Daughter of Jael

Not a real post

2010-04-26T19:19:00.002-05:00

I will post here for real very soon. For now, let me redirect you the Bollywood blog I write with my sister.

Handiwork

2009-06-16T23:51:00.008-05:00

I've been silent for a while, but I have a little more of my (brilliant, of course) work to share.

These were a gift to a friend of mine who had kindly made me a beautiful cape last year...so I owed her something. I made them to match one of her ball dresses.

I made this for an equally good friend as a graduation present. She isn't exactly girly, so she needed something different.

I need to get some clearer pictures of this, but that will have to wait for another day, when it's not so late.
That is one of the best parts of jewelry making, I think: making something that is right for a certain person, occasion or outfit. And there's just something fun about working on some radically different projects; each one can be nice without any of them being the same.

What You've All Been Waiting For

2009-04-10T09:43:00.009-05:00

Ta-da! This is really the first thing I started. A necklace and earring set! Thanks to Peter and my dad I figured out how to take the pictures I need.
When I started this, I could not believe how nice it looked! I didn't know you could make stuff like this with just pliers, wire, beads, and a little time. I may be making more stuff, but I made a deal with myself that I will buy no more jewelry making stuff until at least the end of May. That way I can evaluate how much money to spend on this here hobby. But I have a spool of wire and a spool of beading thread and some beads so I can probably still indulge myself just fine. :)

wanting it to happen

2009-04-09T13:43:00.005-05:00

My favorite part of Perelandra, the first book in Lewis' space trilogy, is the part in which Weston is making a speech which Ransom is translating into Malacandrian. It brings an amazing amount of clarity to silly humanist reasoning. Here's just the last bit.

"I may fall," said Weston. "But while I live I will not, with such a key in my hand, consent to close the gates of the future on my race. What lies in that future, beyond our present ken, passes imagination to conceive: it is enough for me that there is a Beyond."
"He is saying," Ransom translated, "that he will not stop trying to do all this unless you kill him. And he says that though he doesn't know what will happen to the creatures sprung from us, he wants it to happen very much."

More Creativity

2009-04-09T10:53:00.006-05:00

As I find myself with less school to do, and sort of at loose ends due to a lack of decision about my future, I am really having fun with being crafty. I bought a copy of Beadwork Magazine while buying stuff for my other project that I mentioned earlier (which is finished but I'm having difficulty taking pictures where you can see it clearly, so we'll wait on that) and yesterday I bought the stuff to make a project out of there (yes, this is getting expensive; I'm going to have to start selling the stuff or something if I'm going to keep this up). So last night and this morning I made it.
I'm going to have to figure out this photography thing if I want to keep showing off my work, because y'all can't see it very well.

Potato soup

2009-04-04T20:38:00.004-05:00

I make dinner Wednesday nights, and sometimes I have a hard time deciding what to make. I did find a really good recipe this week (just stumbled upon it) that everybody enjoyed. It's a spicy potato soup! I cut the cayenne in half (a tablespoon is a lot) and even so it was very spicy. I liked it that way, but that's a personal choice. Anyway, I was happy to find a potato soup with some meat (Italian sausage) in it because I love potato soup and it's quite filling but I feel that it needs a little help to make a complete meal. I served it with (store-bought) sour-dough bread. (hm. Note to self, maybe, just maybe, I should consider getting sour-dough starter going...hm....)

I'm being creative!

2009-04-02T13:57:00.003-05:00

"cre·a·tive
adj.

Having the ability or power to create: Human beings are creative animals.
Productive; creating.
Characterized by originality and expressiveness; imaginative: creative writing.

n. One who displays productive originality: the creatives in the advertising department.
cre·a'tive·ly adv., cre'a·tiv'i·ty (-ĭ-tē), cre·a'tive·ness n."

I was at the library yesterday and I picked up a book on making cool stuff with wire, so I checked it out, picked something I wanted to make and bought the supplies to get started. Now, it will be a little while to finish that 'cause I need to buy a few more things, that I will probably have to get from a craft store instead of Wal-Mart, but I'm feeling pretty proud of myself, doing something creative for once. Also, using my nifty new tools, a barrette, and some beads I had lying around, I made something pretty without any help from anybody! Behold:

I know you can't see it very well, but I can't get a better image right now, so it will have to do. It's really pretty; just trust me

2009-03-29T21:09:00.000-05:00

Me and my ball dress:

Bluegrass Jam

2009-03-26T20:15:00.004-05:00

I stayed with Fred and Leon a little bit ago, and got to sit in on a bluegrass jam. It was fun. I have a video of Fred singing, but I'd have to get her permission to post it I think. I also have another video where Leon is making funny faces when she's not playing but that's not her fault because I was making faces at her and she didn't know (I don't think she did anyway) that I was taking a video.

2009-02-20T14:41:00.000-06:00

I just finished reading Green Dolphin Street by Elizabeth Goudge. I was really impressed.

Goudge has some slightly unorthodox views of religion, I think, or at least there are hints of that kind in this book. However there is a great deal of wisdom contained within its pages.

It is not a nice book at all. Happiness is elusive for most of the characters in the book. Also it holds a mirror up to the selfish, striving complaining woman that I am, and that really wasn't pleasant at all.

The lessons to be learned about the nature of love and humility are priceless. Most wonderful of is for a book to show honestly what the cost of real self-sacrificing love. I have been encouraged to work harder, and more importantly to complain less.

This book would certainly be much more appealing to women than men. I think its intended audience is women, but I do believe that a guy could learn a lot from it as well. It has its silly, sentimental moments, but has many poignant, awesome insights as well.

Progress? What progress?

2009-02-17T17:29:00.005-06:00

What did I learn from Winston Churchill's History of the English Speaking Peoples? I learned a sort of drearily hopeful thing: people have always blundered through life. Politics (at least in England and the US) have always involved crazy legislation that generally makes things worse...and yet the human race limps onward.

I learned that people are blinded by their own culture.

I learned that small mistakes have awful consequences.

I learned that few people actually do learn from history, and the mistakes of the past are repeated over and over again.

AND

I learned that the nobility, humility, power, brilliance, or virtue of some people can still inspire and fascinate hundreds of years after they lived and died, even when they seem to be on 'the wrong side' or when you've no idea which side is the right side.

Which leads to the conclusion that we should obey God and love our neighbors, be as wise we can be, and maybe not struggle too hard to always be right, because there are things we cannot see. This may be encouraging in the present chaos concerning money and politics and all that.

Keeping it Holy

2009-02-06T23:28:00.003-06:00

Exodus 23:10-12 "Six years you shall sow your land and gather in its produce, but the seventh year you shall let it rest and lie fallow, that the poor of your people may eat; and what they leave, the beasts of the field may eat. In like manner you shall do with your vineyard and your olive grove. Six days you shall do your work, and on the seventh day you shall rest, that your ox and your donkey may rest, and the son of your female servant and the stranger may be refreshed."

What is the Sabbath all about? It is about sitting on your butt and thinking holy thoughts? Sabbath also more about getting to church on Sunday mornings.

Isaiah 1:11-17

"'To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to Me?”
Says the LORD.
'I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams
And the fat of fed cattle.
I do not delight in the blood of bulls,
Or of lambs or goats.
When you come to appear before Me,
Who has required this from your hand,
To trample My courts?
Bring no more futile sacrifices;
Incense is an abomination to Me.
The New Moons, the Sabbaths, and the calling of assemblies—
I cannot endure iniquity and the sacred meeting.
Your New Moons and your appointed feasts
My soul hates;
They are a trouble to Me,
I am weary of bearing them.
When you spread out your hands,
I will hide My eyes from you;
Even though you make many prayers,
I will not hear.
Your hands are full of blood.
Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean;
Put away the evil of your doings from before My eyes.
Cease to do evil,
Learn to do good;
Seek justice,
Rebuke the oppressor;
Defend the fatherless,
Plead for the widow.'"

These people were bringing a multitude of sacrifices. Sounds like they're really on top of things. They forgot one little thing about the Sabbath, though, I think: ceasing to do evil, and doing good. While offering incense and sacrifices you can't just forget about the weak.

We all need Sabbath rest, I believe we were created (pre-fall) to need it. God made the earth in six days and rested, and we were made to do like him. So by all means rest, but consider: many of us are fortunate; we only have to work five days; we only have school fives days; overall we've got it pretty darn cushy. So give rest; don't just take it. There are lots of people who have to work on Sunday, and they dang-well can't help it because they have to keep their job. So help them however you can, and give rest to the single mother, give rest to the elderly, the poor, the miserable. Have them for dinner on Sunday, watch their kids, do their dishes, and for heaven's sake don't "keep the Sabbath" and keep someone else from keeping the Sabbath.

The worst (or best, depending how you look at it) example of this is the story I read in Touchstone magazine about a church that requested a diner to be open on Sundays so that the congregants could eat there, which forced a waitress who attended that church to work on Sunday, so she served them while they sat at their leisure. Ick. It makes me sick. (no, I don't doubt that I'm like that sometimes.)

That is backwards. They should have all been sitting together at the Lord's table in His house, serving one another and instead she misses the chance to go to the Lord's house, and they sit down and eat while she, less fortunate than they, serves them.

Baby Snatching

2009-02-02T12:46:00.002-06:00

Keep a close eye on anyone who says "our children are our future," because they usually mean that your children are their future. Anyone who thinks that children are the collective property of the community is kooky.

The Great Gatsby

2009-01-16T12:08:00.003-06:00

We read The Great Gatsby in English class. It is my favorite, so far of the novels we have read in class. Anyway, I was really proud of my essay, so I'm posting it. I think one of the reasons I felt the way I did about the book was that I had been meditating on Ecclesiastes, and Fitzgerald does a fantastic job of showing the vaporous, nature of life.

