What do you see?

Concerning cheese

I have a confession to make: sometimes I really enjoy listening to cheesy Christian music. Yep, I do. It can be surprisingly uplifting, if I can suspend my scorn and snobbishness towards the music long enough to take in the words, which may also be cheesy but are nonetheless true.

One of my all-time favourite bands is reasonably cheesy. Anyone got parents who used to listen to Lamb in the '70s? I just love those guys. We've only got them on LP records, which is slightly annoying but kinda cool. They consist of a pair of American Messianic Jews, who set lots of beautiful passages of scripture to extremely 70s-sounding music, with the odd Beegees impersonation thrown in. It's kinda cute.

Also the Jewish element in the music is nice; only Jewish music can get away with using an aeolian (sp?) mode, a tempo of about 40 BPM, and the most mournful, wailing instruments they can find, creating the overall impression of a funeral dirge, then setting a passage about joy and laughter to it, and having the audacity to make it work and be somehow uplifting. Also their stuff is just beautiful to play.

One of the guys made an album of his own this year, which I bought and was a little disappointed with, on account of its being incredibly '90s, with, you know, super-clean guitar sounds, not many chords, drum beats that I could play, a backing female chorus along black gospel lines, and songs with titles like 'Love One Another' (those being the only words of the whole first two verses). However, I was listening to it last night whilst studying, and once I made up my mind to enjoy it, I actually did. It's still got a touch of that Jewish wistfulness about it, which is nice. Sometimes simplicity is very refreshing.

***

And now for something completely different: Jared (or anyone else), would you mind telling me the reference for that verse you mentioned the other night, about how we aren't to judge non-Christians by the same measure we use for Christians? Sorry, I don't know how else to contact you.

It was fun talking to everyone the other night. My appetite for theological discussion is only partially satisfied by blogging; there's nothing quite like the real live thing is there? Well, they both serve a purpose.

Right. Must study.

Womanpower

I'm sorry to write another Gender Issues post amid the current proliferation of them, but my marvellous little sister made another interesting observation last night that I thought was post-worthy (nothing to do with punctuation - fear not).

Margaret observed that these days we tend to still call females between the ages of about 20 and 30 'girls' rather than 'women', and males are likewise not 'men' but 'guys' or sometimes 'boys'. In earlier times, a girl would 'come out' at around 17 or 18, and be formally introduced to adult society, and a boy would be considered a man once he started working I guess, at around 19/20 or so. There would be corresponding changes in dress, behaviour and the treatment one might expect from others, upon this transition.

We wonder, Margaret and I, why this is no longer the case, and what the effects are, if any. Probably it's to do with the trend towards getting married later in life, I suppose, and people not wanting to 'settle down' till they've done plenty of study (which is becoming more and more necessary these days), had some fun, seen the world etc. Are we avoiding the adult gender terms because they imply responsibility that we are trying to postpone?

For my own part, at age 20, I guess I still feel more like a girl than a woman. In some ways anyway. I kind of feel like a potential woman - like I haven't really been tried and tested, or had to act like an adult in society, though I (hopefully) could if I had to. This is perhaps mostly in terms of my economic function in society; spiritually I feel somewhat more womanly, and intellectually...well, sort of. Actually in both those areas I feel very much like I'm still in the 'listen and learn' phase of life. [heh, what's with me and compartmentalising my life like this in my recent posts? Evidence of the Greek influence on Western thought?] I guess it's not till you start giving of yourself and having to teach rather than just listen, that you become an adult. Yes, that sounds about right, because it's in things like my roles as a youth group leader, employee, church member and mentor to my younger sister, that I feel like an adult, because I need to be one in those situations.

I'm rather undecided, too, about whether I want to 'grow up'. It's fun being young, being able to be spontaneous, hanging out with my friends till ridiculous hours because I can easily catch up on sleep later, heading off on random roadtrips and things, dressing as casually as I like, sitting with my feet on the furniture [don't tell Dad], being giggly with my sisters. Being 5'1" and looking about 16 possibly has something to do with it.

On the other hand, I would like to be, you know, a grown-up and graceful lady with good posture, good social skills, and an air of composedness and ease - one of those people who is always appropriate and equal to any situation; and I would like to be responsible and useful in society. I've always been aware of this toss-up between liking to be casual and liking to be elegant. And of course I want to marry a man, not a boy; but why would a man want to marry a girl? Unless it does turn out that I somehow flourish into womanliness upon finding myself loved by a man. Which I sort of think would be the case. Blah.

