a time.  The best workaround I’ve seen for this is to “mention” other people so they’ll get a notification of your message even if they aren’t in a “To:” box.

These limitations don’t exist in real-life group conversations.  Since I mentioned my goal of defining the conversational structure of biblical people, consider an example in that context.  Jesus is speaking with his disciples.  One of them raises a question or makes a statement that requires a response from their teacher.  Does he respond only to one person? He might, but often he will address the group.  Now, complicate it further.  A council is arguing theology among themselves. Jesus steps into their conversation, addressing the group to answer multiple questions with one statement. It’s not in direct reply to a single person or point.

Do you see that this could not take place using today’s online discussion tools?  True, replies can be seen by the world, but you must address your reply to a specific statement made by a particular person.  Incredibly, the oldest communication technology on the internet is the one that allows you the most freedom in choosing intended recipients: e-mail!  I routinely get a message that requires a reply and I choose to send it to more people than were originally included.  Conversely, I may get a mass e-mail but only respond to the sender.  Or, I may send it on to a completely new person.  I can’t do that as easily or effectively on Facebook, Twitter, Disqus, etc. Perhaps that’s one reason that e-mail just won’t die.

I can envision scenarios where tools that overcome those boundaries may improve upon real-life exchanges.  Maybe someone said something I really want to respond to but can’t because of an interruption.  By the time I find a break in the conversation, we’re on a different subject.  To speak what has been in my head that whole time would invite awkward stares.  To go back in time to an earlier point in a written dialogue might not be so awkward and I don’t have to worry about interruptions.  Everyone gets a turn to speak.  On second thought, maybe that’s not an improvement after all…

If we can develop computer technologies which allow for the complexities of real-life conversations (startup buddy, I’m talking to YOU!) then I may find a better way to capture biblical exchanges in an electronic database. Doing so may help us better understand the whole arc of the Bible which can help us better understand ourselves. Let’s have a conversation about that some time.  Find me on Google+ or in the comment section below.

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Inspirations MetaV The Bible Vision

What’s next: Graphing the Graphe

For many in our day, to picture the Bible is to think of an old dusty book on the shelf with leather binding and golden accents.  Its pages are so thin you’re afraid you’ll destroy them at every turn, or perhaps you believe the words on its pages will destroy you.  I have taken the words from those pages and linked them with explanatory works in order to show you the Bible in a way that you’ve never seen it before.

Scripture contains stories about thousands of people over thousands of years in thousands of places.  We can take those thousands of words and make them into a picture.  The root word from which we translate the term “Scripture” is graphe. This same root word is also the basis for our English word “graph.”  How appropriate is it then to to translate the words of scripture into graphs as we use that word today?

Christians of the renaissance “visualized” the Bible with works of art that are now considered priceless.  Now we can replace the oil and canvas with data and computers.  I would contend that this approach is no less beautiful or creative.  Now that the foundation has been laid, in the coming months on this blog I will bring forth the realization of this vision.  Never before seen patterns may emerge.  Beautiful structures may unfold.  Readers will see the consistency of design in God’s words and works through time, space, and the soul of mankind.  This is truly an exciting time.

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Analysis Inspirations MetaV The Bible

It’s about time!

One central idea behind this new tool called MetaV is to link everything in the Bible to a period of time, then use that to perform a search or put a passage in greater context. Today, this is one step closer to being real.

R.A. Torrey compiled the Treasury of Scripture knowledge which contains the most cross-references of any concordance available.  It also contains a year associated with each passage.  I have taken this data and plotted it along a timeline (below) in a way that I believe will be simple to understand and use when combined with other panes of information.

The concept comes from atomic mass spectroscopy.  A simple strip with bars on it of varying colors or line densities indicates particular wavelengths of an element.

The same layout can be used for a timeline, substituting years for wavelengths and verses for particles of light where BC is denoted with a negative number and the darkness of the color indicates how many verses deal with that year, as seen above.

This graphic is based on Torrey’s book, but in its electronic form it must be checked for data quality and completeness before being incorporated into anything more detailed.  The simplicity of such a view, when combined with details from associated passages and other useful information has a real potential to make a complex, interrelated whole more understandable.

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Inspirations MetaV Personal stories The Christian

From Business Intelligence to Biblical Wisdom

Let me share  a story about how God orchestrates events in our lives to accomplish his will and help us find our calling.  I started this blog not long after moving to a new department in my company.  The road I’ve been speeding down since then is worth describing.

My first attempt at getting the transfer failed.  Another engineer who hired on at our location shortly after me got it instead.  Later on, I discovered that the divine plan was better than my own.  A few months after that first interview, another job in the same department came available, but this one was far better suited to my skills and one which I knew would be much more interesting to me.  It would involve a great deal of database manipulation for reporting, analysis, and whatever else might need to be done with our computer systems that I could help with.