In the Great Gatsby, emphasis is placed on the emptiness of modern life. The characters float here and there, trying to fill their purposeless lives, but continually finding themselves bored by everything. Gatsby is in contrast to the bored masses of people he collects around him. However, it is Gatsby's differentness, the very purpose in his life, that dooms him to misery and loneliness in the end,

Throughout the book there is a great contrast between East Egg and West Egg and between Daisy and Tom's tranquil, soporific life and Gatsby's fantastic, lively parties. Daisy's life could be said to simply happen to her, she is a passive observer and although she is somewhat dissatisfied with her life as it is, she does not like to take action to change it. Jordan Baker exemplifies the carelessness of this set of people. When Nick speaks to her about her careless driving, she says in that case the other drivers had better be careful. Daisy, Tom, and their friends are essentially careless, and leave other people to clean up the messes they make.

Gatsby, on the other hand is not so careless. He has been planning his life in grand detail since his childhood, as Nick discovers from reading the schedule Gatsby had written in the back of “Hopalong Cassidy.” Everything he has done for the past several years has been with the purpose of getting Daisy. He has a purpose in his life which is everything to him, and he will do anything to gain his object. In the end, however, all of Gatsby's attempts at control fail miserably, his sense of purpose is insufficient to make him happy, and after his death his former friends desert him. Gatsby is, indeed, “great” in some ways, but he is ultimately as pathetic and lonely as the others.

Meanwhile, the eyes of Dr. T. J. Eckleberg look down on everyone. The old billboard represents God. Mr. Wilson points to it when he is speaking about God seeing what goes on. The billboard was put up by an optometrist who has long since disappeared. Likewise, God is apparently absent from the empty lives of the residents of the East and West Eggs. The empty eyes of a missing deity look down on the empty lives of people below. It would appear that, not only is there no immediate purpose in their lives, but neither have they any greater hope than whatever enjoyment can be drawn out of their own dull lives.

The Great Gatsby is an honest book, that presents truthfully the horribleness of a life without God (and thus without meaning). Lives may be bright, even beautiful, but they are brief, without meaning, and often destructive. There is no interconnectedness in life, people are not connected with one another, or with anything- there is no accountability for the damage people cause one another, and there is no change. Everyone continues as they were before, until the light goes out and they die.

2009-01-08T10:33:00.003-06:00

Reading through Winston Churchill's A History of the English Speaking Peoples today, as I am wont to do (mostly because if I didn't, I would be in trouble- I'm reading it for school.), I came at length to the French Revolution (or at least to the beginning of it. A phrase about Rousseau struck my already troubled brain.

"Rousseau in his famous Social Contract and other essays had preached the theme of equality. Every man, however humble, was born with a right to play his part in the government of State. This is doctrine long since acknowledged by all democracies, but Rousseau was the first to formulate it in broad and piercing terms."

This idea of the right of everyone to play a part in government appears to me to be deeply ingrained in our culture and completely unexamined.

It seems to me if an "accident of birth" is not enough to entitle someone to be a king, millions of such accidents can hardly be sufficient to entitle millions of people to vote. I mean, from whence came this right?

Furthermore, when such an idea is accepted without question, it is not surprising that the populace of European countries have been known to complain that they cannot vote in US elections. After all, are they not our equals? I demand justice!

Of course, the use of the words preached and doctrine is apposite. After all, the religion of democracy grew from such ideas. I have read The Social Contract and I must admit, I merely thought it foolish. It is entirely made up, reality plays little part in the formulation of his ideas, including his history of mankind. As Chesteron wrote "[T]hey really were wrong in so far as they suggested that men had ever aimed at order or ethics directly by a conscious exchange of interests. Morality did not begin by one man saying to another, 'I will not hit you if you do not hit me'; there is no trace of such a transaction. There is a trace of both men having said, 'We must not hit each other in the holy place.'" And that is probably a better history of the evolution of government than Rousseau ever made. In any case, I still think it's rather nonsense. There was a lot of stuff about the "general will" or something, which is NOT the same as majority rule, only if someone doesn't agree, we must make him agree, which DOES sound like majority rule, and on it goes.

What I was saying in the last paragraph is this: Whether it makes sense, whether it is poorly reasoned is irrelevant; it is doctrine, and it may not be questioned.

Of course, "We hold these truths to be self-evident..." but self-evident is not the same as obvious, and that argument depends on, "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights." The thing is that, while men are created equal, they are never born equal. This is why fairness and justice rarely look the same. It would be fair to take Jimmy's eight blocks and give half of them to Stephen, but it would hardly be just, because it's stealing. In any case, I think everything goes crazy when you abandon simple rules (you shall not steal) in favor of "the greater good" 'cause from then on, you're just making stuff up.

How 'bout some folk music?

2008-11-25T15:13:00.003-06:00

I was reading an article and it was kinda cool. So I'm sharing it.

Here's the first video mentioned in the article:

Here's the second:

I especially like the line in "Roots" "And we learn to be ashamed before we walk, of the way we look and the way we talk." That's what multiculturalism does. It's not about appreciating other cultures it's about being ashamed of your Western cultural roots.

2008-11-06T18:22:00.000-06:00

I can't believe I hear people say things to the effect of "Yeah, they may have believed that at the time the Bible was written but it is impossible to believe in this day and age." As if time makes any difference in what's true or not!

But seriously shouldn't we be more credulous in this age when what was impossible yesterday may just be possible, and even simple today or tomorrow?

And, when you give it serious thought do you think the people in first-century Judea were really unaware, for instance that it was impossible for a virgin to conceive? It sure seems like Mary was aware of that. Joseph too, for that matter.

The only reason they believe miracles and we don't is that we have long ago written off miracles. We can explain everything. And if we can't explain it; it didn't happen. Because we really understand why physics works. And why we're here. And all the rest.

Chicken fried

2008-11-05T19:34:00.003-06:00

You know I like my chicken fried
Cold beer on a Friday night
A pair of jeans that fit just right
And the radio up

Well I was raised up beneath the shade of a Georgia pine
And that`s home you know
Sweet tea pecan pie and homemade wine
Where the peaches grow
And my house it`s not much to talk about
But it`s filled with love that`s grown in southern ground
And a little bit of chicken fried

(Chorus)

Well its funny how it`s the little things in life that mean the most
Not where you live or the car you drive or the price tag on your clothes
There`s no dollar sign on a piece of mind this I`ve come to know
So if you agree have a drink with me
Raise you glasses for a toast
To a little bit of chicken fried

(Chorus)

I thank God for my life
And for the stars and stripes
May freedom forever fly, let it ring.
Salute the ones who died
The ones that give their lives so we don`t have to sacrifice
All the things we love
Like our chicken fried

Cold beer on a Friday night
A pair of jeans that fit just right
And the radio up
Well I`ve seen the sunrise
See the love in my woman`s eyes
Feel the touch of a precious child
And know a mother`s love

-The Zac Brown Band, Chicken Fried; Here's the music video.

The bolded text shocked me the first time I heard it. My goodness, is he saying he's glad people died so that he could have the following things?!?! Obviously, it's figurative- they didn't die for that. All the same it would appear that he is saying it was for that lifestyle, etc. How pathetic, doesn't he know that they died for freedom, and justice, and humanity?

Then again, what does that even mean? Those are abstractions. Maybe it's better to die for chicken fried.

Utilizing words

2008-11-03T22:30:00.000-06:00

A pet peeve of mine is people who employ the word "utilize" when they could save a few syllables and use "use." Not that it matters any more, but they aren't the same.
I found this on Dictionary.com

tr.v. u·til·ized, u·til·iz·ing, u·til·iz·es
To put to use, especially to find a profitable or practical use for.
Usage Note: A number of critics have remarked that utilize is an unnecessary substitute for use. It is true that many occurrences of utilize could be replaced by use with no loss to anything but pretentiousness, for example, in sentences such as They utilized questionable methods in their analysis or We hope that many commuters will continue to utilize mass transit after the bridge has reopened. But utilize can mean "to find a profitable or practical use for." Thus the sentence The teachers were unable to use the new computers might mean only that the teachers were unable to operate the computers, whereas The teachers were unable to utilize the new computers suggests that the teachers could not find ways to employ the computers in instruction.

Does it matter? Not in the grand scheme of things. Do I care? You bet your fuzzy pink socks I do!

Thank you and goodnight,
Sarah R, Deputy Commander, Vocabulary Police

Whose wish?

2008-11-01T07:21:00.000-05:00

"'I see,' said John, 'But what was the second interpretation?'
'In the second,' said Reason, 'the bridge signifies the giant's own favorite doctrine of the wish-fulfillment dream. For this he also wishes to use and not to use.'
'I don't see how he wishes not to use it'
'Does he not keep on telling people that the Landlord is a wish-fulfillment dream?'
'Yes. Surely that is true- the only true thing he did say.'
'Now, think. Is it really true that the giant and Sigismund, and the people in Eschropolis, and Mr. Halfways, are going about filled with a longing that there should be a Landlord, and cards of rules, and a mountain land beyond that brook, with a possibility of a black hole?'
Then John stood still in the road to think. And first he gave a shake of his shoulders, and then he began to laugh until he was almost shaken to pieces. And when he had nearly finished, the vastness and impudence and simplicity of the fraud which had been practiced came over him all again, and he laughed harder. And just when he had nearly recovered and was beginning to get his breath again, suddenly he had a picture in his mind of Victoriana and Glugly and Gus Halfways and how they would look if a rumour reached them that there was a Landlord and he was coming to Eschropolis. This was too much for him, and he laughed so hard that the broken chains of the Spirit of the Age fell off his wrists altogether. But all the while Reason sat and watched him
'You had better hear the rest of the argument,' she said at last, 'It may not be such a laughing matter as you suppose.'
'Oh yes- the argument, said John, wiping his eyes.
'You see now the direction in which the giant does not want the wish-fulfillment theory used?'
'I'm not sure that I do,' said John.
'Don't you see what follows if you adopt his own rules?'
'No,' said John very loudly: for a terrible apprehension was stealing over him.
'But you must see,' said Reason, 'that for him and all his subjects disbelief in the Landlord is a wish-fulfillment dream.'
'I shall not adopt his rules.'
'You would be foolish not to have profited at all by your stay in his country,' said Reason, 'There is some force in the wish-fulfillment doctrine.'
'Some, perhaps, but very little.'
'I only wanted to make it clear that whatever force it had was in favour of the Landlord's existence, not against it- specially in your case.'
'Why specially in mine?' said John sulkily.
'Because the Landlord is the thing you have been most afraid of all your life. I do not say that any theory should be accepted because it is disagreeable, but if any should, then belief in the Landlord should be accepted first.'" C.S. Lewis, The Pilgrim's Regress, Book 4, Chapter IV

To reason or not to reason

2008-10-31T08:00:00.000-05:00

"In the warmth of the afternoon they went on again, and it came into John's mind to ask the lady the meaning of her second riddle.
'It has two meanings,' said she, 'and in the first the bridge signifies Reasoning. The Spirit of the Age wishes to allow argument and not to allow argument.'
'How is that?'
'You heard what they said. If anyone argues with them they say that he is rationalizing his own desires, and therefore need not be answered. But if anyone listens to them they will argue themselves to show that their own doctrines are true.'
'I see. And what is the cure for this?'
'You must ask them whether any reasoning is valid or not. If they say no, then their own doctrines, being reached by reasoning, fall to the ground. If they say yes, then they will have to examine your arguments and refute them on their merits: for if some reasoning is valid, for all they know, your bit of reasoning may be one of the valid bits.'"
C. S. Lewis, The Pilgrim's Regress, Book 4, Chapter IV

What is the colour of things in the dark?

