|
SubscriptionsSites I Read
|
|
|
|
| Colossians 1:15-50 (NKJV)15. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. 17. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. 18. And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have preeminence. 19. For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, 20. and by him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth of things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross.
***
There's a lot in those verses, a whole lot. David Robertson (who preaches at St. Peter's Free Church of Scotland, where I've been going) has been delving into them for the past two weeks, urging us to think, to use our brains, to engaged and wrestle with the Scripture (he's been doing the same on Sunday nights with Revelation). When we read the Bible through the eyes of the World (which we all do because we are products of this world), we get it wrong - rather, we need to read the World through the Bible. This really reminds me of what Dr. Ferguson says: that we need to see with our ears, i.e., looks are deceiving, so we really have to process everything through what it is saying to us - a direct link to the bring more so than the eyes.
A major point from the sermon:
- Christ as the head of the body (the church): as the head, we are all linked together. Thus, we can't really say "personal Jesus" - we are members of a community of Christians, Jesus is our head. A single person cannot stand up and claim Jesus to his or her self because we are all connected to each other through Christ. Moreover, as He is the head we cannot do anything, absolutely anything, except by Him acting as head. David told this to the wee children in his children's sermon, saying that if they if jolly well didn't have a head that they couldn't scratch their nose - that it is the head which controls all, and that without it, we're dead. Thus, people like strong leaders in church as a replacement because these strong leaders are tangible - people can see them, talk to them, touch them, in a way more "real" than their relationship with Christ. Again, this points back to what Dr. Ferguson says: we have to see with our ears. When we see with our eyes we compromise, we are drawn away by false teachers.
It's really cool to be able to hear different preachers who are both totally ingrained with the Word of God more so than probably any preachers that I've ever heard (and since I've heard a *lot* I find this quite sad - that there weren't more). I wasn't expecting to get such Biblically sound preaching over here - because I've always been hard-pressed to find it in the States. I'm really glad for St. Pete's, let me tell you. The kids there are very in the Word, thinking about the Bible, eager to talk about it and pray - to worship. So prayer meeting is half of 7 on Wednesday and Christian Union here on campus is on Friday quarter of 8 (which I entirely missed last week...I actually knew about it, but it slipped my mind after that crazy week of trying to get classes straightened out). Praise God for His goodness in bringing me to a place so filled with believers in a country (the UK) that has, for the most part, forsaken Him! | | |
| Poetry, poetic inspiration, Keillor-styleFrom the Introduction to "Good Poems for Hard Times", collected and ed. by Garrison Keillor. If I ever teach a Philosophy of Poetry class, this will be included:
"Poetry is a necessity as simple as the need to be touched and similarly a need that is hard to enunciate. The intense vision and high spirits and moral grandeur are simply needed lest we drift through our days consumed by clothing options and hair styling and whether to have the soup or salad.
"The meaning of poetry is to give courage. A poem is not a puzzle that you the dutiful reader are obliged to solve. It is meant to poke you, get you to buck up, pay attention, rise and shine, look alive, get a grip, get the picture, pull up your socks, wake up and die right. Poets have many motives for writing (to be published on expensive paper, to show up the other in your M.F.A. program, to flaunt your sensitive nature and thereby impress someone who might then go to bed with you, to win valuable prizes and fellowships and maybe a year in Rome or Provence, to have a plausible excuse for making a mess of your life), but what really matters about poetry and what distinguishes poets from, say, fashion models or ad salesmen is the miracle of incantation in rendering the gravity and grace and beauty of the ordinary world and thereby lending courage to strangers. This is a necessary thing. At times life becomes almost impossible, and you curl up under a blanket in a dim room behind drawn shades and you despise your life, which seems mean and purposeless, a hoax and a cheat, your shining chances all wasted, pissed away, nobody can change this or make this better, love is lost, hope gone, nothing left but to pour a glass of gin and listen to weepy music. But it can help to say words. Moaning helps. So does prayer. God hears prayers and restores the souls of the faithful. Walking helps. Many people have pulled themselves up out of the pit by the simple expedient of rising to their feet, leaning slightly forward, and putting one food ahead of the other. Poems help." | | |
| Hang 'Em HighYou might call me crazy, but this is an excellent movie.