Around that same time frame, I was envisioning a draft concept for a bible search/study tool that I have coined “MetaV.”  All I had was the idea and an illegible sketch.  I was certain that I’d have to invest in some new tools and steadily, patiently learn some new programming language to make it work with the database I had begun building.  That all changed when I swapped jobs and began learning about newer ways to gather, compute, analyze, and visualize data.

Nearly every month I have learned of new tools and techniques which help me take leaps forward in various projects for this site and at work.  Many times I just “happen” to discover them.  As one who believes in God’s omnipotence rather than luck, I can see how he uses things like this in “secular” circumstances to teach us and mold us spiritually.  There is really no difference between our work lives and spiritual lives.  God is everywhere, in control of everything and every part of our day.

The field collectively known as Business Intelligence includes players like SAP (Crystal Reports), IBM Cognos, and of course Microsoft (plus many others).  Then, along comes Tableau.  It turns out that the people that make the most annoying Facebook games collect and analyze user data in ways you wouldn’t believe – and they use Tableau to do it.  I thought: what if I could use that to analyze scripture?  What if we applied business intelligence tools to find biblical wisdom?

Now, don’t get me wrong – only the Holy Spirit can truly bring understanding of his words.  But, having a tool that provides a view of scripture you’ve never seen before can be a big help in beginning that process.  I am happy to report that Tableau does have a free version of their software for use with public data that I have begun applying to MetaV.  Thanks to the awareness of new tools gained through my new job duties, I am using weeks-old technology to create things like readability graphics without having to learn any special programming or making any investment other than time.

With a little more of that investment, an integrated view of the entire Bible with a map, timeline, and details about each verse in a single interactive view is not that far away.  Had I gotten the job I originally went for, I don’t know that I’d be this far along in the process.  I don’t know that I would have found the tools to help me do the things that I believe God has equipped and called me to do.  I do know that his timing and his plans are perfect.  When that time is right, readers of this blog will be the first to discover an entirely new approach to bible study.

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Inspirations MetaV Personal stories The Bible The Christian

Motivated by the Impossible

With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible.
– Matthew 19:26b

After I graduated from one of the most prestigious institutions in America, the US Air Force Academy, I was filled with pride … too much, in fact.  One of my first assignments was to create project reports from an online database which I had never used.  I met the challenge head on as any new military officer would.

My reply to the task was: “If it is possible, I can figure out how to do it no matter what it is.”  One of my newest colleagues who was familiar with this system quickly took the cue to initiate some “mentorship.”  Perhaps the hero persona of this higher-ranking Afghanistan war veteran compelled him to save his troops from the crash that a rookie like me could have caused by flying blind.

The system didn’t crash.  He showed me a lot, and so did some computer experts I had the privilege of working with in northern Japan.  At my next base, I had the same attitude toward a similar challenge – this time with a lot more knowledge and even less humility.  Once again, the system we had couldn’t do what we needed and the red tape involved with replacing it could wrap around the world a hundred times.  After following the chain of command all the way up to the person responsible for this system across the entire Air Force, he explained that what we wanted to do was “not possible.”

What self-respecting company grade officer would accept that as an answer?  “Impossible? I’ll show you impossible!” A few months later I found a workaround solution and everybody was happy with the new process.  It saved some people a lot of work and gave others more control over the work they were interested in getting accomplished.

My intent here is not to boast of these accomplishments.  God has brought me a long way from that kind of big-headedness.  My point is that when others say something is impossible it is often because they cannot imagine many possibilities beyond their experience.  In that respect, inexperience is an advantage when guided properly.  With God’s leading and power, all things are possible.

The things I describe on this blog are part of my ongoing attempt to realize what may otherwise remain unknown and undone.  It is daunting to think of collecting biblical scholarship in such a way that you can see and analyze it all at once rather than picking through it a piece at a time.  It is a mountain of a challenge, but it is not impossible to move such mountains. Lord, help us!

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Books Inspirations MetaV Prophecy The Bible The Last Days Visualizations

The Groundbreaking Achievement of Clarence Larkin

Clarence Larkin Revelation Chart

Every now and then people come across a classic scholarly work that for one reason or another seems to have been forgotten or at least taken out of the main stream of cultural influence although their truth is just as timeless as when it was originally produced. Clarence Larkin’s book, Dispensational Truth, is one such treasure. It is still sold in Christian bookstores and has been referenced by popular authors like Tim LaHaye, but that’s about the extent of it. His charts are available within Sword Searcher, which has a good bio. You can also get the full text and images for free at www.preservedwords.com.

To give you an idea of his influence over time, consider this: every illustration I’ve ever seen describing the statue in the vision of Daniel 2:31-45 is a variation of Larkin’s original graphic.

Larkin Chart Daniel's Vision
Clarence Larkin’s chart on Daniel’s Vision

I can identify with this particular author because, like me, he was a young mechanical engineer with some experience in drafting before being called into ministry. While a pastor, he employed his skills toward creating exacting illustrations of the Bible. The Larkin Estate indicates that he produced 205 charts and illustrations, complete with biblical references and full explanations of each. The ones I find most impressive are his works titled “Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth” and “The Book of Revelation.”