2008-10-30T08:00:00.001-05:00

"'You said that there were two things to say,' said John, 'What was the second?'
'The second was this. Did you think that the things you saw in the dungeon were real: that we really are like that?'
'Of course I did. It is only our skin that hides them.'
'Then I must ask you the same question that I asked the giant. What is the colour of things in the dark?'
'I suppose no color at all.'
'And what of their shape? Have you any notion of it save as what could be seen or touched, or what you could collect from many seeing and touchings?'
'I don't know that I have.'
'Then do you not see how the giant has deceived you?'
'Not quite clearly.'
'He showed you by a trick what our inwards would look like if they were visible. That is, he showed you something that is not, but something that would be if the world were made all other than it is. But in the real world our inwards are invisible. They are not coloured shapes at all, they are feelings. The warmth in your limbs at this moment, the sweetness of your breath as you draw it in, the comfort in your belly because we breakfasted well, and your hunger for the next meal- these are the reality: all the sponges and tubes you saw in the dungeon are the lie.'
'But if I cut a man open I should see them in him.'
'A man cut open is, so far, not a man: and if you did not sew him up speedily you would be seeing not organs, but death. I am not denying that death is ugly: but the giant made you believe that life is ugly.'
'I cannot forget the man with the cancer.'
'What you saw was unreality. The ugly lump was the giant's trick: the reality was pain which has no colour or shape.'
'Is that much better?'
'That depends on the man.'
'I think I begin to see.'
'Is it surprising that things should look strange if you see them as they are not? If you take an organ out of a man's body- or a longing out of the dark part of a man's mind- and give to the one shape and colour, and to the other the self-consciousness, which they never have in reality, would you expect them to be other than monstrous?'
'Is there, then, no truth at all in what I saw under the giant's eyes?'
'Such pictures are useful to physicians.'
'Then I really am clean,' said John. 'I am not- like those.'
Reason smiled, 'There, too,' she said, 'there is truth mixed up with the giant's conjuring tricks. It will do you know harm to remember from time to time the ugly sights inside. You come of a race that cannot afford to be proud.'" C.S. Lewis, The Pilgrim's Regress, Book 4, Chapter III

Scheduled Posts

2008-10-30T04:37:00.000-05:00

From henceforward I shall make scheduled posts whenever I feel like it. This way I can save up material instead of dumping it all at once. So I tell blogger when I want it to post a post and it does so.
No, I did not get up at 4:30 to make this post.

Brief Update

2008-10-29T20:53:00.002-05:00

On Resident Aliens, I read chapter 2 and it is becoming evident that it's a liberal book, but I still think there are quite a few pearls of wisdom in there. It is somewhat a matter of presuppositions, though; it's the sort of thing where you'll tend to read in your own views when the author is using words quite differently.

My little sister meanwhile is a budding classics scholar, she said something like this the other day, "Aeneas is the slave of duty, just like Frederick from Pirates of Penzance."

Worth noting

2008-10-29T20:25:00.002-05:00

``Sir Jasper Finch-Farrowmere?'' said Wilfred.
``ffinch-ffarrowmere,'' corrected the visitor, his sensitive ear detecting the capitals." P.G Wodehouse, A Slice of Life

If you don't know the mistakes of the present you're doomed to...?

2008-10-29T20:02:00.005-05:00

The most appalling thing about reading history or at least about reading a good history is that you discover that people don't think the same way now that they used to, and back then they didn't think the same way as their ancestors. It makes you somewhat suspect that perhaps Reason isn't Supreme after all. I mean, the ancients had reason, the medievals had reason, and the enlightenment philosophers had reason, but reason never brought them to the same point.
The frightening thing is that we can't see the past the way those living in it saw it, and we never will. It makes you wonder if you're just a product of your age just as they were products of theirs. Then you say "Nah" and go back to watching the presidential debate.
Postmoderns would say that there's no way out. You're trapped. You can't think differently if you try, and you're not to be blamed, unless you are a white, male, capitalist oppressor. That is your fault.
But if you really know your history, it will do something for you. You may be able to see more than just the mistakes of the past. You may see the mistakes of the present.
Oh, and back to my other point about Reason. A modern examining the past ought to despair because he has been led to believe that it is pure Reason that makes him think what he thinks. He may, if he is honest, discover that it isn't.

Real Christianity

2008-10-03T15:43:00.004-05:00

I've been reading bits and pieces of a book we have floating around our house called Resident Aliens, which claims in it's subtitle to be "A provocative Christian assessment of culture and ministry for people who know that something is wrong," and it may well be just that. I've only made it through the first chapter and so far it's been insightful. I know nothing about it's authors, had never heard about it before, but it's first chapter is certainly enough to keep me reading. I'll probably post more about it; it's quite quotable.

Who cares, modern theologians asked, whether or not Jesus walked on water, or Moses split the Red Sea, or Christ bodily rose from the dead? The important matter is not these prescientific thought forms but the existential reality beneath them. Everything must be translated into existentialism in order to be believed. Today, when existentialism has fallen out of fashion, the modern theologian is more likely to translate everything into Whiteheadian process theology, the latest psychoanalytic account, or Marxist analysis to make it believable.

"We have come to see that this project, though well intentioned is misguided. The theology of translation assumes that there is some kernel of real Christianity, some abstract essence that can be preserved even while changing some of the old Near Eastern labels. Yet such a view distorts the nature of Christianity. In Jesus we meet not a presentation of basic ideas about God, worlds, and humanity, but an invitation to join up, to become part of a movement, a people. By the very act of our modern theological attempts at translation, we have unconsciously distorted the gospel and transformed it into something it never claimed to be- ideas abstracted from Jesus, rather than Jesus with his people." Resident Aliens, Stanley Hauerwas and William H. Willimon

Objective Observer, my foot!

2008-09-26T13:59:00.003-05:00

I'm reading Winston Churchill's History of the English Speaking Peoples and finding that, regardless of anything, I'm loyal to jolly old England (at least so far-I suppose that'll change when the US comes on the scene.) Anyway, I can't help but wonder at how different the world would look to me if I were raised in France, or Italy, or Russia, or anywhere but here.

I suppose it's the same thing that goes on during the Olympics. I still want the US to win. I don't think I could help it if I tried. I can despise our government, hate our stupidity, look down on most of our citizens, but I couldn't really hate the whole thing if I tried. And if I was in a foreign country for an extended period of time, I don't suppose much would make happier than meeting another American. Funny how that works.

2008-09-26T13:44:00.002-05:00

There was certainly a bit of arrogance in the Renaissance that was so quick to dub the years preceding it the "Middle Ages" as if everything was leading up to the time directly following them and there's a similar arrogance in so-called postmodernism. How do we know that this is where things are going? In any case I would be surprised if future generations think the line between modern and postmodern is a bit blurry or perhaps non-existent, since today all the years through the 17th century are often cavalierly lumped together into the Middle Ages.

A Song - Thomas Carew

2008-09-25T15:52:00.002-05:00

This is a convenient place for dumping poems I like so I don't forget them.

A Song

ASK me no more where Jove bestows,

When June is past, the fading rose ;
For in your beauty's orient deep
These flowers, as in their causes, sleep.

Ask me no more whither do stray
The golden atoms of the day ;
For in pure love heaven did prepare
Those powders to enrich your hair.

Ask me no more whither doth haste
The nightingale, when May is past ;
For in your sweet dividing throat
She winters, and keeps warm her note.

Ask me no more where those stars 'light,
That downwards fall in dead of night ;
For in your eyes they sit, and there
Fixed become, as in their sphere.

Ask me no more if east or west
The phoenix builds her spicy nest ;
For unto you at last she flies,
And in your fragrant bosom dies.

2008-09-06T09:17:00.004-05:00

"'How wonderful,' says the poet, 'is Death, Death and his brother Sleep!' And having asked whether Ianthe will wake again and being assured that she will, he proceeds to weave many beautiful thoughts about Ianthe's sleep. From this we may fairly deduce that he (like Henry who kneeled in silence by her couch) felt tenderly toward Ianthe. For another person's sleep is the acid test to our own sentiments. Unless we are savages we react kindly to death, whether of friend or enemy. It does not exasperate us; it does not tempt us to throw things at it; we do not find it funny. Death is the ultimate weakness, and we dare not insult it. But sleep is only the illusion of weakness and, unless it appeals to our protective instincts, is likely to arouse in us a nasty, bullying spirit. From a height of conscious superiority we look down on the sleeper, thus exposing himself in all his frailty, and indulge in derisive comment on his appearance, his manners and (if the occasion is a public one) the absurdity of the position in which he has placed his companion, if he has one, and particularly if we are that companion." -Dorothy Sayers, Gaudy Night

Anglicans have more fun

2008-09-05T16:59:00.002-05:00

It is often a lot of fun to read a book by an Anglican/Episcopalian author (Dorothy Sayers' books, or even Jan Karon's Mitford series) because liturgy ends up in the mouths of the characters. Occasionally I even recognize it because we sometimes use the same prayers in our church, although I'm sure an actual Anglican would catch more references. Anyway it gives one the feeling of a sort of "in-joke" as well as making one see that, since they have scripture and prayer always on the tip of their tongue (no matter how interesting the application must be) that liturgy cannot be all bad.

