The Power to Love

"Now how can we do this? Where does power to love like this come from? Just think how astonishing this is when it appears in the real world! Could anything show the truth and power and reality of Christ more than this?

Let me just give you part of the answer from Matthew 5:11-12,

Blessed are you when men cast insults at you, and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely, on account of Me. 12 Rejoice. and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Jesus says that not only can you endure the mistreatment of the enemy, but you can also rejoice in it. Why? Because your reward in heaven is great.

Which means that the command to love your enemy is a command to set your mind on things that are above, not on things that are on the earth. The command to love your enemy is a command to find your hope and your satisfaction in God and his great reward--not in the way people treat you. The steadfast love of the Lord is better than life (Psalm 63:3).

Loving your enemy doesn't earn you the reward of heaven. Treasuring the reward of heaven empowers you to love your enemy."

This excerpt is taken from John Piper's sermon "But I Say to You, Love Your Enemies, Part 2." Click over here to see the rest of the article.

A reminder

Psalm 121

I lift up my eyes to the hills.

From where does my help come?

My help comes from the LORD,

who made heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot be moved;

he who keeps you will not slumber.

Behold, he who keeps Israel

will neither slumber nor sleep.

The LORD is your keeper;

the LORD is your shade on your right hand.

The sun shall not strike you by day,

nor the moon by night.

The LORD will keep you from all evil;

he will keep your life.

The LORD will keep

your going out and your coming in

from this time forth and forevermore.

I might be back... after this brief message

Murphy's Laws on Applied Terror

1. When reviewing your notes before an exam, the most important ones will be illegible.

2.The more studying you did for the exam, the less certain you are as to which answer they want.

3. Eighty percent of the final exam will be based on the one lecture you missed and the one book you didn't read.

4. The night before the history midterm, your biology instructor will assign two hundred pages on Plenarian.
Corollary: Every instructor assumes that you have nothing else to do except study for that instructor's course.

5. If you are given an open-book exam, you will forget your book.
Corollary: If you are given a take-home exam, you will forget where you live.

6. At the end of the semester, you will recall having enrolled in a course at the beginning of the semester - and never attending.

7. Law of Universal Intelligence: the most ill-behaved student in every teacher's class is always one of the brightest ones he can't flunk.

p.s. yes, I am procrastinating on studying for finals =)

A Dream Within a Dream - Edgar Allen Poe

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow--
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand--
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep--while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

My life in a nutshell

"80% of the final exam will be based on the one lecture you missed and the one book you didn’t read."

"College professor–someone who talks in other people’s sleep." ~ W. H. Auden

"Instead of giving money to found colleges to promote learning, why don't they pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting anybody from learning anything? If it works as good as the Prohibition one did, why, in five years we would have the smartest race of people on earth." ~ Will Rogers

"Of course there's a lot of knowledge in universities: the freshmen bring a little in; the seniors don't take much away, so knowledge sort of accumulates." 

~ A. Lawrence Lowell

"The difference between fiction and reality is that fiction has to make sense." 

~ Tom Clancy

"The family. We were a strange little band of characters trudging through life sharing diseases and toothpaste, coveting one another's desserts, hiding shampoo, borrowing money, locking each other out of our rooms, inflicting pain and kissing to heal it in the same instant, loving, laughing, defending, and trying to figure out the common thread that bound us all together." ~ Erma Bombeck

"Sleeping is no mean art: for its sake one must stay awake all day."
~ Friedrich Nietzsche

"I'm not asleep... but that doesn't mean I'm awake."

"A day without a nap is like a cupcake without frosting." ~ Terri Guillemets

"Inside some of us is a thin person struggling to get out, but they can usually be sedated with a few pieces of chocolate cake."

“But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.” ~ Joshua 24:15

What's the difference?

A boy makes his girl jealous of other women. 

A gentleman makes other women jealous of his girl.

My kinda guy.

More About Me

 I can't for the life of me find the time to come up with a decent blog post of my own, so I'm tagging along with Simply SA and her all-about-me ABC blog post ~ enjoy!

Age? twenty-one and lovin it!
Bed Size? twin, mostly because I've never lived anywhere that's big enough for anything else =P
Chore that you hate? cleaning the bathroom ::shudder::
Dogs? my dog's an idiot, but at least he's cute. my dogs gotta be cute =)
Essential way to start the day? enough time to wake up slowwwly and look out the window and relish a few moments all to mine-selfs.
Favorite Color? there's at least one shade of each color that I like... but I've yet to find an ugly shade of blue
Gold or Silver? silver goes better with my 'look,' so I'll go with that
Height? 5 '4" ::sigh:: now THIRD tallest of the sibs {some perspective: I'm the oldest}... and even that's not going to last long - the next two are catching up fast.
Instruments you play? kindabutnotreally violin. I suck at it.
Job title? crew member. Im'a NOT telling you where.
Kids? generally cute & crazy, mostly loveable.. and faaar in the future.
Live...? in a house more than twice as big as our old one on three acres with lots of trees and elbow room! and I never want to leave =)
Mother's name? Carrie
Nickname? one lady at work calls me  'ladybug,' but even she doesn't know why. nothing else has ever stuck.
Overnight hospital stays? last year with DKA.
Pet peeves? professors that assign homework like theirs is the only class you're taking that semester, and grossly mispronounced/misspelled words
Quote from a movie? Mal: "This is the captain. We have a little problem with our entry sequence, so we may experience some slight turbulence and then - explode."  ~ Serenity, one of the awesomest and most unappreciated movies out there.
Right or left handed? Right
Siblings? ten {yes, siblings}
Underwear? no comment.
Typed or handwritten? the way I hold a pen/pencil is just horrible and I usually end up cramping it up really bad if I do it for any length of time, so typed if I can. But I still always write my letters by hand.
Vegetables you hate? cooked spinach. most cooked leafy greens, actually.
What makes you late? generally other people. I hate it when someone's late, so I rarely am myself.
Yummy food you make? quiche! my daddy likes my quiche better than even a chef's that he had once =)
Zoo animals? the red panda (which isn't actually a panda) and the penguins.