Clarence Larkin: The Book of Revelation
Clarence Larkin: The Book of Revelation

As you can see, the original illustration is a black-and-white print. While Mr. Larkin did produce color charts, those he published were not, perhaps due to technology or cost limitations on producing a full-color book back in the 1920’s. I have found some colorized versions, but in my opinion they lack the original quality of his work. It has been on my to-do list for some time to make an attempt at converting at least one of these charts to a high-quality, interactive web presentation. Given the astounding detail of each chart, I’m not expecting to complete that task any time soon (any graphic designers out there looking for a project?).

He built these graphics at a time when no one had heard of the Bible being converted to a digital format. No one could yet dream of the complex visualizations made possible by advanced technology of the information age. I personally believe he was ahead of his time in creating ways to visualize related points in a unified whole that gives a consistent biblical picture.

Clarence Larkin gives due credit to the one who made such a work possible:

“With profound gratitude and thankfulness for the blessing of his Heavenly Father…in the hands of the Holy Spirit…”

Indeed, without the direction of the Spirit, no one man alone could accomplish this remarkable work. He also could not have done it if he had chosen to focus efforts on presenting and debating multiple theological views. On this point, the author states:

“[I have] sought to avoid such criticisms and to simply expound the Word of God as the Holy Spirit opened it up to [me.]”

It took three years to produce a book on just one theological view which he earnestly believed and was framed by nothing more or less than the scriptures. Had he gone beyond that into every wind of doctrine, three years would scarcely be enough to complete a discussion on the Book of Daniel alone!

Therein lies an area in which I believe it’s time to shift our thinking about the way we produce and use Bible study software. Everything available today includes a host of commentaries, versions, systematic theologies…all of which tend to have conflicting viewpoints to one degree or another. Yet, when Christians gather together for Bible study, only one such view is presented. To do otherwise would lead to confusion and be time prohibitive to boot. The same holds true for the working man or woman today who has trouble finding time to even read the Bible daily, let alone sift through a full library of data.

The teacher of such a study would wisely consult multiple resources while praying for God’s guidance, so in that sense today’s study tools are great. But, I believe that in-depth study should be made possible for everyone, not just the scholars and teachers. One way to do this is to 1) make it free to everyone and 2) limit the information to only authoritative works which agree with those of the author of said software as guided by the Spirit. While I do agree that it’s a not a good idea to limit access to multiple viewpoints, I do not agree that presenting an endless list of options to sort through accomplishes that goal. That kind of information overload actually makes good information harder to find, which is the last thing I want.

By restricting the database to a more popular-level summary based on detailed and reliable scholarship of old (such as the charts mentioned above), I expect it to be possible for one or a few godly men to produce more advanced tools quite economically. They could be used by anyone and would contain the same level of accuracy, detail, and cohesiveness of the many works of Clarence Larkin and others like him. Anyone willing to help in this endeavor is more than encouraged to pray and if you feel led to do so, contact me by leaving a comment on this blog.

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Cool Tools Inspirations MetaV The Bible

Finding Biblical People, Places, and Things

I came across a video the other day that does a great job of explaining a concept that I am working implementing in new Bible study tools.  Take a look at what Metaweb is doing:

Today’s Bible study tools have the same problem: they primarily use words in order to find relevant content from a library of sources designed to explain some passage or topic.  If a user searches for the word “Paul,” a good program would find all verses with Paul’s name in them, some commentaries about his life, maps of his missionary journeys, and maybe show a long list of other included resources.  But, what about the verses in which Paul is still named Saul?  Would these tools help you easily discover that Paul was once a pharisee, or take you right to the verses in which he’s mentioned in that role, without having to click through some chain of links or menus?

One way to find those verses would be to search a topical index for Paul which would list passages about the man regardless of his name at the time.  But, a user would have to go specifically to a topical index instead of a verse search, and even then he won’t find everything.  Another problem is that people are often referred to by personal pronouns or as part of a group.  So, if you searched for “Thaddeus” you wouldn’t be taken to the verses which reference “the apostles” but don’t list all of them by name.

The same things holds true for places.  At dynamicbible.org, I can search for “Bethel,” pick a verse I want to look at, and click that word to see it on a map.  But, there are two places with that name and I only want to see the one dealt with in that particular verse.  So, you can see how using words alone to search for biblical references won’t return a full set of results or might return irrelevant things.

That’s where I plan to help, except my goal is far more limited in scope than Metaweb.  I’ll start with the text of the Bible itself and then begin linking each word to location information, biographical information, or whatever else is relevant to that particular text. Thankfully, a good bit of this data is already available in different formats. If all the words in the Bible could be described as an entity (a person, place, thing, event, etc.) rather than just a string of letters, it would not only ensure that you find all the references to that entity (no matter what word is used to describe it) but also guarantee that you find the right results.

Keep an eye on this blog for more examples of the possibilities behind such a concept.  Believe me, this is only the beginning!