Humble?

"I hate, I despise, I loathe masked piety. I detest the jerk in the mirror every morning. The venemous viper of pride seems to always lurk in God's garden of my soul. Why can't other people see?! Are they blind?! Why don't they think?! Am I the only one who knows what's going on here?!?! He resists the Jim, oops, I mean the proud; He gives grace to the humble. I can't be counted among that number - the humble!Who will deliver me from this body of death?Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! He has done it all! He found me in my sin. He is my substitute. He has given me of His Spirit. He bought me with a price. I am His and He is mine. His mercy is new every morning. I cannot cause the reservoir of "grace upon grace" to ever be emptied of the smallest drop. I have died with Jesus. I have risen with Jesus. Herein lies my humility. "

- taken from the blog of Jim Thompson (Donna Thompson's [my boss] son)

from jennie siemens

it's like walking through sweat

it has been sooooooooooo humid here lately. it's sick. anita and i were saying that it's preparing us for the mission field (perhaps) (along with the cockroach). but i do have to admit that it was a little frightening during the thunder and lightening storm all alone in my little mobile home. yes, i was even counting. but then it stopped and the sound of the rain on the roof was quite soothing. praise the Lord who created it all.

laughter

anita (my precious housemate) and i laughed our faces off last night over dinner. we had rice, vegetables, and chicken curry - yummy. we were telling stories about food flying off forks and landing in other people's laps. later, we found a dead cockroach which we were both scared to put in the trash and moved a huge chest about ten feet. the laughter felt really good but i think we've both had a really rough first week. we are thankful to God for laughter though. (and we sat next to each other in chapel today where the speaker just had to bring up cockroaches and, thus, our laughter began all over again...)

(this pictue was linked to a "hahaha!" on an e-mail to sent to me by rebecca boone. suffice it to say, i laughed heartily for a good hour. it is now the picture on my desktop and, yes, i have hugged my computer screen.)

Isaiah

"...it will suffice here merely to sketch the outlines in order to convey the sense of the point being made. The central theme of the book relates to the nature and destiny of the people of God. While this people is, on the one hand, destroyed and corrupted (ch. 1), it is called to be a manifestation of the glory of the only God in the world (2:1-5). This calling may be summed up in the word servanthood. The book then seeks to answer the question: How can a sinful, corrupt people become the servants of God? This theme is developed in the following way: Chs. 1-6 set forth the problem (chs. 1-5, sinful yet called) and the solution (ch. 6 , a vision of the Holy One). The rest of the book works out the ramifications and the implications of this introduction. Chs. 7-39 are unified by their recurring emphasis upon trust. They demonstrate that Israel's problems stem from her tendency to trust the nations instead of God. Furthermore, they show that God alone is trustworthy, and that Israel can only become God's servant, a light to the nations, if she comes to that place of radical trust. But it is not enough for God to be shown trustworthy. True enough, that trust is the essential basis for a person or a nation to lay aside pretensions to self-sufficiency and accept the servant's role. But what will actually motivate that person or nation to do so? For example, in Judah's case, although God had demonstrated his supreme trustworthiness in delivering Jerusalem from Sennacherib, Judah would still not relinquish her trust in the nations and their idols. The result was that God would not and could not defend her from Babylon.

The Judeans had encountered the truth of chs. 7-39, but they had not acted upon it in a long-term way. Why not? The problem was motivation. What could motivate the Judeans to trust God? The answer is found in chs. 40-48 and in the kind of vision of God given to Isaiah in ch. 6. When the nation as a whole, repining in exile in Babylon, can sense not only God's inestimable greatness but also his boundless love in continuing to chose them as his own despite their sin, then they will be motivated to trust him and join Isaiah in answering "Here am I."

But before that "Here am I," between motivating vision and willing response, must come another step. Can sinful Israel become servant Israel merely be choosing to do so? No, and neither could Isaiah of the unclean lips become Isaiah the messenger through mere choice. Put another way, the question is, by what means shall Israel's servanthood be achieved? The answer, as revealed in chs. 49-55, is the Servant. Here comes the rounding out of the vision of the Messiah as initially given in chs. 9 and 11. BY means of his self-giving and by means of his ideal servanthood, Israel's sins may be forgiven and the hopes of chs. 40-52 are able to give way to the realization and celebration of chs. 54-55.