Or maybe I'm more 'grown up' than I think, having been raised with, and actively pursued, such spiritual good sense that I am wise about life in some ways that others may never be in all their years. Surely this kind of wisdom is superior to worldly wisdom of other kinds. And I do take life very seriously, after all, as my choice of uni papers and the focus of my thought-life demonstrates; the 'fun' of life, much as I love it, is incidental to me in many ways. And maybe 'potentially a woman' is as good as being a woman. Or maybe I should just carry on having fun and not be too eager for the more difficult things in life to start to dominate. And maybe adults still feel like kids more than I realize.

But to bring the discussion away from myself again [gah! talking about self], I wonder if our generation actually will always be more casual than our parents and grandparents, even once we're older. Will we ever grow out of sitting with our feet on the furniture? Will we always see things like table manners and keeping the house immaculate for guests as rather less important than our parents consider them? Will our families eat their meals together? Heh, will we end up with haircuts like our grandmothers'? How long will we [and I use the term loosely] keep our crazy body piercings and such things? How long will it take us all to 'settle down' and think of ourselves as adults? And what, help us all, will the country be like when we are the old and responsible ones?

Hm, this hasn't really been a gender issues post after all.

Happy days everyone.

A good thing to do

I've been thinking a lot about fasting recently. I decided to fast one day last week, just as an expression of my love for God, but I got to wondering about how the practice originated, and whether there is a 'right' reason and way to do it. Some thoughts:

1) Most Christians these days seem to see it kind of as a way of adding weight to one's prayers about particular things. Well, no, I don't think they really think that, but it's a way of demonstrating to God the urgency of one's prayers. Often people will do it when there's something particular that they want of God, either asking Him to act in some way on someone's behalf, such as physical healing or revelation, or seeking His will on some particular matter, such as whether to propose to one's girlfriend or not. This approach is fairly well represented in the OT (2 Sam. 12:21-23, 2 Chron. 20:3, Ezra 8:21, Esther 4:3 & 16, etc), where it is also used on other occasions as a token of mourning - both in terms of contrition and worldly sorrow of some kind.

2) Isaiah 58 is of course the classic biblical passage on fasting. Here God says that for a day of fasting to be what it should be - 'a day acceptable to the Lord' - it must be accompanied by a righteous lifestyle. And of course, it's fairly obvious that the mere act of fasting is worthless in itself without a corresponding attitude of submission. But this suggests that not merely a right attitude but right actions are necessary.

3) I visited the mosque with my Arabic class on Sunday, and a man gave a talk about Ramadan, the month of fasting in Islam, which starts this Friday. It was intriguing - especially as I had already been thinking about fasting. He said Ramadan is 'the sweetest month of the year' because one lives in a constant state of submission, expressing love toward God, as well as learning a healthy discipline. During Ramadan, a person gets up before dawn to have breakfast, then doesn't eat or drink, not even water, till sundown, when families get together and 'break fast' together, either at someone's house or at the mosque. Hence there's a strong sense of community that develops at this time, as everyone goes through this ordeal together. Of course it's easy, once you set up rules like this, to get lost in the rules and just go through the motions, perhaps out of fear. But it strikes me as something very beautiful, if a person were to do it in the right spirit, to do something so totally 'unnecessary' in a utilitarian sense, just because you love God.

***

So there's three different approaches to fasting. I suppose they're all valid. I haven't really said anything controversial enough to inspire comments, so perhaps I'll just give an invitation to everyone to share any insights or relevant experiences they've had. Have you found it meaningful to fast, if you've tried it? Do you tend to fast for some particular thing, or just as a disciplinary exercise, or for some other reason I haven't mentioned, perhaps? Do any of you fast regularly? I did for a while, and tried to use the mealtimes to pray for my youth group girls; not sure why I stopped actually...

A silly thing to do

In case any of you are looking for ways to make life difficult for yourselves, here's an idea: walk to uni from your house, which is an hour away, and fail to account for the norwester when dressing. In this way, you will be so hot after the first half hour or so that you will find it necessary to remove your shoes and socks, which is in general a pleasant thing to do, but not for 25 minutes on the hot asphalt when you haven't done so for six months and your feet aren't yet as hardy as they might be. Thus, your feet will be sore for the rest of the day.

