Play List

Hi all! I was wondering if everyone could do me a favor and leave a comment telling me what songs on my playlist you like/ don't like. Thanks! :)

Something Even Greater Than Worship

"No one else holds or has held the place in the heart of the world which Jesus holds. Other gods have been as devoutly worshipped; no other man has been so devoutly loved."

--John Knox

In Ancient times, and even still today, many people worship(ed) false gods whose whims 'demanded' human sacrifice. When Jesus came to earth, He proved, through humbling Himself, that He not only wants to show His power and glory to gain our worship-- He also desires our love. You can worship, like the pagans, out of fear. But you can only love out of love.

Is It Love or a Corset?

There is a book that I read about a year ago called, A Proper Pursuit. It's basically about a shallow but naive twenty-year-old girl whose mother ran away when she was a child and whose father is about to be remarried. She decides to go stay with her grandmother and three great aunts for a while to search for her mother-- the catch? They each have their own idea of what they want Violet to do with her life. Her grandmother just wants her to marry a pastor. One great aunt just wants her to marry well (read: someone rich). Another great aunt just doesn't want her to marry AT ALL. And the last great aunt-- well, she just encourages Violet to marry someone she loves. By the end of the story, Violet has completely changed and becomes a Christian.

Now, Violet is quite the humorous young lady. The only knowledge she has of the world at large comes from reading romance and mystery and adventure novels. *Ahem* dime novels. Below is a section of her thoughts during a lecture that one of her great aunts took her to. I hope you find it as amusing as I did. By the way, this story is set at the end of the 19th century and is written in the first person.

"'Ladies,' she began, 'I'm well aware that the majority of you are, at this very moment, trapped in the confines of a whalebone corset. But you might be shocked to learn that, according to my research, your tightly laced corsets are responsible for more than fifty female ailments.' She proceeded to enumerate them, one by one, but my mind began to wander after 'heart palpitations, difficulty breathing, and lightheadedness.' The symptoms sounded suspiciously like a romance novel's description of love. Could it be that thousands of women had married their husbands in the mistaken belief that they were in love, when all along their corsets had been too tight? How disappointing to watch their love mysteriously vanish once their corsets were unlaced. I made up my mind that if I ever felt love's symptoms, I would loosen my corset immediately before accepting a proposal of marriage."

Pure in Heart-- a Prestigious Award

Hello one and all! Okay, so I was awarded with this 'Pure in Heart Award' by a couple of friends this last week. Partake in the observation of the award, if you please:

Yep. It's just that cool.

If you are tagged:
1. Post about the tag.
2. Pick 10 bloggers who deserve this award.
3. Leave a comment on the blogs of the people you tagged letting them know they were awarded.
4. Answer the questions along with your post.

I've already posted about the tag. I'll do the questions next.

Ready- set- go!

1: Apples, Oranges or Bananas? I would have to say oranges. Since moving to Japan, they have become my #1 staple as far as food goes.
2: How many siblings do you have? Two comedic brothers, Matthew (11) and Titus (5) and one adorable sister, Grace (5)
3: How old are you? I'm fifteen. I'll be sixteen this month. Kind of funny-- this year has flown by!
4: Do you live on a prairie, woodland, swamp, city or other? City, dahlin.

5: Scissors or glue? Scissors are always winners with me! I used to LOVE cutting things out.

6: Describe your dream house. I seriously do not have a dream house whatsoever. I don't really care what my house is like. However, I do want to live in an orphanage one day, for some amount of time -- maybe in China or Mexico or Haiti, or wherever God would have me.

7: Is your room clean? Clean is a relative term.

8: If you could be a movie character for a day, who would you be? Definitely Miss Elizabeth Bennet. Pride and Prejudice is my favorite movie!!!

9: Italy, Greece, France, Spain or England? England, of course. I'd love to go there! Although any of those would be fun, none of them are the main places that I truly want to go to.

10: What denomination are you? 1 Corinthians 3:4-6, "For when one says, 'I follow Paul,' and another, 'I follow Apollos,' are you not mere men? What after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe-- as the Lord has assigned to each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow."

And 1 Corinthians 1:10-13 says, "Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment... Is Christ divided?

"Ephesians 4:3-6"Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; One Lord, one faith, one baptism, One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all."

As you can see, I'm not really into the whole 'denomination' thing. I believe in what the God of the Bible says. In America, and currently in Nagoya, I go to non-denominational churches (ironic, no? :) but I've also gone to Baptist and Presbyterian churches in the past.

11: Do you sleep with a stuffed toy (BE HONEST!)? No.


12: Gum, chocolate, or jelly beans? Hum.... depends on the chocolate. If it has nuts and caramel or toffee then I'm in. But if it's just plain chocolate or has fruity stuff then there is nothing to tempt me.