Not only because of a great story, but because of the cinematography, too. I would compare this to Hemingway stylistically - Eastwood plays the tough lawman whose eyes tell more than half the story. Close-ups of faces reveal details that words couldn't, and the eyes always speak volumes. The camera isn't always just a steady spectator - it, and the viewer through it - are in the middle of the action. Sometimes an actor will even fall onto it, or it will shake with the bumps of the road while riding in a wagon.
But I can't forget the story - it is about Law, and the execution of it. About how the government has it, and that it is wrong to take it into one's own hands. The moral isn't, however, that you can use the Law to exact revenge - the moral is that under the Law even revenge is a crime. The moral is that there is a judge who sends his servants into the earth to exact justice. The moral is that under the Law, if you break it, you will be justly rewarded.
Thankfully, Christians have Someone who fulfilled the Law.
***** (for the film)
[my life] (for Christ) | | |
| So I'm lingering over the smell of stale cigarettes, the taste of jasmine, and the feel of the autumn air. and it's making me poetic. Maybe I could write something later? I sent a few poems to the Lettered Olive...I would love nothing more than to be a publishing poet, which is one reason I'm taking the creating writing class in Scotland. I just want to have a book of poems that people can sit down with for a few minutes and take what I'm saying and remember it for...the rest of their lives? [is that too much to ask?] That's a reason I'm not so much of a muscian any more - music is too fleeting. Unless you're recording it, the best performance of your life is just there and gone. And even a recording will never capture the entire originality of a performance. But words? They are there on the page for - virtually - ever. Every time someone reads them aloud it is new, fresh. And solid - words are solid. I need solidarity in my life. I wouldn't mind being someone who is grounded.
Last week Dr. Maris gave me a signed copy of his book because I got +'s on all of the exercises for the whole semester: "To Edward, A sensitive, bright man who takes Life seriously. Your exercies were wonderful and thoughtful. It has been a privilege to get to know you this semester. Your friend, Ron Maris". For perhaps only the second time in my life I have been deeply touched by...the sympathy? praise?...of a professor. And this from a man that I don't agree with at all on most Major Life Points, who is probably bound for hell the second he breathes his last, whose mind is obviously in the gutter, and...interestingly enough...who I can't help but liking. In a way, he represents the idea Academic - he has tried everything in life at least once just to see what it was like, and he's come away from it a happy old man who enjoys making life hell for his students, but who loves them enough to make life (and his tests) hard for them. But who happens to give a curve (thank goodness). For this reason, if I wasn't a Christian, he of all people would be my hero. Instead? I am touched by his extension of friendship, and saddened by it at the same time - it, like all of his earthy pursuits towards true happiness and knowledge, will be fleeting. Not because I think he'll forget all about me by the time next semester rolls around, but because at the end of his life his soul will be bound for eternal torment. How helpless I feel - because how can I show him the Light of Christ when he has so blatantly rejected it? (he was/is an ordained Methodist minister, although converted to Judiasm apparently to appease his wife. he obviously doesn't believe it) Maybe I'll try and talk to him sometime, just to find out what he *really* believes, if anything. So many people don't these days. Relationships with these sorts of people are so hard - in the end all I can do is fall on my knees in prayer for them. | | |
| Can you say, awesome?Latest addition to the collection, and it is SWEET:
Large octavo, parchment boards with gilt titling to top board and spine. Top edge gilt. viii, 371pp. green marker ribbon. A limited edition of 250 copies on hand-made paper, of which this copy is numbered 182. A printed valedictory note concerning Keats has been pasted to the endpaper. A postcard depicting Keats from the national Portrait gallery, London is pasted to the first blank page. Else a clean Vg+ copy. This is volume two, only of a set of two volumes. | | |
|