If you're really keen, you could continue to follow my example and walk home as well, rather than spend $2 for the bus (which is a lot of money if you're me this week). You will feel heroic and very thrifty, and when you get home, the size and number of the blisters on your feet will be considerable, and you will be unable to walk in comfort for some time.

Happy stuff in the life of Katherine

I am happy. Yes I am. I keep smiling at random moments, like walking down the street or eating dinner, for no other reason than that life is so enjoyable. I have lots of people to love; my mind is more stimulated than it's been for a long time (which is enjoyable even if the subject matter is distressing to me); and I am constantly aware of my affection towards God. Obviously there's bad stuff too, but I just have virtually a constant underlying happiness. Hurrah. I love life.

And here's something new that's recently been added to the general pool of good stuff:

I've recently started co-leading one of the youth cell groups at my church, for the 3rd-4th formers, and exciting stuff is happening. [ach! I'm determined not to use the word 'stuff' in the remainder of this post; the English language deserves to be treated with more respect.] One of the guys brought a friend along a few weeks ago, a girl from his school (yay! girls in my cell group apart from me!), and the other week she became a Christian! Wow! Expressive language here! Having only been to cell group once, and a few social events, she 'made the move' at church a couple of weeks ago, and she's just so happy and bubbly and excited, and it's just so cool, and inspiring.

And best of all, I get the privilege of kind of 'discipling' her now. On Wednesday night, Vance led the study with the boys, and Simone and I went off into the lounge and started working through one of those book things for new Christians together. So I got to tell her all about the Bible and how to use it and what certain things mean and how good God is and how exciting it is to live a life that's pleasing to Him. And she, being an open, talkative, friendly person, really opened up to me and told me some of the things she's struggled with in her life, and how happy and peaceful she's feeling now that she feels like she's found what life's about. She's a smart young thing, and she knows what it is she's doing, I feel - that she's committing to a changed life and all - and she's genuinely excited about it. Yep, I'm pretty sure it's the real thing, not just one of those emotional spur-of-the-moment decisions that teenagers so often make these days. She's really hungry to know more, and is all keen to meet up more often and talk about things together.

I feel so extraordinarily privileged! I feel like I'm really in my element with this kind of thing. I'm useless at 'evangelism' (so far); but once someone starts coming with questions and wants a mentor and someone to love them to pieces, listen to their problems, pray with them and advise them - that's me! I have that kind of relationship with my little sister, which is one of my favourite things in life. It makes me feel like I'm doing some good in the world.

There's another girl too, who's not in my cell group but whom I've been praying for all year, who also became a Christian that same day, having been hanging around with the youth group for about a year. She's going to be a slightly tougher nut to crack, I suspect, not being so naturally open as Simone; but I hope I will be able to help her in a similar way. She's an extremely intelligent young lady, and she will keep me on my toes; but I hope before too long she'll get a sense of my affection and concern towards her and be willing to open up to me, so I can bless her in some way. When I think of how I've appreciated the various people who've taken me under their wing in the past, I'm just so grateful for the chance to do the same for someone else. Oh! how I love people!

As far as my own confusions and things go, I guess I'm reasonably comfortable with glossing over some of the hazy issues in my mind for the sake of giving them something they can hang onto while they're still growing. I'm happy to pass on the faith that got me through my teens very successfully, especially since for all I know it may yet be the 'right' one. A Christian friend of mine, someone whom I greatly respect, advised me to think of it in a 'lies to children' sense, and though that terminology makes me a little uneasy, I see no alternative. Not that I'll go ahead and pretend I know everything, or dissuade anyone from questioning things; but I guess it's a little early in the game for these girls, so it's okay to give them something to get started on for the time being. Like telling 3rd formers that Newton's physical laws or Euclidian geometry are true, whilst knowing they're an over-simplification. Anyway, the vast majority of my 'childhood faith' I am still happy with; all the basic elements are still there. Blah. That's enough about that.

The point is, praise God! He has revealed Himself to two beautiful young ladies; the world is blessed with two more people intent on pursuing Him and His ways than there were a few weeks ago; and I have the joy of being part of the process.

[another long post; sorry]

Edit: rephrased second to last paragraph