Despite the joy of the realization that God has not only chose and redeemed, however, there remains the outworking of that servanthood. Here, as was revealed to Isaiah at the close of his vision, all is not gladness and light. Rather, the realities of human inability and divine ability must find a concrete meeting point. These realities are dealt with in chs. 56-66, coming to their climax with the revelation of God's glory through his people in ch. 66."

- John N. Oswalt

mr. toad's wild ride

my classes:
isaiah with dr. luc - amazing! it will be time consuming but absolutely wonderful!
techniques of tefl with joe - i laughed my face off on friday. will be very fun to finally have a class to learn about all the fun things i can do in my classroom to "facilitate" language learning.
gospels with dr. howell - dropped - but God wanted me to have been in the first class.
practicum with dr. yin - she is ciu's new tefl professor and i love her! she is gentle, sweet, organized, brilliant, and hilarious. i spent some time in her office the other day talking about different things and then later met her precious daughter. dr. yin is chinese and her husband is south korean. practicum will be fun (although i still greatly miss my fellow students from last year.) i will update when i know when and where i'll be teaching, tutoring, etc. but i am super excited about it!
intro. to bible translation with joe - wahoo! joe and dr. hislop made this a faculty directed studies for me. i will be going to joe's undergrad course (which i went to on friday and loved, there are only three other students in the class) and doing two translation projects. this is thrilling.
classes - whew!

God is trustworthy. Pray to Him for me please!

vacation games with mom

from carlsbad to el paso, texas. to abilene with peggy & ray and then mckinney with judy & ivan & butch (& james & erin & tiger-man.) to jackson, tennessee to "the mouth."

i drove the +500 miles to mouth of wilson, virginia, today. so that meant mom was in the passenger seat trying to come up with creative things to do. last year she made me say all the states in alphabetical order. this year, it was all the capitals (thankfully, not in alphabetical order.) if i couldn't think of the capital, she would proceed to give me some hints. i hope you enjoy some of them as much as i did.

Montgomery, Alabama
Juneau, Alaska - my clue: how my Korean students say 'did you know?'
Phoenix, Arizona
Little Rock, Arkansas
Sacramento, California - mom's clue: the Lord's supper in Spanish (I didn't need a clue.)
Denver, Colorado - mom's: a famous country western singer whose first name is John
Hartford, Connecticut - mine: "In _____, Harrisburg, & Hampshire hurricanes hardly ever happen."
Dover, Delaware - mine: the horse Eliza Doolittle cheers for
Tallahassee, Florida
Atlanta, Georgia - mine: where Scarlet O'Hara went to see her aunt
Honolulu, Hawaii
Boise, Idaho - mine: what little girls say - "BOYS! Eeeeee!"
Springfield, Illinois
Des Moines, Iowa
Topeka, Kansas
Frankfort, Kentucky - mom's (& my personal favorite): the guy who went to Samoa with Rebecca
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Augusta, Maine - mom's: Caesar at the time of Jesus' birth
Annapolis, Maryland
Boston, Massachusetts - Emily's would have been: "ooooooh!"
Lansing, Michigan
St. Paul, Minnesota
Jackson, Mississippi
Jefferson City, Missouri - mom's: our music minister's son
Helena, Montana
Lincoln, Nebraska
Carson City, Nevada
Concord, New Hampshire
Trenton, New Jersey
Santa Fe, New Mexico
Albany, New York - mom's: the first syllable is a man's name spelled with two letters
Raleigh, North Carolina
Bismarck, North Dakota - mom's: a ship & something having to do with her brother's first name and the beginning sound of his last name (my first guess with mom's clue was Brasmark)
Columbus, Ohio
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Salem, Oregon
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Providence, Rhode Island
Columbia, South Carolina
Pierre, South Dakota
Nashville, Tennessee - mom's: the city we just drove through
Austin, Texas
Salt Lake City, Utah
Montpelier, Vermont - mom's: a big, French hill (hahahahahahaha!)
Richmond, Virginia
Olympia, Washington
Charleston, West Virginia - mom's: the real name of Emily's date to the prom
Madison, Wisconsin
Cheyenne, Wyoming

TADA!

a pic of the boys from erika (with a little to drink)

my last day @ cisl! (new link w/more pics)

go here to see pics