A quote from (the fictional) Lord Peter Wimsey: "I have the most ill-regulated memory. It does those things which it ought not to do and leaves undone that which it ought to have done. But it has not yet gone on strike altogether."

The italicized portion is adapted from a prayer of confession. Typing it out, after the last 'done,' I nearly typed 'And there is no health in us.' which is what comes next.

For pondering

2008-09-04T19:05:00.002-05:00

I'm currently reading the book Original Sin by P. D. James. It's a mystery novel and a good one at that. James is brilliant really. She brings out human misery so naturally; I'd have to say she's got a very good grasp of the human condition really. Anyway, a paragraph about belief that caught my eye, this from the perspective of a Jewish police officer.

"His mother, of course, would never bring herself to say, 'I don't care whether you believe or disbelieve, I want you to be here with us on the Sabbath. I want you to be seen in the synagogue with your father and brother.' And it wasn't intellectual dishonesty, although he tried to tell himself that it was. You could argue that few adherents of any religion believed all the dogma of their faith except the fundamentalists and, God knew, they were a bloody sight more dangerous than any non-believer. God knew. How natural it was an how universal to slip into the language of faith. And perhaps his mother was right, although she would never bring herself to speak the truth. The outward forms were important. To practice religion wasn't only a matter of intellectual assent. To be seen in synagogue was to proclaim: This is where I stand, these are my people, these are the values by which I try to live, this is what generations of my forebears have made me, this is what I am. He remembered his grandfather's words, spoken to him after his bar mitzvah: 'What is a Jew without his belief? What Hitler could not do to us shall we do to ourselves?' The old resentments welled up. A Jew wasn't even allowed his atheism. Burdened with guilt from childhood, he couldn't reject his faith without feeling the need to apologize to the God he no longer believed in. It was always there at the back of his mind, silent witness of his apostasy, that moving army of naked humanity, the young, the middle-aged, the elderly, flowing like a dark tide into the gas chambers."

One Good Reason to Sing the Psalms

2008-08-10T22:39:00.001-05:00

The warnings of Psalm 78 still apply today, but we don't know the warnings of Psalm 78 because we don't know the Psalms. Hmm.

Surprised by Joy

2008-08-06T17:30:00.004-05:00

"In reading Chesterton, as in reading MacDonald, I did not know what I was letting myself i for. A young man who wishes to remain a sound atheist cannot be too careful of his reading. There are traps everywhere-- 'Bibles laid open, millions of surprises,' as Herbert says, 'fine nets and stratagems.' God is, if I may say it, very unscrupulous."

I just finished reading Surprised by Joy, C.S. Lewis's telling of his early life. It's very interesting (and closely related to his book The Pilgrim's Regress). It isn't child friendly actually, because Lewis's life was not G rated. But it's full of insights and quotable quotes like the above. It's definitely worthwhile in helping to understand how the great man thought.

It's NOT (too) girly!

2007-10-15T20:40:00.002-05:00

Why should men be interested in dancing? Isn't that a girl thing?

Contra dance gives men a chance to practice leadership skills, which is hard, and it gives girls a chance to practice following, which is possibly even harder. It may not be obvious to a beginning dancer what the differences in the men and woman's parts are and what their effect may be, but have seen a big change in both my ability to take charge and my ability to listen to other people since I started teaching dance. Some of this may be attributed to growing older and maturing, but something has to make us mature and I'll say that dancing has helped me.

I also advocate everyone try dancing both parts, although I guess that'd be awkward for guys.

When you say you love me, do you mean it?

2007-02-07T19:27:00.000-06:00

Having been deeply caught up in the work of trying to practice what I preach and put my principles in action, I have been away some time from my accustomed thinking ground: this here blog.

I have been thinking some about love. "Love your neighbor as yourself" and all that. I've come to the same conclusion as I have countless times before, that love isn't a feeling; it's something you do. If you love someone, you take care of them and serve them. Or, rather, not "if;" that can be misconstrued. Instead, when you take care of them and serve them, then you are loving them. This eventually brings up the warm feeling that you expect. When I help my mother with the housework that's when that "warm feeling" towards her is strongest. This is not, I think, merely because I have placed myself in her shoes and understand, but because I have loved her so I feel towards her those feelings which suit love the best.

Marriage and dancing

2006-12-05T20:15:00.001-06:00

Well, one of my favorite books is Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey if only for the wit of her hero, one Henry Tilney by name. This is taken from said book, Chapter 10.

[The obnoxious John Thorpe has been obtruding himself on Catherine Morland as she is starting to dance with the much more enticing Henry Tilney:]...This was the last sentence by which he [Thorpe] could weary Catherine's attention, for he was just then borne off by the resistless pressure of a long string of passing ladies.
Her partner [Henry Tilney] now drew near, and said,
"That gentleman would have put me out of patience, had he stayed with you half a minute longer. He has no business to withdraw the attention of my partner from me. We have entered into a contract of mutual agreeableness for the space of an evening, and all our agreeableness belongs solely to each other for that time. Nobody can fasten themselves on the notice of one, without injuring the rights of the other. I consider a country-dance as an emblem of marriage. Fidelity and complaisance are the principal duties of both; and those men who do not choose to dance or marry themselves, have no business with the partners or wives of their neighbours."
[Catherine Morland:]
"But they are such very different things! --"
[Henry Tilney:]
"-- That you think they cannot be compared together."
[Catherine Morland:]
"To be sure not. People that marry can never part, but must go and keep house together. People that dance only stand opposite each other in a long room for half an hour."
[Henry Tilney:]
"And such is your definition of matrimony and dancing. Taken in that light certainly, their resemblance is not striking; but I think I could place them in such a view. -- You will allow, that in both, man has the advantage of choice, woman only the power of refusal; that in both, it is an engagement between man and woman, formed for the advantage of each; and that when once entered into, they belong exclusively to each other till the moment of its dissolution; that it is their duty, each to endeavour to give the other no cause for wishing that he or she had bestowed themselves elsewhere, and their best interest to keep their own imaginations from wandering towards the perfections of their neighbours, or fancying that they should have been better off with anyone else. You will allow all this?"
[Catherine Morland:]
"Yes, to be sure, as you state it, all this sounds very well; but still they are so very different. -- I cannot look upon them at all in the same light, nor think the same duties belong to them."
[Henry Tilney:]
"In one respect, there certainly is a difference. In marriage, the man is supposed to provide for the support of the woman, the woman to make the home agreeable to the man; he is to purvey, and she is to smile. But in dancing, their duties are exactly changed; the agreeableness, the compliance are expected from him, while she furnishes the fan and the lavender water. That, I suppose, was the difference of duties which struck you, as rendering the conditions incapable of comparison."
[Catherine Morland:]
"No, indeed, I never thought of that."
[Henry Tilney:]
"Then I am quite at a loss. One thing, however, I must observe. This disposition on your side is rather alarming. You totally disallow any similarity in the obligations; and may I not thence infer that your notions of the duties of the dancing state are not so strict as your partner might wish? Have I not reason to fear that if the gentleman who spoke to you just now were to return, or if any other gentleman were to address you, there would be nothing to restrain you from conversing with him as long as you chose?"
[Catherine Morland:]
"Mr. Thorpe is such a very particular friend of my brother's, that if he talks to me, I must talk to him again; but there are hardly three young men in the room besides him that I have any acquaintance with."
[Henry Tilney:]
"And is that to be my only security? alas, alas!"
[Catherine Morland:]
"Nay, I am sure you cannot have a better; for if I do not know any body, it is impossible for me to talk to them; and, besides, I do not want to talk to any body."
[Henry Tilney:]
"Now you have given me a security worth having; and I shall proceed with courage."

Racism in Disguise

2006-11-13T19:53:00.001-06:00

I just finished reading The Last of the Mohicans. The author's treatment of Indians is terribly confusing. Uncas and Chingachgook (pronounce 'Chicago' I think, to quote Mark Twain) behave in ways that ought to be totally unacceptable, killing and scalping people unecessarily, etc. but Hawkeye (and seemingly the author) seems to think that they worship the same God as 'the white man' does and that they must be going to heaven...but it must be a different heaven because they don't like 'the white man's' ideas about heaven or something. Apparently the same standards cannot be held for white men and red men.

Apparently, salvation is not by Christ alone, 'red men' can come to God another way. Or is it that they, unlike us cannot understand the way? It is implied from time to time that it is beyond their understanding...and that they cannot live any way but the way they had been living. They cannot abandon their sinful ways (true of everyone outside of Grace) . Are Indians incapable of receiving Grace? They can't come to God? They can't stop acting like animals...but white men can? Lower standards must be had for them because they can't do as much as white men? Have they no souls? (Hmm. Maybe Cooper's red men are totally depraved and his white men resemble more of the Arminian idea of man! That makes for weird theology.)

James Fenimore Cooper didn't know it, but he didn't think much of the Indians. Then again, most people don't like logical conclusions and only go halfway with their beliefs so maybe I'm being unfair. Seems to me that his Indians are pathetic creatures. I'll let you in on a little secret: James Fenimore Cooper had a very small understanding on human nature and I don't think much of his writing. Yeah, I read too deeply into it. The Last of the Mohicans was fun but it isn't great literature.

We want YOUR opinion!

2006-11-03T17:44:00.000-06:00

If you happen to be reading this and even mildly enjoy contra dance, etc., pop on over to the Galloping Schlock and give us your opinion...if you can even be made to care, dear reader. I thank you.