13: What is your favorite book? Oh, dear. I knew this one was coming. I have so many! I love historical fiction. Some of my favorite books in the past are Elsie Dinsmore and Millie Keith and Violet Travilla books--they're so good. And I love the somewhat comical A Proper Pursuit by Lynn Austin, and Candle in the Darkness and Fire by Night. I also love A Case for Christmas and A Case for Easter by Lee Strobel when I'm in an investigating mood. I love Do Hard Things by Alex and Brett Harris. I like Yellow Rose Bride. I enjoy Silas Marner which we read for Lit. 10 this year. And... hum. I still haven't finished Pride and Prejudice (Sorry Haley!!) but I really want to as soon as I get back to America (I don't have access here in Japan...) because I forgot to pack it and like I said, it's my favorite movie. Ever. But anyway, although I love all these books, none of them can really compare to my very favorite book. Hands down, the winner is the Bible. No other book or writing can ever touch my heart like it has. So it wins. Definitely.

14: Favorite ice cream flavor? Cookie dough and Mint Chocolate Chip.

15: If you had to eat one type of food for two weeks, what would that food be? Mexican. Right now, you could say for the next year and I wouldn't mind if it were Mexican food. We don't have much in Japan, so bring it on!! :)

16: What is your favorite Olympic sport? Hum-- ice skating, maybe. Or gymnastics. But I don't really watch the olympics (Except I watched some this year-- long story.)

17: If you woke up and discovered that you had turned into Miley Cyrus for the day, what would you do? Heaven forbid.

18: Describe yourself in three words. OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH, tall order! A sister, a friend, a Daughter of God

19: What chore do you hate? Maybe weeding? I don't know, my favorite is probably doing the dishes. But I don't know what my least favorite is.

20: If Elmo came into your room with a gun, what would you do? Gotta love THAT! haha-- I don't know. maybe call Gracie and Titus in to practice their karate on him.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOH. So now I choose my victims. I mean *ahem* friends.

(I'm gonna award some of you who I know have already done this, just because I feel like it. )

Kals over at "Adventures in the Life of a Daughter of Christ"

Haley over at "Singing in the Rain"

Problematic over at "It's Raining"

Hannah over at "My Book of Days"

Hannah over at "These Little Wonders"

Heidi over at "Heidi's Musings"

Hosanna over at "Hosanna's Messings"

Gray over at "The Locket"

Whoever happens to be reading this write now. If you are reading this blog post, you are tagged. It's official.

And, sorry that's only nine. Too bad. :'(

A Revival

For Easter I received a book called Though Waters Roar. All in all it was interesting, but far too sad for my taste. Anyway, that's not the point of this post. In fact, I only bring this up because the last few pages of the book are more than worth reading. Basically, this book is about a girl during prohibition helping her poor friend who was tricked into transporting alcohol from Canada to a saloon in the States. However, the friends have two young children and they cannot risk getting thrown in jail because the husband will never get a job and they are broke already. Long story short, that's where the heroine-- Harriet-- comes in. Harriet volunteers to deliver the alcohol herself under the condition that they agree to never, EVER, do anything like that again. Gratefully, her friends accept her offer, but in an unfortunate turn of events, Harriet is caught with the alcohol on her way to the saloon and thrown in jail. After she proves that she is not in to make money for herself by helping the police capture the still, she is freed and she goes to her grandma to tell her about what has happened. The problem? Her grandmother has fought for prohibition and against alcohol almost her entire life because her husband was an alcoholic.


All right, sorry that took so long. Now we have finally arrived to the part that really matters. At almost the end of the book, Harriet's grandmother tells her, "Jesus' harshest words were for the moral guardians of His day-- the Pharisees. They wanted to dictate morality, too, but Jesus called them hypocrites and whitewashed tombs. It isn't our calling as Christians to write laws that force people to live moral lives. As much as our communities might need it, and as bad as things are, imposing our morality on others isn't the answer. It doesn't work. People may be forced to give up alcohol, but they are still going to hell. That's our calling-- to bring people to Christ-- not to force them to behave the way we want them to or to solve all their external problems." She goes on to tell Harriet about different laws in the past that couldn't make people's hearts change. The Emancipation Proclamation set the slaves free, but it couldn't make people treat the former slaves as their equals. Prohibition could make drinking illegal, but if people's hearts were evil then it wouldn't really make a difference. They would still be wicked.

Now, please don't get me wrong, I do not say this or repeat this because I believe we should never have laws. God has laws, and I believe that our country should hold laws that uphold the laws that God gave. I believe this sincerely. What I am saying, however, is that laws do not change people's hearts. If one made all the laws in the world, it would not change the hearts of the people whose responsibility it was to uphold these laws. Only God can change hearts, and we must be willing to share the incredible news of the gospel with others, through evangelism and discipleship. Do you think that it's possible that sometimes Satan might distract us by getting us so involved in other causes, whether noble or not, that distract us from our ultimate goal-- to tell people about Christ and become like Christ?

I used to pray sometimes that God would change some laws in America. That He would change American's standards-- because it's always nice to live in a more moral society, right? But you know what I'm praying for now?

A revival.

