in need of relaxation, i headed out to the bush library again to take some pictures. it looks like within the next few weeks there will be some more flowers, so there may be multiple trips out there… at any rate, the rest of the pics can be found here.
Not to complain, but this has definitely come up as an issue the past two weeks in church services i’ve attended: language usage.
Now I understand that no one speaks with perfect grammar all the time. I am certainly guilty of bad english usage as much as the next guy, but if you’re going to depart from your normal pattern of speech while praying just so that you can sound smarter or more formal, I would appreciate if you do it correctly.
With that in mind, I thought we might have a refresher course on what certain archaic words mean, and their usage:
1. Thy or Thine – Thy and Thine are possessive pronouns in the genitive case. Correct usages: Thy word, Thy chair, Thy heart, thy grace. Incorrect usages: Thy art, Thy bring us, Thy formed the world. Thy should be used in place of the more common word “your” – and let’s not get started on the proper usage of “your” as compared to “you’re”. ex. sentence: Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.
2. Thou and Thee- Thou and Thee are pronouns, thou being the nominative case and Thee being the objective, functioning as both the dative and accusative. For those of you who are counting, the nominative case marks the subject of a verb while the objective case functions as the target of the verb. Correct usage: “We beseech thee.” or “Thou art great among all Gods.” or “Thou hast provided …”
coldplay was fun tonight, though generously only about 45% as good as u2. of course comparing u2 @ year 26 with coldplay @ year 7 isn’t exactly fair, but none the less it’s hard to compare with the show u2 puts on. my hope is that in 15 years or so coldplay will have evolved to the level of showmanship of u2 and mellowed out of some of their rolling stonesish antics.
that being said, there were several really cool moments. my personal favorites were “the scientist”, “till kingdom come” with a tribute to johnny cash with “ring of fire” tacked on the end of it, as well as “talk” and “yellow”. the encore (“swallowed in the sea”, “in my place”, and “fix you”) was quite compelling, and probably worth the price of admission alone. i don’t know that i’d payed proper attention to “swallowed in the sea” before. the lyrics from the final bridge seemed to me to be particularly appropriate for the evening: “oh, what good is it to live / with nothing left to give / forget, but not forgive / not loving all you see?”
at the conclusion, “fix you” was quite well done, with chris martin not singing the final refrain at all, but rather allowing the voices of the crowd echoing in the toyota center to rise above the strains of the piano.
“lights will guide you home,
and ignite your bones,
and i will try
to fix you.”
all in all an extremely enjoyable evening.
thursday james and i went out and stole traci’s tulips so we could take some shots of them. not the best macro work i’ve ever done, but some came out ok.
i was going through old benedictions tonight when i realized that there were several from the early days that weren’t posted here. i thought i’d fix that by putting them up, but i wanted to keep their date structure somewhat intact, so i’ve placed them back where they belong (a year or so ago). here are the links:
to you who are alone
you who have tasted the world
as you follow his plan
you who wait expectantly
you who search for wisdom
may you run
God reaches out to you
a people – lost and wandering
as you survey your valley of dry bones
it was still back in the early days, so some are better than others, but there are a few that i like a lot, and that are rather meaningful to me. hope you enjoy.
may you carry others to Christ:
wounded, helpless, hopeless.
may you have eyes to see those in need –
in need of relief and release from an existence of fear and doubt –
in need of a Savior.
and as we approach Christ together
poor in our spirits and blind in our understanding
may we be continually reminded
that we are not above the charity of God –
that we are all the rescued ones.
James and I were talking today about all manner of things, and he dropped a little thought bomb that I thought I would share in rough form, before I’ve given it a lot of time to process and make my answer somewhat cogent (though I will no doubt do so soon…)
Proposition: What if God exists, and Jesus comes down, and everything we believe about Christianity remained constant, except there was no promise of eternal reward: i.e. there were no heaven, or at the very least we were not promised that we would go there simply by serving God/believing in Him/insert your own requirements here?
Given the above, here are a few questions:
1. Would you still serve God and attempt to live a “holy” lifestyle?
2. How would that change your view of the “Gospel”?
3. What does your answer to the first two questions tell you about the role that selfishness plays in your own personal decision to follow Christ?
4. If we as Christians are actually doing everything we’re doing ultimately so that we won’t end up in hell, does it mean that we may actually end up “doing all the right things”, yet still end up there anyway because our inward motivation was wrong?
5. How would this conflict with the current goals and ideas of mainstream American Christianity as a whole, and whatever local community of believers you find yourself a part of?
While this question is, in some sense, purely hypothetical, I none the less think it an important question to answer, or to at least think about.
I would be interested in hearing some of your comments on the subject.
full gallery available here.
some technical side comments… the d200 is an amazing camera. i cranked through 300 pictures in about 30 minutes and never once ran into buffer issues. i was at 1600 the entire evening, with most shots at 1/30 of a second, many of them at or close to 200mm. on shots that weren’t too terribly underexposed (such as the bass shot above), the detail is fantastic, and the noise performance is terrific. when you underexpose by a stop or two, things get fairly noisy and grainy in a hurry, but it’s not any worse than any other digital i’ve ever seen, and certainly isn’t any worse than shooting with film.
robbie seay was in CS tonight, playing at all faiths. i’ll have some pictures up later.
there were two highlights for me – the first coming right off the bat as they played “when the cold wind blows” – one of my favorite songs. they also played “go outside” – a fantastic song, with a near haunting chorus that continues to ring in my ears:
“no one should be left out…”
as you journey with a broken heart
may you walk with expectation of Christ’s healing.
may you appreciate and embrace the pain and sorrow of disappointment,
trusting Christ to guide you to completeness.
may you experience fully the place you are,
not seeking to run ahead,
cheapening the priceless gift of life God has given you.
and may you wait patiently for the Lord,
weeping in your time,
but perpetually aware
that joy comes in the morning.
earlier this month, bono spoke at the national prayer breakfast. i would highly encourage you to read the transcript (available here), as there are far too many good parts to put them all here. This one in particular that stuck with me:
A number of years ago, I met a wise man who changed my life. In countless ways, large and small, I was always seeking the Lord’s blessing. I was saying, you know, I have a new song, look after it… I have a family, please look after them… I have this crazy idea…
And this wise man said: stop.
He said, stop asking God to bless what you’re doing.
Get involved in what God is doing—because it’s already blessed.
Well, God, as I said, is with the poor. That, I believe, is what God is doing.
And that is what He’s calling us to do.
I’ve changed the RSS feed of this site to include the previous 20 posts.
Just so you know.
For those of you who haven’t read Tuesdays With Morrie, buy a copy (and read it) today.
There are a few rules I know to be true about love and marriage: If you don’t respect the other person, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. If you don’t know how to compromise, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. If you can’t talk openly about what goes on between you, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. And if you don’t have a common set of values in life, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble.
-Morrie Schwartz