Racism in Disguise

2006-11-01T19:54:00.001-06:00

I just finished reading The Last of the Mohicans. The author's treatment of Indians is terribly confusing. Uncas and Chingachgook (pronounce 'Chicago' I think, to quote Mark Twain) behave in ways that ought to be totally unacceptable, killing and scalping people unecessarily, etc. but Hawkeye (and seemingly the author) persists in talking about how they worship the same God as 'the white man' does and how they must be going to heaven...but it must be a different heaven because they don't like 'the white man's' ideas about heaven or something.

Apparently the same standards cannot be held for white men and red men. Apparently, salvation is not by Christ alone, 'red men' can come to God another way. Or is it that they, unlike us cannot understand the way? It is implied from time to time that it is beyond their understanding...and that they cannot but live the way they had been living. They cannot abandon their sinful ways (true of everyone outside of Grace) . Are Indians incapable of receiving Grace? They can't come to God? They can't stop acting like animals...but white men can? Lower standards must be had for them because they can't do as much as white men? Have they no souls?

James Fenimore Cooper didn't know it, but he didn't think much of the Indians. Then again, most people don't like logical conclusions and only go halfway with their beliefs so maybe I'm being unfair. Seems to me that his Indians are pathetic creatures. I'll let you in on a little secret: James Fenimore Cooper had a very small understanding on human nature and I don't think much of his writing. Yeah, I read too deeply into it. The Last of the Mohicans was fun but it isn't great literature.

The Wisdom of the Ancients

2006-10-23T18:59:00.000-05:00

There's an old Irish saying that says just about anything you want it to.

2006-10-20T18:15:00.001-05:00

Dancing can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people.

For me it's a break. Balls and dances themselves aren't relaxing, I know that I get very tense and nervous before a dance, but dancing itself can get rid of a lot of strain.

I've grown up very reformed and very...shall we say English? Hands off, you know. Even among family, touching people is awkward. We hug...sometimes, but let's just say it's a not too common occurrance. If we aren't going to see you very often, we may hug you; it's not so awkward after all to hug someone once or twice a year. Mostly, though, it's handshakes for me. Most people who meet me will come into actual contact with me once, in a handshake. Actually I've even recently started avoiding handshakes by pretending to be doing something with my hands every time I'm introduced.

Dancing is healthy physical contact. It's not affectionate, but you acknowledge that the other person is a physical being. We aren't gnostics, okay? Every once in a while, no-touchy people need a break from backing off. This sounds very weird, and everyone is going to be trying to stay away from me, but really, what is better than a good Posties where you're being flung around this way and that by several people? Uh-huh. And what is cooler than the Dogbranch when you can send your partner flying every time you stop spinning? (It wasn't very gentlemanly of me!)

I may get lynched, or drawn and quartered, or tarred and feathered for this. It may just be too frank, but it's part of the joy of dancing. Dancing has a LOT of other meaning to me. Jane Austen spoke of the "felicities of rapid motion," I can get very philosophical about the meaning of dance and it's usefulness to show what it really means to be Trinitarian, BUT dance is also useful to speak of being incarnational. (Hey, I bet Jesus danced!) People are physical.

Sometimes we're too Victorian or something to even really admit physical being, but the real cure for that is grabbing a partner and leaping into one of them crazy Virginia Reels as called by the Mad Knights. (speaking of which, what were those about? The calls seemed just a bit random and possibly as if they were trying to confuse people ON PURPOSE!)

Was that too radical? Are you heading off to find your hot tar and you feathers? Actually, tarring and feathering sounds rather incarnational...so maybe I'll just be a gnostic today!

On a less radical point, it's nice to be able to throw your energy into something that is supposedly 'pointless.' When someone asks "What is the point?" The answer may be, "The point is that there isn't one." Having fun will always look stupid until you've tried it. It's one of things you can't actually understand; you have fun, but you don't know why. I'm not mature enough in this yet. I still can't understand why people play sports. Football and baseball and basketball (but not soccer, don't as me why) seem so completely stupid to me that I don't know why anyone plays them. And yet they do. Some people I suppose play them with exercise in mind, but really most people play them for the joy of exerting yourself to do nothing...and have fun doing just that. (Or so I suppose, maybe there's a better reason.) Dancing is a sport; it's a complex sport, but it is one. (It's a sport in a sense; It's sure not as silly looking!...well.....)

God bless y'all. And don't y'all shoot the messenger neither!

Oh, and...am I wrong? I just started thinking and I couldn't stop. Have I expressed it wrong? Have I scared anyone off the dance floor for life?

Solemn Joy--I guess

2006-10-17T15:29:00.000-05:00

This world is filled with cynics. I think I may have been one of them when I was about eleven. Hence, even today, my glasses aren't rose-colored. All the same I have difficulty being serious.
When others are being serious, I start joking. I can't help myself; I speak quickly what comes to mind, and then, of course, insist that it was well and truly nothing (my beliefs on what constitutes nothing may be told another time). And what do I say? I couldn't tell you. All I can say is : Oh, nothing really.

But what am I doing? I'm organizing my thoughts. Laughter holds my life together. Laughter is the deeply serious mission of my life. While others talk about grand visions what am I doing? Punning and finishing their sentences for them! I don't stand for straight faces.

Now, I couldn't tell you why I do this. I just do. It's quite the same as "Why is the grass green?" It just is. Red might as well have been the best color for chlorophyll and whatnot, but who wants red grass? I have been known to smile at the thought that grass is green and sunburns are red (speaking of which, I had quite the bright red face Sunday evening, but red is such a cheerful color). And what is the meaning of wood?

Solid Joys

2006-09-12T19:40:00.000-05:00

My favorite hymn is Glorious Things of Thee are Spoken, at least I think so. I want it sung at my funeral, along with For All the Saints. I have always loved the last lines of the last verse: Fading is the worlding's pleasure/All his boasted pomp and show/Solid joys and lasting treasure/None but Zion's children know. I like that idea, the idea of our joys being solid.

Dictionary.com defines solid as:

"adjective
1. having three dimensions (length, breadth, and thickness), as a geometrical body or figure.
2. of or pertaining to bodies or figures of three dimensions.
3. having the interior completely filled up, free from cavities, or not hollow: a solid piece of chocolate.
4. without openings or breaks: a solid wall.
5. firm, hard, or compact in substance: solid ground.
6. having relative firmness, coherence of particles, or persistence of form, as matter that is not liquid or gaseous: solid particles suspended in a liquid.
7. pertaining to such matter: Water in a solid state is ice.
8. dense, thick, or heavy in nature or appearance: solid masses of cloud.
9. not flimsy, slight, or light, as buildings, furniture, fabrics, or food; substantial.
10. of a substantial character; not superficial, trifling, or frivolous: a solid work of scientific scholarship.
11. without separation or division; continuous: a solid row of buildings.
12. whole or entire: one solid hour.
13. forming the whole; consisting entirely of one substance or material: solid gold.
14. uniform in tone or shades, as a color: a solid blue dress.
15. real or genuine: solid comfort.
16. sound or reliable, as reasons or arguments: solid facts.
17. sober-minded; fully reliable or sensible: a solid citizen. "

Almost all of those definitions relate to what the word solid means in that song. I really love that idea.

Sounds like a great dance!

2006-08-29T21:15:00.001-05:00

Swing your partner, dosey-do, now clap your hands... uh-oh, that's all the square dance moves I know... I'll bluff the rest. Slap your partner in the face, Write bad checks all over the place, Flirt with strangers, annoy your spouse, Get a divorce and lose your house, ...uh... dosey-do.
--Dogbert calling a square dance

For Gabriel, Alethea, and Noah

2006-08-26T14:31:00.000-05:00

I visited one of my brothers' blogs and saw a post he made the day we held a memorial service for our little siblings that we have never met. It still makes me cry when I think about it. I'm just glad to know that they are covenant children and are with their Savior. I want to join them soon, but I guess God has a reason for keeping me here, even though I want to be there.

Providence can be hard, and I know we wouldn't have Dora if they had lived, but...I wish I could have seen them...any of them, held them...known them. I'm not sad because they didn't get a chance to live, no. They are with Jesus, what could be better? I just wish I could be with them or...anything.

2006-08-09T21:39:00.000-05:00

Martin Luther liked to call Erasmus and pals "sleepy-headed."

Take THAT, papists!

School again

2006-08-08T21:12:00.000-05:00

I always am glad to think I'm starting school again! Every summer I long for school. Every year I swear to be more studious (this rarely works out, but it's a good goal). Once again, I'm getting ready for school. Yay! The bad bit is...my parents aren't *quite* sure about curriculum yet. Never mind I may have to take history with Han again. I hate taking classes with my siblings. The only people that should have to worry about this are twins. Freshmen should not have to take classes with their sisters who are Juniors. Argh. Of course, this is God's providence. I shouldn't fight. But only homeschooling...*fist clench*

Don't get me wrong, I like homeschooling. But my favorite bit is the indepence of it. When I am behaving in a self-disciplined manner (about a fourth of the time) I don't want adults and older siblings ruining my precarious balance by adding a load of unnecessary suggestions, work, and rules (by this I mean the sort of extra ideas that learning must be done "exactly so" or "just this way" and other things that hurt my poor, stupid little head). I have grown up teaching myself, changing is so hard (this being one of the reasons I'm not sure I'll want to go to college. Bleh. The only reason I can see for going to college is getting a husband. Smart, I'm sure, but, really.

Well, I might have talked my parents into letting me take classes at the gummint school, but I don't like gummint schools. Public schools are full of clueless person who think I'm peculiar (I am of God's peculiar people...but they don't get it). I don't mind being thought weird, last year I relished it. However, once in a while I want people to understand what informs my frame of mind. I'm not stuck on boys or money or having fun (well, once in a while I get distracted...but I'm working on this). My life isn't these fading pleasures, I want solid joys. Sure, I love this world, God made it. But nobody gets it. I look at everything through the eyes my dad made for me by constantly reading Scripture, and talking about theology until my head was full of it. Anyway, public schools are filled with bad influences, distractions, and just...dumb people.