The Search for Eternal Life

The last few weeks in Literature, we've been studying philosophy/ ancient Greek literature/ world views. It's very interesting to read about what the Greeks believed and what ideas shaped there thinking for centuries. But more than that, I find myself saddened by how misled these people were. Among the works that we've read in the past week or two are, "The Search for Everlasting Life" (from The Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the oldest works of literature in existence today), "The Death of Hector" (from the Iliad, by Homer), "The Return of Odysseus" (from the Odyssey, by Homer), "The Brevity of Life" (attributed to Semonides), "On Early Death" (by Lucian), "Unhappy Dionysius" (author unknown), "Elegy for Heraclitus" (by Callimachus), The Fables of Aesop, Antigone (by Sophocles), The Death of Socrates (by Plato), and Two Images from The Republic (by Plato). If you are familiar with any or all of these works, then you know that many of them deal with the same three key questions: What is the meaning of life? Is there a life after death, and, if so, how do I obtain it? What is the best way to live your life? Of course the questions I just listed are not by any means an exhaustive list, but the three questions that kept popping into my mind as I thought over all these poems, stories, and plays. Socrates wrote extensively on the question, "What is the best way to live?" Because he never believed in the gods of the Greeks. However, although he was wise in not adopting the Greek 'gods,' he never found the love and satisfaction of being forgiven by the true God. He was sentenced to death on the charges of 'denying the existence of the gods and corrupting the young men of the city' but without the true God, he died for nothing.

In "The Search for Everlasting Life," a king named Gilgamesh's best friend, Enkidu, died. He could not live in peace after this because he feared death. Because of this, he travelled long and far to meet a man named Utnapishtim, who has obtained eternal life. Gilgamesh embarks on a most daunting and before unattempted journey to reach Utnapishtim. Along the way, he meets a woman named Siduri. Upon his explaining to her his quest to find eternal life, she replies, "Gilgamesh, where are you hurrying to? You will never find that life for which you are looking. When thte gods created man they allotted to him death, but life they retained in their own keeping." She goes on to say something to the extent of, "Live it up while you can, bud. This is the only life you're gettin'." (Although as I'm sure you will believe she does not use that exact terminology.) Finally, Gilgamesh reaches Utnapishtim. Just when he is leaving again, Utnapishtim says that he will find a plant in the water that will restore his youth-- Gilgamesh finds this plant, but a serpant takes it away. In the end, despite his best efforts, Gilgamesh dies. Sad story, no? But it accurately displays how fleeting this life is, and how hopeless when we do not have the assurance of eternal life. Utnapishtim, who is the "Noah" figure for the Greeks (he supposedly survived a huge flood cast by the gods because the people awoke them from their sleep) was seemingly given eternal life merely by chance. How great is the God that we serve to not merely give us eternal life as a matter of chance or because we weren't the main source of His wrath at that particular moment.

If you have read this far, I commend you greatly. The point of this whole post is this: the Greeks lived in spiritual darkness for years upon years. Their faith rested in the whims of the gods-- if the weather was bad, it meant the gods must have been angry. If you were too noisy and accidently woke the gods from an afternoon nap, they sent a flood. Death and life were left in the hands of 'gods' who were no better than we-- in many cases, worse! But the Greeks were not the only ones confused. Still today, people all over the world live in spiritual darkness and decay. Here in Japan, with less than .1% of the people claim to be Christians, I can see first-hand the horror and hopelessness that surrounds a nation that needs the Lord. I think that Gilgamesh represents a lot of people today who are looking for eternal life-- but looking for it in the wrong place. Eternal life does not rest in the hands of gods, but in the ultimate hands of the one true God, the One and Only. The search for truth can end for many, if we are willing to share it.

"I am your Shield, and Reward, and Righteousness"

"Whether you go to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, 'this is the way; walk in it.'" Many Christians would recognize or could even quote this verse, found in Isaiah 30:21, from memory. But I wonder how many people who claim to be Christians live this verse out in their day-to-day lives? It's a hard thing to have faith, really. Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as, "Being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see."





That, my friends, is faith. And it has been a struggle for all of mankind down through the ages. Even Christians often have doubts about whether or not God really exists or whether or not they are truly saved. Having faith can be so difficult!





Yet, as we look closer in scripture, there are few things that are spoken of as highly as having faith. What an amazing thing! Simply believing God is one of the most highly spoken of virtues in the Bible. In Hebrews, chapter 11, the passage that I quoted earlier, there are verses about many different Biblical heroes throughout the Bible. Yet no one person was spoken of more in this chapter than the patriarch Abraham.

11:8-12, "By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. By faith Abraham, even though he was past age-- and Sarah herself was barren-- was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise. And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore." 17-19, "By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had received the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, "It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned. Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death."

James 2:23 says, "And the scripture was fulfilled that says, 'Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,' and he was called God's friend."

Galatians 3:6-9, "Consider Abraham: 'He believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.' Understand, then, that those who believe are children of Abraham. The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: 'All nations will be blessed through you.' so those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith."

Abraham lived during the Old Testament times, yet he was mentioned again and again in the New Testament. Why? Because his faith was counted unto him as righteousness.