Painting Project

Last Thursday in class we had to paint a picture using a passage from the book of Joel. I was not looking forward to it because I really suck at drawing and painting. I have a extremely big imagination but I can't put what's in my head on paper with any kind of resemblance. I chose to paint the passage that talked about how there will be wonders in the sky; blood, fire, and column's of smoke. I pictured in my head a sunset. The kind that look like the picture described in the passage. I tried to put it on paper but failed miserably but like professor Corrigan said it's not about the way it turns out it's the process that matters. I painted my picture the best I could and then I sat there visualizing the passage in my head. In my head I could see the picture that Joel was describing it was so beautiful but scary at the same time. Then I read a little further and started imagining the part that describes the valley of decision. I pictured two huge mountains with a valley in between them. I pictured thousands of people coming over the tops of the mountains and through the valley and God was sitting at the very edge of the valley. Reading scripture while imagining it is a great way to really get what is being described. It allows you to really relate with what's going on. I guess what I'm getting at is that imagery is very important when reading the Bible and Literature in general. It makes reading enjoyable for me. I'm a history major so I have to read a lot. I use the same process when reading it, I like trying to imagine myself at historical events. It's pretty cool and nerdy at the same time, but that's me.

My Painting

This is my masterpiece!

Destruction then Redemption 9-23-2010

Yesterday in class we discussed the book of Joel. I have honestly never read it until Monday. Anyways, yesterday we talked about how a lot of the Old Testament is in poetry and that you can get different meaning from one scripture. One thing that we I and others have to be careful with is taking scripture out of context. Reading before and after a scripture gives you more of a sense of the situation taking place. Professor Corrigan talked about how you can't take certain scriptures and live them out because some scriptures don't make any sense out of context. There is wisdom in this.

We also went outside yesterday to read the book of Joel to the World, I mean the lake and ducks and trees and you get the picture. I was skeptic at first but as I sat by the lake on the grass I began to read in a quiet voice the beginning of Joel. I looked around at the world around me and imagined what it would look like if locusts and fire had decimated everything in sight. The tree's would be burned and all the grass devoured, the lake would be dried up and nothing would be left but death and destruction. It's amazing how my imagination works because it what I was imagining looked so real. The image of Blood, fire and columns of smoke reminded me of sunsets. Then, I read the end of Joel where God was saying repent and I will save you from your enemies. The story of redemption. It's a reoccurring theme in the Old Testament; sin then redemption, sin then redemption. You can see God's master plan all throughout the OT. A Message of Hope.

Reading scripture out-loud helped me catch words or phrases that I might not have grasped if I read it to myself.

Joel Chapter 1

I have actually never read the book of Joel before today. Joel is writing Israel to tell them that they must repent of their sins or else the locusts will be but a taste of God's wrath. He refers to the locusts as an actual marching army to give us a vivid picture of what is taking place. Joel is appealing to the priests and people of the land to fast and humble themselves before God. If they will but respond to his calling he will give them material and spiritual blessings. I like the way that Joel uses verbal imagery to allow his readers to get vivid images in their head. When I read this I could literally see the desolation to the land of Israel. I could see the swarms of locusts devouring everything in their paths. I imagined the part where God said He will display wonders in the sky and on the earth, Blood, fire and columns of smoke.

My favorite passages of this chapter are:
"Yet even now," declares the LORD, "Return to me with all your heart, And with fasting, weeping and mourning; And rend your heart and not your garments " Now return to the LORD you God, For He is gracious and compassionate, Slow to anger, abounding in lovingkindness And relenting evil. Our God is so gracious and loves us more than we can ever imagine.

The practical application of this book is to remember that without repentance, judgement will be swift and thorough. We should not put our trust in our material possessions but in God Himself. At times God may use pain, sorrow, or other avenues to get our attention, but His mercy and grace never fails. God provided us a way to gain eternal life through His son, Jesus Christ.

Cemetery Trip

On Sunday I went to the Lakeview, Roselawn and Tiger Flowers cemetery complex for this field trip, and I stayed for at least 40 minutes. I haven't visited a cemetery since my Aunt Stella died 4 summers ago of cancer. I loved her so much and she was my favorite. Our family used to go stay once a month with them in Port St. Joe. I really miss her.

Going to a cemetery made me think, "how are these people remembered?" How will I be remembered? I want to live a life that changes the world somehow. I want to make my stamp on this earth. I am going into the U.S. Army when I graduate in the spring and I know that in this profession I could lose my life, and I am prepared to give my life for my country if need be. I came across a few graves that the ending date was 1944. I wondered if these men gave there lives over seas to defeat Hitler or the Japanese. I also came across a bunch of names who lived through the Civil Rights movement. What a world that must have been? Different water fountains, different bathrooms, white's only restaurants. That's a world most of us don't even know about.

Saturday was the 9th anniversary of 9/11. Over 3,000 people lost their lives in about a 3 hour span, that's more deaths than the U.S. suffered at Pearl Harbor. This summer I was lucky enough to get to visit Manhattan and see ground zero. It really got to me. Being there were all those people lost their lives. How will they be remembered many years from now? I hope everyone said a prayer for the families.

What will your dash mean? How will people remember you? Will your life have made a difference?