But I can't wait to throw myself back at Algebra and give it one more shot (I started it half-way through last year and am about half-way through). I'm hopeful.

The Will of God

2006-07-29T12:25:00.000-05:00

Ok. First, I pray that this post, these words would somehow bring glory to God. All that is good in them is surely Him working in me, and not my own ability, all evil surely comes from my depravity and folly, and also with less blame, my finiteness as I do not know all that is, some things are hidden from us.

The points of the so called "free will" discussion appear to be as follows:

The total depravity of man. Is it or isn't it?
God's fore-knowledge? Is it in conflict with His justice? His power?
Reward and Punishment
Fatalism; Does the bondage of the will eliminate responsibility for sin?

The Total Depravity of man

"And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others." (Ephesians 2:1-3)

Ecclesiastes 7:20 " For there is not a just man on earth who does good and does not sin."

Romans 5:12-14 "Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned— for before the law was given, sin was in the world. But sin is not taken into account when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who was a pattern of the one to come."

St. Augustine (of Hippo, heh-heh) said :"Man's original capacities included both the power not to sin and the power to sin ( posse non peccare et posse peccare ). In Adam's original sin, man lost the posse non peccare (the power not to sin) and retained the posse peccare (the power to sin)--which he continues to exercise. In the fulfillment of grace, man will have the posse peccare taken away and receive the highest of all, the power not to be able to sin, non posse peccare ." (On Correction and Grace XXXIII.) I've never read this in original context, I found this on a website. I realize of course, that St. Augustine is not on par with Scripture, but the Romans ought to recognize him as fairly authoritative.

If it were possible for man without Christ not to sin, I'm surprised at the very small evidence of genuinely good non-Christians. Yes, I know genuinely kind pagans, genuinely loving pagans, genuinely loving pagans, but I really know no genuinely good pagans.

Supposing man was really, deep down inside, good, then I think the world would be prevalently good with a few mistakes and goofs here and there. But the utter confusion of the world without God is so complete, that while in every culture a particular virtue is thought important, there are generally several prevalent vices, that completly "cancel out" any virtue. Man is not just confused, he is dead in sin.

God's Foreknowledge

Does God know the future?

I will not cite passages at this moment, but cast your mind around, and think back to the many prophecies in Scripture that have been fulfilled so exactly as to leave no doubt that God perfectly knows the future.

Some will argue, I suppose, that He knows the future because since He is not bound by space and time He is present in it. Suppose that is the case (and so it would seem to be), then it might not be necessary that He controls every detail.

But this leaves God in an awkward state, past, present, or future, it would seem as though He must view it rather as we do, but with the disadvantage that His acting would interfere with the free-will of humans, His "hands-off" area.

If God does not foresee the future, then His knowledge is incomplete and imperfect. If His knowledge is incomplete, is not, then, His power limited? His power limited, we cannot confess "God the Father Almighty" as we have for hundreds (almost thousands) of years.

Reward and Punishment

Understand first of all, that we are condemned by nature. Nothing we can do will save us, for our nature is evil. God does not take neutral man and make half of them "good" and half "bad". He takes some sinners and redeems them, and some He destroys.

A)Punishment

"What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion."It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: "I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth."Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden."(Romans 9:14-18)

He hardens some. He fixes them in their sin, which directly or indirectly He willed through Adam's sin. Adam would not have sinned had God wished Him not to, for God knows all things and if Adam's sin would not bring glory to Him, He would not have created Adam. How could He?

One of you will say to me: "Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?" But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?' "Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use? What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory— even us, whom he called.

B) Reward

Christians are promised a "reward." This is Scriptural language, so let me not be said to quarrel with it, but what is the reward for? I have been told by some that this is a reward for following God, but would you reward a corpse for keeping up with the hearse it was riding in?

Surely, we have been made alive in Christ, but this must mean we no longer live in ourselves, we live in Christ. The life we have can hardly be our own, and we will not be rewarded for following. We will be rewarded for the righteousness of Christ: His works on earth, His death and resurrection, and His good works through us. As the sin of our first head, Adam, is imputed to us, despite the fact that we did not actually participate, so the righteousness of our new head, Christ Jesus, is imputed to us, through no act of our own. We did not will our sin and so do not will our salvation.

Fatalism

I was asked this question recently:

"What if God came and told you that He had predestined you to go to Hell and there was absolutely nothing you could do to redeem yourself? How would you feel, what would you do?"

The obvious flaw in this is: has God ever done that? Is there any reason that He would? Why ever would He say that?

But ignoring that, this shows a very flawed understanding of the doctrine of predestination.

Predestination is not fate. Fate is impersonal, God's will is supremely personal. Everything we do is directly tied in to the end. It is not as though nothing we do matters, every detail is part of the extreme detail of God's plan. It seems that some think we believe that only the "big stuff" matters. When, in Romans 8, Paul speaks of all things working together, he means all things and does not exclude any details of anything. It is not a matter of "all the big stuff" but rather all the everyday stuff as well.

If God has predestined us to go to Hell, then He has also predestined us to sin. Predestined or not, sin is still, at least in some sense, a choice. We do not respond to some preprogrammed course of action, but rather to things we see, hear, feel, etc. at the moment.

Predestination is not a get out of jail free card. God will not tell you that you are predestined to go one place or do one thing. What purpose would that serve?

We don't for what we are predestined, although we can see where someone may be heading. If they bear bad fruit, then their faith is probably dead. If we see ourselves bearing bad fruit, we should be on our knees repenting. Through God's power and only God's power are we brought back, our own sinful hearts will not admit our sin, and certainly not repent of them. I have no problem asserting that a man without Christ cannot possibly choose Christ. The Holy Spirite (and through Him, Christ) must enter into the man before he can so much as see the extent of his sin.

Fatalism says that no matter what you do, the end will be the same, the one that is fated to be.
The doctrine of Predestination says that because of what you do, the end is what God willed.

See the difference?

Closing Statements--

There is a complete failure in the so called "free will" arguments to account for sin or salvation. By the arguments I have heard, man is basically good, so most sin cannot be explained, or man is basically evil so how can he do good if he is free to choose?

I have heard few arguments of any sort on behalf of free will. I have heard almost entirely questions skirting around the matter to speak about something not being discussed.

This is by no means perfect, there are so many Scripture passages I forget to quote that I meant to, I haven't quoted from Luther like I meant to and not as much from Augustine as maybe might be useful, but I hope this is clearer than previous posts on my other blog or on the ISLAS forum.

Disclaimer: I make mistakes, I say things I don't mean. I may not have read this through enough times. I'm not brilliant.

For random people reading this: This is a response to Roman Catholics and not Arminian-non-calvinist-type Baptists. I'm not sure if in this case it makes much of a difference, but it might. God bless!

God's plan

2006-07-24T21:04:00.000-05:00

When everything seems to be going just right I start to wonder, if maybe everything's going to come so close to happening and then everything will go wrong. What does He mean by this? Whatever happens is for my best, including the good things. Still I wonder, things look too good to be true. What is happening?

God's blessings are great...

He has begun to show me the qualities of some younger ladies at our church, and how valuable they are as friends
He has given me a few friendships that allow me to grow in Christ, by discussing Our King, glorying in Him, and advising one another when we are confused
He has provided beautiful weather lately, that if it continues will be lovely for Han's ball (If it doesn't, praise the Lord! His will is our highest good)
He has given us wonderful friends who are willing to travel far to visit us. I'm especially glad about the Johnstons. I love those people.
He has provided us with music and other such necessary things for this ball
He has given me many friends with an active love for the Word
He has given me the breath I breathe
He has given me things I cannot understand or speak of, suffice it to say that His grace is daily revealed to me in more wonderful ways than ever could be described.
He fills me with the desire to belong to Him, and saves me from my folly and stubborness.

Posting!

2006-07-13T10:37:00.000-05:00

Okay, normally I meditate on Scripture so here goes. I have some instructions for y'all:

Read Psalm 19, then read the book of Ephesians. No, I haven't seen any real similarities (besides the obvious), but Psalm 19 is a good read...and helps me appreciate Scripture better.

Okay, with that step done, thank God for bringing you to Him despite the fact that you were dead in trespasses and sins.

The Living and Active Word

2006-06-12T18:04:00.000-05:00

"For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account."

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God."

I said something about the passage in the Bible regarding headcoverings for women and making a joke (pretending to take a very strange position on the passage; and by strange position I do not simply mean "pro-head-covering" I do indeed mean something strange, though I do not now recall what it was I do believe it was related to a paper-hat) and then said that seriously I had a head covering; it was made out of hair. I got a strange look from another girl my age and was told, "Well, that was in the Old Testament." I expressed my surprise that that should make a difference, but insisted that the passage I had referenced was (1 Corinthians 11 was what I had been thinking of), in fact, in the New Testament. Her response was two-fold, "That was a long time ago. Besides, guys back then had long hair." What an intellectual discussion. Back to the point--

Does the meaning of Scripture becomes irrelevant if its meaning is not easily understood by our minds; minds that have not be trained to think in biblical terms?

The word of God is living and powerful. The Word of God is not mere words, but a living and powerful person. The word of God is also Holy Scripture. Scripture is God's statement about Himself. Knowledge of God is ever relevant, ever important. It is not worthwhile to the mind that has not been trained in it and has not been turned towards it, because God is not relevant to such a mind. But if we study Scripture, we see how relevant God is, and if God is relevant, then His word is relevant. He who has ears to hear let him hear.

Psalm 19
"The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
2 Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they display knowledge.
3 There is no speech or language
where their voice is not heard.
4 Their voice goes out into all the earth,
their words to the ends of the world.
In the heavens he has pitched a tent for the sun,
5 which is like a bridegroom coming forth from his pavilion,
like a champion rejoicing to run his course.
6 It rises at one end of the heavens
and makes its circuit to the other;
nothing is hidden from its heat. "

Creation pours forth silent speech which is heard from East to West.

