About Me

To start off, my name isn't really Altaran, It's Joel. I just use Altaran as an alias on the Internet for things like games, message boards and other stuff. So, if you ever need, or want, to get a hold of me, please don't address me by Altaran.

Any way, my name is Joel Arndt and I live in a small town in Northern Ontario. I am in grade 11 and are finding out a lot of things about myself and my relationship with God in this year. My parents are both very spiritual, not religious, people. My dad was the pastor of the pentecostal church here in town, but he stepped down about march of 2004, but neither he nor my mom have felt the Lord telling them to go anywhere else. My mom is a mother primarily, and has a part time job at a motel restaurant as the baker (she makes excellent pastries!!). I have three younger siblings; my sister, Evangeline, the second oldest, Zachary, the second youngest, and Micah, my littlest brother and the last of my siblings.

As you probably guessed, I was born and raised Christian, but one Wednesday night at a kids club is when I really gave my heart to the Lord. From an early age, I have felt the hand of God on my life and experienced him in an intimate way. This relationship only grew with time, but it grew slowly. I had always been different than the other kids at school. I tried to blend in, but it never worked. For the majority of my adolescent life I would say one thing and then do the other, but as I am maturing, both physically and spiritually, I am slowly getting out of that routine of going to church or youth or whatever, where I have said that I will start to witness to my friends, or have gone deep into the spirit and there have even been some that have commented on how, "spiritual" I am, but the next school day, I would be trying to be accepted into some sort of group. Now, I have never done anything major, like smoking anything, or drink, but stuff like swearing, putting others down and few other things. I realized what I was doing, but the urge to fit in was greater than I could handle. Once I hit high school though, things changed a little faster.

I go to high school in a city not too far from my home. There, I got away from the people that would tease, taunt and ridicule me because of my beliefs, and was with people that knew nothing of me. Now, when I told people about myself, I didn't not shy away from the fact that I was a Christian. I had grown enough in my faith not to be ashamed of who I was in Christ. In high school, I soon found people who really didn't care about my beliefs and how different I was. These people are now some of my best friends, and we do talk/debate (debate most of the time because that's more fun! LOL ^_^) of Christianity and religion some times, but we are all mature enough not to hold our beliefs against anyone. But, there are those, that believe in some things that are just really not good, so I tend to stay away from them, but I don't judge them. I have become stable in terms of who I am in Christ. Now, who I am in the world, that is still a little questionable.

When I say who I am in the world, I mean like what I will be when I grow up, and what I will be doing 20 years from now. I love sports, but I love computers too. I also like to read and write whenever I can, and I will draw if I really feel the need to. I have plans, but I know that if those plans are not of God, I will get no where in the right direction. I want to get my own Web Design and Development company started, but that's like a secondary thing. I know my future is in and with God and that I am to be doing something in the ministry. My heart is for Canada, I don't know what specifically yet though. Right now, I am thinking of going to bible college to become a youth pastor, but that isn't in stone yet, nothing is. All I know is that I have a dream of owning my own web design and development company, and a heart for the people of Canada, so that is what I work towards and what I pray about as often as I think about it. I'd ask that you would pray for me too.
-Joel