A Grief Observed 9-13

At the beginning of Chapter three, Lewis talks about how he is struggling with his feelings. He is tired of just "feeling" so he tries thinking for a change. H.'s death has made him doubt everything he believed in and now he is struggling with the thought that he never believed it in the first place. I have had this happen to me before. We think we have it all figured out and everything is going great in then something happens that makes us doubt what we thought we believed. Lewis refers to this faith a being like a deck of cards.  Everything is fine and dandy until our faith is tested and then it just falls apart. God did promise that we would suffer in this life and he said blessed are those who mourn but when something bad happens to us we seem to forget what we had bargained for. Our faith must be truly grounded if we are survive the times when bad things happen to us. We must be planted firmly in good soil. Lewis says, "I thought I trusted the rope until it mattered to me whether it would bear me." Such a true statement, but it doesn't have to. We have a rope, so to speak, that we can trust to hold us when it matters.

Lewis talks about him calling God a Cosmic Sadist not as an expression of thought but as of hatred. You that feeling when you get back at someone when they have done something to make you mad. You feel good after it but only for a little while. You soon see the error of your ways and man up and apologize. You can say what you think but what you think doesn't mean it is necessarily true. We all lash out with our emotions just to get that high of feeing better but it isn't the right way to react. Maturity is a painful process but ultimately necessary to deal with people and situations in an adult way.

9/8/2010

Yesterday we met in the cafeteria for class which was really cool. At my table we talked a lot about J.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis and how they have made their impact on literature. We discussed who was the better writer and we came up with this conclusion. C.S. Lewis was the better thinker in terms of philosophy and theology but Tolkien was a better dreamer and story teller. I mean he came up with an entire world and new languages for each race to speak. I'm not taking away from Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia ,but in my opinion, Tolkien's Lord of the Rings was just stunning. He had an imagination that I can only dream off. I remember reading both the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings series as a young teenager. The story takes you in and you almost become part of the story. I haven't to this day found a better book on fiction than Tolkien's the Hobbit and LOTR. 

C.S. Lewis is probably the most influential writer in my life. His book Mere Christianity has helped me hammer out my believes. I've always had a problem with just accepting what people say when it comes to Christian beliefs. His book laid out the Christian foundations in way that I could understand them. He goes into great detail to lay out principles by which you can follow his thinking. He talks about in Mere Christianity how Christianity is the only true way to find God, but he also talks about how some religions are closer to being right than others. He uses a mathematics example to explain. In a math problem there is only one right answer but some answers are closer to being right than others. I agree with Mr. Lewis on this point. Burning religious books and scriptures is not the way we are supposed to act. 

Blog 9/6/2010

The author's start off chapter three by talking about the importance of theme. They explain that summarizing a story message or putting a poem into a statement jeopardizes the meaning of both. This is a true statement. To really understand and know what the author's original intent was is extremely important when reading anything.

Little Red Riding Hood
I never thought that this fairy tale had a moral story in it. I always thought of it as simply a fairy tale told to children but reading the author's explanation of the moral i totally see it. The moral is basically: beware of any strangers who just happen's to walk by. They may seem nice and pleasant but down deep their just like every other wolf... dangerous. The story has a gruesome ending but it is justified by the message of the story, beware of smooth talking men.

When the Message is Unwanted
Last semester in my history class we actually watched Triumph of the Will. It was a brilliant propaganda film. It showed Germans that Hitler was their savior and he was going to make Germany great again. During this time in Germany things were going terrible for everyone. The economy was in shambles and no one had any answers to the mounting problems, but then came Hitler riding in to save the day. At the beginning of the film Hitler descends from the sky aboard an airplane which personifies his coming out of heaven to make things right. Riefenstahl uses disciplined workers who look like soldiers and beautiful landscape shots to glorify the Nazi party. This is a great example of how film, and for that case any form of media, can be used to achieve any outcome wanted. One advantage Riefenstahl and the Nazi party had was that Germany was in shambles at the time of the film so the people of Germany were willing to accept any form of government as long as it made things better. Appealing to the emotions of people is an outlet writers and the media use quite often.

What We Talk about When We Talk about Love

This story is an attempt to define what love really is. Mel at one point talks about how if he or his wife Terri died, whichever one was left alive would grieve for a little while and then probably fall in love all over again. This is a very true assumption because I have seen it happen to people. I thought was very interesting that both couples were previously married. Mel talks about he really loved his ex-wife but now he hates her guts. He asks. "what happened to that love?" No one in the story can say. I don't have an answer for this, but I have asked other people that have divorced someone else and they said that the love just ran out. I have been taught my life that beauty is only skin deep and this statement is as true today as it has always been. A relationship Can Not be based on looks alone. There has to be a deeper connection. A connection that is so strong mentally as well as physically that it can bind people together. Love is an extremely complicated but yet a simple thing if and when you meet that special someone.
Terri's story was an all to often story-abusive husbands and the so called love they have for their wife's. Terri explains that her ex really did love her but it was not a healthy love. He probably did love her at one time but somewhere along the road he went looney.
The story of the old couple really got me thinking. The love that the old man had for is wife is the kind of love I want to have for my wife when I do find her. He got depressed just because he couldn't see her. That is what I believe love looks like. I believe that is what love is.