We Remember

Lacrymosa dies illa

qua resurget ex favilla

judicandus homo reus;

huic ergo parce Deus.

Pie Jesu, Domine,

dona eis requiem.

Amen.

 Oh, this day full of tears

when from the ashes arises

guilty man, to be judged:

Oh Lord, have mercy upon him.

Gentle Lord Jesus,

grant them rest.

Amen.

Hostias et preces tibi, Domine,

laudius offerimus,

tu suscipe pro animabus illis,

quarum hodie memorarium facimus:

quam olim Abrahae promisisti

et semini ejus.

Lord, in praise we offer to Thee

sacrifices and prayers,

receive them for the souls of those 

whom we remember this day:

as Thou didst promise Abraham

and his seed.

{from Mozart's Requiem Mass in D Minor, K. 626}

the creation of Eve

We will be looking at Genesis in my religion class today - most likely with a certain emphasis on the Creation story (though there might be a small discussion on human sacrifice in the Bible... *le sigh*). While I was reading through our assigned chapters for today, I remembered a quote I had seen some time ago, and was able to find it fairly quickly using Google. It's a favorite of mine:

"Woman was taken out of man; not out of his head to top him, nor out of his feet to be trampled underfoot; but out of his side to be equal to him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be loved." 
~ Marguerite De Valois

Of thee I sing

"Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it."

~ Mark Twain

"I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually."

~James A. Baldwin

"Patriotism consists not in waving the flag, but in striving that our country shall be righteous as well as strong."

~ James Bryce

"Gentlemen have talked a great deal of patriotism. A venerable word, when duly practised."

~ Robert Walpole 

"Patriotism is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime."

~ Adlai E. Stevenson 

"You have to love a nation that celebrates its independence every July 4, not with a parade of guns, tanks, and soldiers who file by the White House in a show of strength and muscle, but with family picnics where kids throw Frisbees, the potato salad gets iffy, and the flies die from happiness."

~Erma Bombeck

"The highest patriotism is not a blind acceptance of official policy, but a love of one's country deep enough to call her to a higher plain."

~George McGovern

"And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."

~ John F. Kennedy

"See, I have taught you decrees and laws as the LORD my God commanded me, so that you may follow them in the land you are entering to take possession of it. Observe them carefully, for this will show your wisdom and understanding to the nations, who will hear about all these decrees and say, “'Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.' What other nation is so great as to have their gods near them the way the LORD our God is near us whenever we pray to him?"

~ Deteronomy 4:5-7

My bubble

{pic credit}

Still in your bubble today?

But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger.

Romans 2:8

Tomorrow will worry about itself

"The pursuit of happiness is a most ridiculous phrase; if you pursue happiness you'll never find it."
~ C.P. Snow

"What's the use of worrying? It never was worthwhile." ~ George Asaf

"We spend most of our time and energy in a kind of horizontal thinking. We move along the surface of things [but] there are times when we stop. We sit still. We lose ourselves in a pile of leaves or its memory. We listen and breezes from a whole other world begin to whisper."
~ James Carroll

"To sit in the shade on a fine day, and look upon verdure is the most perfect refreshment."
~ Jane Austen

"Stress is an ignorant state. It believes that everything is an emergency. Nothing is that important."
~ Natalie Goldberg

"Sometimes I sits and thinks, and sometimes I just sits." ~ Satchel Paige

"Slow down and enjoy life. It's not only the scenery you miss by going too fast - you also miss the sense of where you are going and why."  ~ Eddie Cantor  

"Take a rest; a field that has rested gives a bountiful crop." ~ Ovid

"Nothing is permanent in this wicked world - not even our troubles." ~ Charlie Chaplin

When words just aren't enough... shut up

 A huge part of rhetoric is knowing when to speak ~ a well-placed silence can say volumes.

"We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature - trees, flowers, grass - grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence... we need silence to be able to touch souls." ~ Mother Teresa

"There are times when silence has the loudest voice." 
~ Leroy Brownlow

"Do not speak unless you can improve the silence."

"Silences make the real conversations between friends. Not the saying but the never needing to say is what counts." 
~ Margaret Lee Runbeck

"Saying nothing... sometimes says the most." ~ Emily Dickinson

"We must have reasons for speech but we need none for silence."

"Silence is one of the hardest arguments to refute." ~ Josh Billings

"Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence, and I learn, whatever state I may be in, therein to be content." 
~ Helen Keller

"The world would be happier if men had the same capacity to be silent that they have to speak." ~ Baruch Spinoza

Wisdom can come from the strangest places...

“If you live to be 100, I hope I live to be 100 minus 1 day, so I never have to live without you.”

"Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day."

"You can't stay in your corner of the forest, waiting for others to come to you; you have to go to them sometimes."

"If ever there is tomorrow when we’re not together... there is something you must always remember. You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think."

“A little Consideration, a little Thought for Others, makes all the difference.”

“Before beginning a Hunt, it is wise to ask someone what you are looking for before you begin looking for it.”

 ~ Winnie the Pooh ~

Not safe... but good

"The infinite value of each human soul is not a Christian doctrine. God did not die for man because of some value He perceived in him. The value of each human soul considered in itself, out of relation to God, is zero. As St. Paul writes, to have died for valuable men would have been not divine but merely heroic; but God died for sinners." ~ C.S. Lewis

"Safe? Of course he's not safe! But he's good." 

~ Mr. Beaver in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe