I listen to my blogs and I see why God didn't permit or gift me for teaching. I need humbling. I am not meek or easy to learn from like natural teachers are. If only I could share what is deeply impacting me without explaining my knowledge. But I think that's impossible.
After I finished those audio blogs (choose the last one to listen to if you want reference for this written entry; 2 Cor 4:4,6; the gospel that unbelievers don't get, is the glorification of Christ) I thought: "WHY/HOW does it make a difference to know the gospel as being, summarily, the glorification of Christ?"
God gave me a passage, and I want to use it as an illustration. I am going to have you read it two times, as God had me do. For those two times as I did I am going to give you two different presuppositions by which to comprehend what is being communicated in that passage.
Read this, first, under the assumption that Jesus is a higher-up or a go-between/mediator or a vessel of God or a prophet of God or an angel or son of God or some other being or person who understands God's point of view, and comes to us to help illuminate heaven and bring us to a point of belief in God:
"Then Jesus told them, 'This very night you will all fall away on account of me....'
Peter replied, 'Even if all fall away on account of you, I never will.'
'I tell you the truth,' Jesus answered, 'this very night, before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.'"
matt 26 + lk 22
Okay, that's your typical read.
(Give a moment to next read this to set the new tone, as if it were Jesus descending on Moses in Exodus 19-20:)
"And the LORD said to Moses, 'Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. Have them wash their clothes and be ready by the third day, because on that day the LORD will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people. Put limits for the people around the mountain and tell them, "Be careful that you do not go up the mountain or touch the foot of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall surely be put to death."' ... On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in the camp trembled. Then Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain. Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the LORD descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, the whole mountain trembled violently, and the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder. Then Moses spoke and the voice of God answered him. ... And God spoke all these words: 'I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me.'" (That was the intro to the ten commandments and I didn't transpose the rest, because you know what it says.)
The typical read: Revere the God of heaven. Follow His rules; keep your distance. Keep up your end of the covenant.... You know, this sense of Him, as all-powerful and perfect.
Now, go back and read about Peter again with the presupposition that the Jesus prophecying to Peter is the same one who keeps himself at bay from us because of his omnipotence and moral perfection... as I assume you saw as I did in exodus.
"Then Jesus told them, 'This very night you will all fall away on account of me....'
Peter replied, 'Even if all fall away on account of you, I never will.'
'I tell you the truth,' Jesus answered, 'this very night, before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.'"
matt 26 + lk 22
Did you feel the difference?
The big guy up in the sky knew all this about me and yet prayed, in advance, for me, to recover?
Hooh. I don't look up at the daytime clouds now without feeling the difference. And I was suffering, oh I was, by comparison, laboring under that impression of Jesus just as the go-between. Yeah, the Father loves and accepts Jesus' deeds, and so therefore mine by grace, but what if Jesus wasn't there to stand the gap? I would feel uncomfortable if in a room with just the Father and no Jesus to remind him not to take His wrath out on me.
That Garden of Gesthemane praying man, where Jesus went away from the crowds to let his Father strengthen him, and to intercede for those he made his friends, was also the person who was perfect and moral and pure, never having a weak or unglorious or tempted moment, in heaven, naturally inciting the fear and awe of those who saw His works and heard his voice.
That's why it matters that they're the same being; the one who avenges wrath for wrongdoing, and the one who intercedes for our benefit. It makes the sense of God into everything simotaneously. Jesus reached down to the most immoral and weak and hopeless of men -- it's where he was most welcome, and where his power worked to make them into the image of righteousness. So you see it is Jesus that makes the connection, and takes us there... from the depths, to the greatest of heights. He sets before me a path of a life to walk that is the strict perfection He already prepared by his own cost-to-self.
I hope I was able to express it. I read this over before I post and I wonder if I was effective, or not. Not for the sake of anyone agreeing or whatever, all I want is to show you what I have seen. That's all my goal. We'll see. Could use some feedback on this one, if anyone wouldn't mind. Thank-you.
Sunday, April 30, 2006
Saturday, April 29, 2006
Friday, April 28, 2006
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
Joseph
Joseph modeled Jesus when they both "did not think honor and inheritance something to be attained, but instead made himself nothing, becoming a servant."
Joseph knew as Jesus did that all his brothers were supposed to bow down in honor and respect for him, being the one to be obeyed among the children of Israel. But they mocked him and sent him off to suffering and humiliation and lonliness.
Joseph was sold as a slave and served as one in Egypt, and then also unjustly became a prisoner. Eleven years of this stuff occured in his life while he waited for God to exault him according to his promises.