" The law of the LORD is perfect,
reviving the soul.
The statutes of the LORD are trustworthy,
making wise the simple.
8 The precepts of the LORD are right,
giving joy to the heart.
The commands of the LORD are radiant,
giving light to the eyes.
9 The fear of the LORD is pure,
enduring forever.
The ordinances of the LORD are sure
and altogether righteous.
10 They are more precious than gold,
than much pure gold;
they are sweeter than honey,
than honey from the comb.
11 By them is your servant warned;
in keeping them there is great reward.
12 Who can discern his errors?
Forgive my hidden faults."

I think this and the Hebrews passage go hand in hand (as if Scripture passage could not go hand in hand?). The Law of God is perfect and living and powerful for conviction, for comfort, for assurance, for edification etc. "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work." (2 Timothy 3:16-17) I meant in some way to discuss the word of God and the Word incarnate, but the glory and power of it is so inexpressible.

I end this post with this prayer:

"Keep your servant also from willful sins;
may they not rule over me.
Then will I be blameless,
innocent of great transgression.
14 May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
be pleasing in your sight,
O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer."

In much need of prayer

2006-06-08T22:35:00.000-05:00

Please pray for me. Pray that my longings and desires would be in accord with God's will for my life. Pray that I would love what God has planned for me. Pray that God will give me patience; that I could trust Him now and not rush on ahead. One can love too much what one cannot have; it is so dangerous! God save us all!

I have been praying the Lord's Prayer every night before I go to sleep. This ensures that I can say something even if I am too tired to say much. Often I kinda choke up on "thy will be done." It's hard on me. I'm sure it's hard on everyone. Our pride does not allow us to think of God's will, and we will want what we cannot have and pride will lead us to covetousness, etc.

Pride is my mortal enemy. But I wasn't really posting about pride. We'll leave pride for another time. My problem now is loneliness and this feeling of loss which ought to be inexplicable considering I have lost nothing of value. But yet I feel that I have lost what I have never had and mean to gain what is not meant for me. I will not explain further. The longing may be excusable, the attitude and habits that go with it are not.

May might heart long after God's will and God's word. May my soul long only for Him. May I not look to the left or right. What can satisfy me but my creator?

Prayer would be so wonderful.

Evil Laughter #2

2006-06-05T18:42:00.000-05:00

Pastor Shade, Luke and JFC.

JFC and Joseph. Also Jedediah and someone else but I don't know why Jedediah is doing whatever he is doing.

It's beloved! Doesn't...her hair...look lovely? I have pictures of her face but I thought I should respect her wishes

Katie's head is sort of cut off...and that's Jedediah in the suspender. Since when was Katie Lutheran?

Evil Laughter #1

2006-06-05T18:33:00.000-05:00

Ye have much to fear evil-doers! or...people in general!

I recieved a CD with pictures from Christ the King today in the mail. Beware!

I will be nice, of course. There are a couple really nice pictures that it would be a shame not to post...but mostly you will be left in peace.

But I would really appreciate it if some people would quake in their boots...or suspenders, as suspenders appear to be quite fashionable down there...Alright, I saw two people wearing them but still.

I always knew I would find the perfect man

2006-06-01T22:26:00.000-05:00

I just never thought he would be the Brawny man. Check it out.

The Scottish Play

2006-05-30T16:08:00.000-05:00

Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.
I have thee not and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible to feeling as to sight,
Or art thou but a dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat oppressed brain? I see thee yet
In form as palpable as this which now I draw.
Thou marshall'st me the way that I was going
And such an instrument I was to use.
Mine eyes are made the fools o' th'other senses
Or else worth all the rest. I see thee still
And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood
Which was not so before. There's no such thing
It is the bloody business which informs
thus to mine eyes. From Macbeth Act II, scene i

I cannot promise that this is accurate word for word or line for line. This is from my memory as I was to memorize a speech from the dark and dismal play. I still have more lines to memorize but that is all the speech directly related to the dagger Macbeth thinks he sees. This is a fun speech to speak, as it may be delivered wildly and with lots of hand movements. I intend to memorize the other speech (If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly), too! Also the St. Crispian's speech from Henry V; Shakespeare is very inspiring. Of course I also have a little Shakespeare memorized for the play I am acting in this summer but as the Dauphin says I need only "do a very little little and all is done". I haven't got many lines.

I'm madly in love...

2006-05-16T11:02:00.000-05:00

What's not to love? Dorothy is just the cutest little creature ever.

Henty must die!

2006-05-11T11:46:00.000-05:00

Wait...He's already dead. That's comforting. I suppose I shouldn't get so worked up over just a book, but Winning His Spurs is really boring. Yes, it almost has me in tears. It is sooo a guy book. Cuthbert is like...a male Elsie Dinsmore. Ich, yeck, bleh. This is actually something I would post on my Xanga. But Xanga is temporarily down, and I need to whine now! Yes, I'm suffering deeply. I read 12 chapters of that book yesterday! Ooh. The pain! The pain!

Once more at home

2006-05-08T12:12:00.000-05:00

By God's grace, I was able to visit some friends at Christ the King church in Springfield, MO this weekend. Seeing Autumn again was absolutely delightful. Girls from 3 to 6 are my specialty, and can be very good for one's ego (depending on how you define "good"), she told me I was very pretty. I'm gratified. Nice to see the other Johnstons, too. Lorisha is such fun to talk too!

Nice to meet others, too. Especially the ones I had "met" already.

Goodbyes are awful for me. I hate leaving. Driving away I was listening to Strong Hand of Love, a wonderful song by Mark Heard that makes me cry even when I'm not upset about leaving people I love (without even ever dancing!).

Down peppers the rain from a clear blue sky
Down trickles a tear on a youthful face
Feeling in haste and wondering why
Up struggles the sun from a wounded night
Out venture our hearts in their silent shrouds
Trying to ignite but wondering how

We can laugh and we can cry
And never see the strong hand of love
Hidden in the shadows
We can dance and we can sigh
And never see the strong hand of love
Hidden in the shadows

Young dreamers explode like popped balloons
Some kind of emotional rodeo
Learning too slow and acting too soon
Time marches away like a lost platoon
We gracefully age as we feel the weight of loving too late
And leaving too soon

We can laugh and we can cry
And never see the strong hand of love
Hidden in the shadows
We can dance and we can sigh
And never see the strong hand of love
Hidden in the shadows

I'm a WHAT?

2006-04-26T12:27:00.000-05:00

How frightening. Apparently I'm a minion throng. I've never been one of those before. I always thought it took more than one person to be a throng. But a reliable source told me otherwise. Or at least they have insinuated that I was someone's minion throng.

Does this mean I get group rates and museums and stuff?

Sacrifice

2006-04-23T22:21:00.000-05:00

My sister's favorite sport is military style marching band. After seeing this you may understand. I'm trying to resign myself to a fate I have brought upon myself. I don't mean to sound like a martyr, but it's one tough descision to make to keep oneself from participating in something that has intrigued you for a while, and you have watched from the sidelines for several years. I'm learning to appreciate the joys of others. This is my siblings' sport. I have other things to do with my life. But you can be sure, that for the next couple of years I will be cheering for the Marching Dutch with all my might.

Bittersweet. Yeah. I'm making faces. This is tough to think about. I think I will have a couple sobbing fits this summer while I berate myself for not staying in band. But it's for the best, I think.

So what should my favorite sport be? Is contra-dancing a sport?

How far is heaven?

2006-04-22T17:35:00.000-05:00

I generally object to people saying such and such a thing as "heaven on earth," but I have found something that I would describe as "a little slice of heaven." Ah, yes. Dancing.

I haven't been dancing recently. Not really. Not unless you count dancing with my sister (I in the part of a gentleman), as we teach ourselves dances or write them. But maybe that does count, we've been drawn a lot closer since we've discovered dancing.

Christian community is marvelous. What more could one say?

But dancing isn't everything. I know some people who, strange to say, prefer card games to dancing. I also know some people who prefer to just sit and talk (but they are mostly *coughcough*), that's cool, too.

For me, dancing is the fusing of music and movement and something rather mathematical, too. Nevermind, contra dancing specifically is marvelous because it's not "just me and my guy", it's me and my partner and this other couple, or, in the case of the Virginia Reel, me and my partner and this whole roomful of people. You spend your time meeting new people. I always make some comment or greeting. Generally it's the same for every couple, but if they're also talkative I might say something different. Back to music, everyone loves moving in rhythm, right (I'm not actually sure this is true, I'm a musician if a poor one, and love music and rhythm)?

But why dance? One answer is the will is the slave of the body, alright, you may deny on some grounds, we're all free in Christ, right? But admit it; when you're hungry, you eat. Starving yourself to death is one tough pill to swallow. I have this on good faith from my father, a convert to the love of dancing (I have always loved it, I think), that since actually trying it, he has found that it's not as silly as it seems. Not to say it's not silly, if it wasn't it would hardly be an activity that I would love so much. It is actually possible to make yourself have fun. Choose not to believe it, if you will, but I am fairly certain. So why not make yourself have fun? Good, clean, old-fashioned-type fun (not to say that that which is old is automatically good, but this is time-tested enjoyment).

Morning Walk

2006-04-18T08:15:00.000-05:00

On clouds, rain, sunshine, and resurrection.

Golden hues from wealthy clouds
Are lodged up in the sky.
Gentle rumbles threaten rain
As I go walking by.

The sun is shining up above
There's a smile on my face
I'm as happy as a lark
The world is filled with grace.

I look up, upon the clouds
A sweet celestial view
Then I chuckle at the use
Of childish pinks and blues

God Almighty, God the King
Does not scorn to show His light
In means to us seem foolishness
He makes display of might.

His love has caused this turn-about
This foolish death and life
Ultimately it is this joke
That is the end of strife.

2006-04-17T22:34:00.000-05:00

Wow. I've never had the pre-destination argument in person. I've only ever argued it online. Until now. Dr. Kleven is a bit too clever for me, but Robert was going for the Open Theism argument. That one's *old*. Fortunately, I had good Reformed friends to help me argue my case.

We may have gotten off the topic, which was, orginally, Mere Christianity, but it was a good experience and it's delightful to see some young apologists honing their skills, as I try to do.

C.S. Lewis was marvelous. If he was RC they would have sainted him by now, or started to. (er..is that 'canonized'? I'm pretty sure the RCs don't use 'sainted')

We ate cookies, too. And I know who the smartest people in that class are: Chris and Josh; they know when to quit talking, and don't have to join every little argument, when we start going off on bunny trails.

Blogging: A venial sin?

2006-04-09T21:51:00.000-05:00

People always talk about the internet as being sort of "anti-social" and "childish" and "uncommunicative". This makes no sense to me, several of my fairly good friends, and Christian encouragers were met at the Classical Christian online school that I took Latin from (for a brief time, and hope to take more again). For a while, they were pretty much my only friends, as at that point I had no one to associate with at church, was homeschooled (still am, but being at the public school three days a week for band allows you to meet some people), and even in the homeschool group, there weren't very many people I shared any interests with, etc.

I particularly like blogging, which is looked on by some as being almost down-right wicked, and certainly selfish. I suppose it is self-centered of me to post my thoughts on the World-Wide-Web, and expect them to be read and commented on, but in general I expect nothing of the kind. I'm humble as they come (eh, what?).

Blogging allows one to organize one's thoughts, to record the events of the day, and to instruct oneself, by reading what you wrote (seriously, sometimes, it's like my subconscious takes over, and I don't know what I'm writing 'til I'm done). Some would say that a private journal would serve just as well, and be less assuming, but a personal journal does not allow you to keep up with you less-than-personal friends (the sort of people whose lives interest you, and you love to interact with, but who you do not know particularly closely), and to practice your prose. I would say that my writing, grammar, and spelling have improved greatly since I began blogging on my xanga. Which, by the way, brings me to the point of why I have this blog. The fact is, I cannot remain serious on my xanga, and besides that, each post on my xanga is a work of art, a carefully crafted one, designed to make people laugh or smile or whatever. A blog where fewer (not less) people read could be an excellent thing, as I may feel less pressure to keep the jokes coming. Not, of course, that that is a facade. Quite the reverse! However, I do enjoy being serious once and a while, but I worry that no one can take you seriously if you make it your serious buisness to make people laugh. Anyway, blogging is a method of communication that can be both effective and enjoyable.

Home again, home again, jiggity jog

2006-04-03T21:07:00.000-05:00

Back home from an adventure in Carbondale. What fun we had!

A poem I wrote a few weeks ago, about the Song of Roland, and the battle cry of Charlemagne's men.

"Mountjoy!" they cry, and away they ride,
Heedless of death or turning tide.

"Mountjoy!" they say, and away they go
Off to die at the hand of the foe.

"Mountjoy!" they shout, "For Charlemagne!
For God and country!" they heed no pain.

"Mountjoy!" cries Roland, though death is near,
"For Christ!" he says; he has no fear.

"Mountjoy!" each whispers as he goes to his Lord
All are ready to meet the sword.

"Mountjoy!" shouts Roland, but once more;
As he dies, his soul doth soar.

"Mountjoy!" each says as he met his death
They have fled from fallen earth.

"Mountjoy" echo the hills in mournful tones
At the death of these e'en nature groans.

"Mountjoy!" 'tis true, they will shout no more
All have passed through heaven's door.

2006-03-26T19:04:00.000-06:00

The fellowship of the Lord's people is truly marvelous.

We ate a meal at church sort of a potluck style today, how delightful...I love eating with my family. Eating with people is a special way of sharing fellowship. It comes in at the Lord's Supper, too. In some way or other we are eating with the saints in heaven and our Lord, too. We're definitely aren't just saying, "here's to Jesus!" or, "I remember Jesus." We eat the meal served, I suppose I should say, by Christ. It's like a big Christmas dinner, I eat with my real family, my brothers and sisters in Christ. That may not be particularly new or profound, but it's true.

2006-03-10T23:42:00.000-06:00

Thou shalt not take the Lord's name in vain?

"Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain." -Exodus 20:7

I saw a billboard while driving through/past Des Moines or Ankeny (they're all the same in my mind), which read "If you're going to swear, use your own name -God" Or something to the effect. I'm sure that whoever put up that builboard meant well, but it would appear to be in itself a violation of the 3rd commandment. (it is actually the third, right? God, idol, name, day, honor, murder, adultery, steal, lie, covet...yep) So hmm. I wish I knew what "in vain" meant exactly, or a little more specifically anyway. It was definitely using God's name in a frivolous and therefore unseemly manner.

2006-03-10T15:43:00.000-06:00

Comfort in God's Knowledge

Psalm 139

1O lord, thou hast searched me, and known me.
2Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off.
3Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways.
4For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O LORD, thou knowest it altogether.
5Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me.
6Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.
7Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?
8If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.
9If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;
10Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.
11If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me.
12Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.
13For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother's womb.
14I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.
15My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.
16Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.
17How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them!
18If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee.
19Surely thou wilt slay the wicked, O God: depart from me therefore, ye bloody men.
20For they speak against thee wickedly, and thine enemies take thy name in vain.
21Do not I hate them, O LORD, that hate thee? and am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee?
22I hate them with perfect hatred: I count them mine enemies.
23Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:
24And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

When people talk about God's knowledge they often mean the way He knows everything that will happen, and understands everything. What I find most amazing about God's knowledge is not the extent of it (though I am always in awe of that), but the depth or the intimacy of it. "Thou understandeth my thought afar off." Wow. Can that be said about anyone? Can you even say that about your own thoughts?

But perhaps we should be frightened. After all, this is the Most High we are talking about. Frightened doesn't begin to describe it, terrified, petrified. The Holy one knows us and we are not holy. Fortunately God is looking at me through the "lens" of Christ. When I read this psalm I am frightened at first, but I lift up my Ebenezer, Jesus Christ and say "God! Remember me!" And he does, because Christ is the new Moses, interceding for us to His Father.

"14Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession.
15For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.
16Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need." -Hebrews 4:14-16

And therein is my surety. Were I to stop with the knowledge of God I would be right to be terrified. But Christ was "in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin." So He knows our temptation and has ransomed me with His submission to the Father.

But I'm not done, oh no. Roman Catholics believe (or used to anyway) that for a sin to be forgiven it must be confessed. People (like Martin Luther) lived in terror of forgetting some sin and not confessing it. But my joy and hope is that I am known so completely by God and washed so completely by the blood of His Son, that it is merely necessary (merely, ha!) to be penitent and ask him to wash me. How could we ever hope by our own ability to escape the knowledge of God? But His knowledge should not be a curse and a terror to Christians, but a blessing and a joy. To have no secrets is truly marvelous to the redeemed and remade man, it is only fallen, rebellious man who should fear the knowledge of the Almighty.

Secrets make young people old and can destroy relationships. But imagine having another human know your innermost thoughts, you would be lonely, for who but Love Himself could love the miserable wretched creatures we are when fully disclosed. But He knows us and loves us, what grace!

2006-03-09T21:42:00.000-06:00

A humongous, thoughtful post vanishes into oblivion. Ashes to ashes.

2006-03-07T22:01:00.000-06:00

Spikenard and chocolate or All to Jesus I surrender

"3And being in Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he sat at meat, there came a woman having an alabaster box of ointment of spikenard very precious; and she brake the box, and poured it on his head.
4And there were some that had indignation within themselves, and said, Why was this waste of the ointment made?
5For it might have been sold for more than three hundred pence, and have been given to the poor. And they murmured against her.
6And Jesus said, Let her alone; why trouble ye her? she hath wrought a good work on me.
7For ye have the poor with you always, and whensoever ye will ye may do them good: but me ye have not always.
8She hath done what she could: she is come aforehand to anoint my body to the burying.
9Verily I say unto you, Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached throughout the whole world, this also that she hath done shall be spoken of for a memorial of her." Mark 14:3-9

It would appear that I copy my sister. But the pastor did preach about this on Sunday. People look at me funny when I say that I gave up chocolate for Lent. After all, what good would it do? But this woman poured spikenard on Jesus' head, which practically speaking, was folly. Whatever seems precious or valuable has no value until we break it and give it unto Jesus. He makes it whole and better than before. "For lo, He makes all things new" (that is probably way out of context, it's just what came to mind.

Anyway, this Easter, chocolate will taste so much sweeter than ever before.

2006-03-05T20:45:00.000-06:00

I wonder...

Will anyone ever read this? I might be glad if they don't, after all I am planning on being serious when I use this blog so...I wouldn't want anyone to see that side of me would I?

The ball (officially, the Winter Wonderland Ball) is just about all I can think of so...on dancing:

My dad is found of speaking of dancing as in, for instance, contra-dancing, as being a Trinitarian activity and so it is. In fact, it is a wonderful example of it. Trinitarianism mainly concerns the one and the many. Dancing is about both the individual (and the couple) and the group as a whole. The Trinity is fellowship as is dancing. To dance in such a way is to be more than an individual, it is to become a part of a whole.

Man created in the image of God was created for fellowship. God loves fellowship; the Father is in fellowship with the Son, the Son with the Spirit, etc. To dance is to fellowship and to fellowship is what we were created for. Now if I could only learn how to dance....

The modern man (as witnessed in the philosophy 'I think therefore I am') measure everything by the self. The only reliable source of knowledge is yourself, your very being is determined by your own ability to percieve it. It must be incredibly lonely to be 'Enlightened'. When you dance in a group what you are doing is recoginizing the 'I'-ness of the person across from you, or holding hands with you. Maybe dancing isn't so pointless after all.

2006-03-04T16:24:00.000-06:00

This is my third or fourth blogspot blog. I always forget my sign in name.

As to the serpent crusher thing, don't think me unfeminine, but...Yeah, like Jael. But I don't smash no one's heads in (double negative! Yay!), at least not physically. But I'm a serpent crusher, or trying to be. Whenever I turn away from the temptation to sin, I am crushing the serpent, Satan. The fact remains that I'm terrible at it, but God will aid me. (thank goodness, by myself I'm nothing or worse than nothing)

Frankly, I'm bored and tired and so I got me another blog. Hopefully I won't forget about this one. I may post, I may not.