Yesterday when I read this and applied my own sense of unfulfillment, un-use, to Joseph's time of suffering, I became bitter. I didn't want to bear under this time of training and preparation and unrecognition. But I continued on in my reading today and here is what I found:
The accomplishment of the time of suffering/waiting/un-use is:
Experiencing God's faithfulness in all circumstances now will make for an even-handed rulership later. It will enable me to encourage and gain trust those who would ever be under me, that I'd be steadied. Experiencing the manage of little, tiny ministries now will make me comfortable with and give me confidence to use my known gifts for God and not turn my back on Him. When I work out the insides of my heart now in un-use, I free myself of things like self-pity, to help... becoming "others-oriented;" an important and necessary trait for those in authority. God is now creating modesty in me, making me pure in heart not because I start like this but he consecrates me to Him so that I will not stray when temptation comes. He makes it so that I will not hope that men will honor or respect or help me out of my circumstances; He will squash my trust in everything, except Him to exault me. A time to generally sift my heart's desires and crucify all evil intentions, so that I look and feel and act like a servant of God, there won't be a doubt in anyone's opinion about it later when I am in a place of authority or leadership. Now is a time to spend around the weak and unspoken and broken people, to find myself no better than the least of men, so that I can exhibit respect and compassion for everyone later; no favoritism. I am learning that God's guidance is perfect, so that I can share that hope to those under my care. I am training in the now, in how to 'save lives' in the little scope. And most importantly, or desperately in my heart, God is now in the time of un-use, breaking my pride. I need many years as Joseph did to truly squash it so that I won't offend others but will be harmless as a dove when authority finally comes.
All these things I gathered from Joseph's struggles in Egypt, things like when Potiphar's wife tempted him, when the cupbearer forgot to help free Joseph and he waited 2 years in vain for him to do so, and things like how conscious Joseph was that God was with him and making his talent great in the midst of all those hard experiences.
It gives me hope, feeling all alone in some ways as I do as I bear under being conscious of my unused talents. I can believe and hope in God's good planning in leaving me for now "forgotten" and "buried," that He has something unseenly great in store for my future.
Joseph knew as Jesus did that all his brothers were supposed to bow down in honor and respect for him, being the one to be obeyed among the children of Israel. But they mocked him and sent him off to suffering and humiliation and lonliness.
Joseph was sold as a slave and served as one in Egypt, and then also unjustly became a prisoner. Eleven years of this stuff occured in his life while he waited for God to exault him according to his promises.
Yesterday when I read this and applied my own sense of unfulfillment, un-use, to Joseph's time of suffering, I became bitter. I didn't want to bear under this time of training and preparation and unrecognition. But I continued on in my reading today and here is what I found:
The accomplishment of the time of suffering/waiting/un-use is:
Experiencing God's faithfulness in all circumstances now will make for an even-handed rulership later. It will enable me to encourage and gain trust those who would ever be under me, that I'd be steadied. Experiencing the manage of little, tiny ministries now will make me comfortable with and give me confidence to use my known gifts for God and not turn my back on Him. When I work out the insides of my heart now in un-use, I free myself of things like self-pity, to help... becoming "others-oriented;" an important and necessary trait for those in authority. God is now creating modesty in me, making me pure in heart not because I start like this but he consecrates me to Him so that I will not stray when temptation comes. He makes it so that I will not hope that men will honor or respect or help me out of my circumstances; He will squash my trust in everything, except Him to exault me. A time to generally sift my heart's desires and crucify all evil intentions, so that I look and feel and act like a servant of God, there won't be a doubt in anyone's opinion about it later when I am in a place of authority or leadership. Now is a time to spend around the weak and unspoken and broken people, to find myself no better than the least of men, so that I can exhibit respect and compassion for everyone later; no favoritism. I am learning that God's guidance is perfect, so that I can share that hope to those under my care. I am training in the now, in how to 'save lives' in the little scope. And most importantly, or desperately in my heart, God is now in the time of un-use, breaking my pride. I need many years as Joseph did to truly squash it so that I won't offend others but will be harmless as a dove when authority finally comes.
All these things I gathered from Joseph's struggles in Egypt, things like when Potiphar's wife tempted him, when the cupbearer forgot to help free Joseph and he waited 2 years in vain for him to do so, and things like how conscious Joseph was that God was with him and making his talent great in the midst of all those hard experiences.
It gives me hope, feeling all alone in some ways as I do as I bear under being conscious of my unused talents. I can believe and hope in God's good planning in leaving me for now "forgotten" and "buried," that He has something unseenly great in store for my future.
Monday, April 10, 2006
More dabbling in my "hobby"
Here are some of the sounds of my show that I liked. These are really great pieces of music. I appreciate their emotional charge. A bit of the "007," a bit of the melancholy angst of oppression. Here are the best....
Imagining being set free
http://members.aol.com/cusmus2/music/torn.wav (Rose Chronicles "Torn")
Discovery, disillusion and rebellion
http://members.aol.com/cusmus2/music/chansuck.wav (Chainsuck, "Big Mistake")
The moment of shock having trust broken
http://members.aol.com/cusmus2/music/heyman.au (Filter "Hey Man Nice Shot")
A 007 Go
http://members.aol.com/cusmus2/music2/loadgun.wav (Hednoize "Loaded Gun")
These last two are my most favorites.
This one is that moment when she can finally see her ideals come to fruition. The lyrics are intensely idealisticly romantic, bordering on a wrongful worship. Whew. The lyrics for what you will hear in the clip:
"This could shatter your heart
The reflection of your soul
Was a vision of me
Take all that I could be
Take all I should be
May faith lead your way
Did you know it was me"
http://members.aol.com/cusmus2/music/klass.wav (Beverly Klass "Temple")
And for very last, the song which captures that bitterness I can't even describe well, where she had used all of her efforts, wits, and power to bargain her freedom. When that moment came to cash in, lo, and behold, they over-strategized her on a technicality. She'd have to remain. Probably the most important scene in all of the seasons.
http://members.aol.com/cusmus2/music/morfine.wav (Morphine "Hanging on a Curtain")
They did a really good job choosing their tracks. They have chosen pieces from Sarah McLaughlin, Depeche Mode, Garbage, etc. but it's amazing to think that they picked them before they had become hits, and in the case of Garbage, before they had their first hit single. I have those two favorite ones above on the La Femme Nikita Soundtrack album; I should pull it out and listen to it again.
All of these clips were selected from Karen Glover's amazing website, Sounds of La Femme Nikita....
http://www.geocities.com/TelevisionCity/Set/2055/index.html
http://members.aol.com/Cusmus2/music.html
http://members.aol.com/Cusmus2/music2.html
Imagining being set free
Discovery, disillusion and rebellion
The moment of shock having trust broken
A 007 Go
These last two are my most favorites.
This one is that moment when she can finally see her ideals come to fruition. The lyrics are intensely idealisticly romantic, bordering on a wrongful worship. Whew. The lyrics for what you will hear in the clip:
"This could shatter your heart
The reflection of your soul
Was a vision of me
Take all that I could be
Take all I should be
May faith lead your way
Did you know it was me"
And for very last, the song which captures that bitterness I can't even describe well, where she had used all of her efforts, wits, and power to bargain her freedom. When that moment came to cash in, lo, and behold, they over-strategized her on a technicality. She'd have to remain. Probably the most important scene in all of the seasons.
They did a really good job choosing their tracks. They have chosen pieces from Sarah McLaughlin, Depeche Mode, Garbage, etc. but it's amazing to think that they picked them before they had become hits, and in the case of Garbage, before they had their first hit single. I have those two favorite ones above on the La Femme Nikita Soundtrack album; I should pull it out and listen to it again.
All of these clips were selected from Karen Glover's amazing website, Sounds of La Femme Nikita....
http://www.geocities.com/TelevisionCity/Set/2055/index.html
http://members.aol.com/Cusmus2/music.html
http://members.aol.com/Cusmus2/music2.html
Sunday, April 09, 2006
why is it my favorite show?
I wasn't interested in the tv show La Femme Nikita just for the suspended romance, the great modern plots and twists, etc. Not even so much because the lead was female. I started watching it in '97 till it ended in 2000, which bookended the times from before I left home until I got married. It had this amazing ability to capture the insane bondage and contradictory code-of-survival that I saw in my parental home life. It was a bondage that, when tested, proved greater and greater lows. Nikita, in the show, had the same fearlessness and passion and vision to be free and live life by her knowledge of reality. So there was that mix of cynicism and bitterness; feeling utterly alone and trapped. And, yet, no matter what they psychologically stripped from her, they could not take her hope nor her standard of morality and freedom.
The character of the man who trained her, Michael, embodied all the aspects of those hopes and frustrations. Deep down Michael was not only attracted to her but loved her, but he could not admit this for her safety or his. His vision for solutions was morally opposed to hers, or at least this is how each conflict began between them. She would see that, by the end of the episode, what she had assumed as inhumane deeds by his practices actually were moral in principle. Imagine that happening on a frequent basis, let alone just once! It turned her mind inside out. Another words, he had inhumane practical applications of his moral principles. She never could capture both aspects into the one man. She ended up getting hurt and surprised to discover either the inhumane or the moral. And the fact that he was a man of few words, made the "mystery" even harder to attempt. Meanwhile, people's lives were being determined to be saved or not, with each decision he made. This drove her crazy. She could barely contain her anger as she discovered his intention for evil, and then her anger would barely be diffused enough to walk away in the end after realizing the good or tolerable reason behind it.
This mental torment, was my young adult life. I could not find a leg to stand on at almost any time in my thinking about who I was, for why there was something morally missing or wrong with the life I currently led.
But that was just in regard to my ability to think. For when it came to my heart, I knew there was much, much more that life was supposed to be. And so I learned to hone in on my passionate feelings, and my emotions to what I was being forced to do, so that I could learn to build a mental framework for leaving one day.
Nikita was the sole voice of moraity and respect for life and love in the Section, and she was torn down for it. And even today in my family I am still the only one with a vision for what respect for life can look like.
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase2/passion.wav
The tearing down:
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/manipult.wav
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/nofreedm.wav
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/notkillr.wav
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/humanity.wav
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/freewill.wav
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/nomore.wav
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/protect.wav
And the vision she has for exercizing respect for life; challenging her oppressors to justify themselves:
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/zoo.wav
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase2/trial.wav
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase3/value.wav
Her last words spoken in isolation, regarding losing her own life in standing up for what was right:
http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase2/notfraid.wav
Am I obsessed? I don't know. Is it abnormal for me to procure quotes of an actress from a fiction tv show to express things that aren't exactly applicable to my life? Maybe. Do you understand why I did it, though??
I did it because there is no other voice, no other story, no other set of scenarios and words said that are similar to my own. And part of the healing process is to ID what is taking place before your eyes. I have had to stand up for myself at a time when there was only me to explain, justify or condemn by my own conscience, what took place. Now, there is another story that depicts the struggle. The epiphanies Nikita has, have been like therapy for me.
La Femme Nikita the tv show was based on two theatrical movies; the first called the same title, a French movie and yes you can find it here in the US, and then after that "Point of No Return" in the early 90's with Bridget Fonda, which you've probably seen playing on tv by now.
The character of the man who trained her, Michael, embodied all the aspects of those hopes and frustrations. Deep down Michael was not only attracted to her but loved her, but he could not admit this for her safety or his. His vision for solutions was morally opposed to hers, or at least this is how each conflict began between them. She would see that, by the end of the episode, what she had assumed as inhumane deeds by his practices actually were moral in principle. Imagine that happening on a frequent basis, let alone just once! It turned her mind inside out. Another words, he had inhumane practical applications of his moral principles. She never could capture both aspects into the one man. She ended up getting hurt and surprised to discover either the inhumane or the moral. And the fact that he was a man of few words, made the "mystery" even harder to attempt. Meanwhile, people's lives were being determined to be saved or not, with each decision he made. This drove her crazy. She could barely contain her anger as she discovered his intention for evil, and then her anger would barely be diffused enough to walk away in the end after realizing the good or tolerable reason behind it.
This mental torment, was my young adult life. I could not find a leg to stand on at almost any time in my thinking about who I was, for why there was something morally missing or wrong with the life I currently led.
But that was just in regard to my ability to think. For when it came to my heart, I knew there was much, much more that life was supposed to be. And so I learned to hone in on my passionate feelings, and my emotions to what I was being forced to do, so that I could learn to build a mental framework for leaving one day.
Nikita was the sole voice of moraity and respect for life and love in the Section, and she was torn down for it. And even today in my family I am still the only one with a vision for what respect for life can look like.
The tearing down:
And the vision she has for exercizing respect for life; challenging her oppressors to justify themselves:
Her last words spoken in isolation, regarding losing her own life in standing up for what was right:
Am I obsessed? I don't know. Is it abnormal for me to procure quotes of an actress from a fiction tv show to express things that aren't exactly applicable to my life? Maybe. Do you understand why I did it, though??
I did it because there is no other voice, no other story, no other set of scenarios and words said that are similar to my own. And part of the healing process is to ID what is taking place before your eyes. I have had to stand up for myself at a time when there was only me to explain, justify or condemn by my own conscience, what took place. Now, there is another story that depicts the struggle. The epiphanies Nikita has, have been like therapy for me.
La Femme Nikita the tv show was based on two theatrical movies; the first called the same title, a French movie and yes you can find it here in the US, and then after that "Point of No Return" in the early 90's with Bridget Fonda, which you've probably seen playing on tv by now.
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