The voice of God

I am grappling with an issue right now. I have heard the pastor at my church say something a few times in the past few weeks that just does not sit right with me. I am not quite to the point of disagreement, but I am certainly uncomfortable with it. He says that he does not believe that God speaks directly to individuals. His statement is qualified, which is why I am uncomfortable and not indignant. God has given us His word in the Bible and speaks to us through the Scriptures as the Holy Spirit gives us understanding. The kind of speaking that God does not do, from what he says, is in a direct message by way of a dream or audible voice. I don't believe that God is going to speak by way of a voice from the heavens as He did affirming His Son before the disciples (Matthew 3:16-17; 17:5, 2 Peter 1:17-18), through an angelic messenger as He did numerous times (see Judges 13 and Luke 1 & 2 for examples), with a blinding light and audible voice as He did with Paul on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:1-7), through the mouth of a donkey as He did with Balaam (Numbers 22:21-35) or through dreams in the way He did with Joseph (Genesis 37) and certainly not by catching someone up to heaven as He did with Isaiah and John (Isaiah 6, the entire book of Revelation). I believe that the age of the prophets is past and that God no longer uses that vehicle to reach His people. I am a skeptic, not a mystic, and am always a little bit incredulous when I hear someone say that God spoke to them, but I cannot discount it completely, either. I won't honestly embrace the kind of dream examination that David Benner might encourage (he wrote about it in Sacred Companions, which I would recommend in general as a book about relationships with other believers, especially for anyone who might have opportunity to lead a small group, although I don't buy into all of his ideas), but I think that God can use dreams to speak to us at the same time. Skeptic though I am and intellectually driven (and thus often dismissive of "personal experience") as I may be, I had a dream several years ago in which I saw a letter written in the sky. It was from God to me. At that time I was seriously examining the practice of communion and what the Bible had to say on the issue on transubstantiation. I had been spending a lot of time reading a praying and had not arrived at an answer. The letter did not contain any deep theological revelation, it was simply a letter of commendation for seriously considering the issue and seeking the truth and of encouragement that I would in time come to understand the truth. I cannot remember any of the exact wording except that it said, "my child." I cannot say for certain that this was God's verbal message to me, but I am not convinced that it was a product of my own imagination, either. Much more recently I had another experience that makes me uncomfortable with the idea of a "silent" God. While I was in Costa Rica in April, I was making decisions about whether to attend graduate school, since that required moving across the country alone. I had prayed about it a lot and was sitting in our evening "chapel" with the rest of the team listening to one of the missionaries talk about her vision for discipleship when one very solid phrase popped into my mind: "Make disciples in New York." I did not question where that came from. That was the answer that I was looking for. It at once confirmed that moving away from everything that I knew was the right thing to do and reminded me that occupation is, for most of us, a very small part of what God would have us do in the world. I considered that a distinct call, not a permanent call, but a call to this phase of life in which I find myself now. Was that God speaking? I suppose it is possible that it is not, but even as a non-mystical skeptic, I believe it was God revealing to me what He wanted me to do, at least for a season. I really need to pursue this with the pastor and see if I can get him to explain more about what he really believes, as I may have misunderstood him, and why he believes that. In the meantime I just can't bring myself to agree.

General update

Today's post will most likely turn out to be a seemingly random conglomeration of thoughts currently running through my mind that I am spitting out on this page in part because I need some way to sort them out. I have new neighbors downstairs. I had a blissful month of no downstairs neighbors, and now that there are people living there I realize just how blissful it was. The couple who lived there before never bothered me. They had friends who would come over at all hours of the night and shout to make their presence known. That was annoying, but it usually happened only once a week or so and I lived with it. The new people might prove more of a challenge, as they showed me last night. The music turned off around 2 AM and I was able to sleep until 4:20 when one of them decided that it was a great time to start pounding nails into the walls and listen to music at the same time. Once I finally figured out where the knocking sound was coming from I started the process of trying to come up with a way of letting my neighbors know that they are completely inconsiderate and that they need to change their ways without coming across like a total jerk. Explain that the walls are thin and that sound travels extremely well between apartments? That might be the gentlest way. Give them hours of freedom and hours of consideration? You never realize until you have neighbors that close just how little courtesy people have. Oh for a house in the middle of a large piece of property where I can make noise when I want to and be impervious to the noise of my neighbors!

I think I might start cooking on the weekends. I have class until 6:30 on Monday and 5:50 on Tuesday, so I won't want to do any real cooking on those days, so having good food that I can just reheat when I get home sounds really nice. I really do like leftovers! Yesterday I made a casserole and lasagne. My mom said that she always thought lasagne was too much work and asked if my homemade stuff was really better than Stouffer's. It's good, certainly, and I appreciate it a lot because I took the time to put it all together. Quite frankly I enjoyed the time I spent making it and was surprised at how easy it was. I have a great opportunity to learn how to cook right now because I am responsible for feeding myself really for the first time in my life and if the stuff I make is not as good as it should be, I'm the only one who has to eat it. My mom also said that cooking is a lost art. As with chivalry, which I also consider to be lost in my generation, there should be a few of us who refuse to bow to the conventions of society in hopes that what is lost now will not be completely dead to our children.

I had a great conversation yesterday after church with someone from my Sunday school class. He is teaching the class right now and was going through a timeline of significant Biblical events and asked if I found it intellectually stimulating. We then talked about a shared appreciation for ancient Israeli history. It is nice to know that I am not alone! That conversation also taught me to be much more grateful for my college experience and how much I learned about the Bible at TMC. That was a blessing that I did not fully realize while I was there. I had to take a lot of Bible classes even though I majored in history and now I am equipped with a lot of knowledge that I tend to take for granted and then wonder why other people don't know these things. The longer I live the more I see of God's goodness to me in the past. His plans for me now are not clear, but I know He always takes me to a place where He can bless me. That is amazing. The LORD is a great God.

Blogging pretensions

"We are each of an unsocial, taciturn disposition, unwilling to speak, unless we expect to say something that will amaze the whole room, and be handed down to posterity with all the éclat of a proverb." ~ Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

Several weeks ago I took this quiz. I would like to think that its results are really accurate, but I think this is the blogging type I want, and not really how I blog.

Your Blogging Type is Confident and Insightful

You've got a ton of brain power, and you leverage it into brilliant blog. Both creative and logical, you come up with amazing ideas and insights. A total perfectionist, you find yourself revising and rewriting posts a lot of the time. You blog for yourself - and you don't care how popular (or unpopular) your blog is!

What's Your Blogging Personality?

Analysis from the top: I won't bother arguing whether or not I have a ton of brain power. I like to think I do, but I suppose reality will make itself apparent to the reader, one way or the other. Creative and logical with amazing ideas and insights? This is precisely why I started this post with the quote from Pride and Prejudice. Something in me wants to blog the way I always wanted to journal (I never could get into journaling, though I have tried on several occasions). I want the blog that is full of wisdom and wit that will amaze the whole blogging world and that my words would be remembered and passed on. I suppose that is why I embraced the nickname "Scribe." It implies something beyond just rambling words on a (web)page. In reality I think I might succeed in imbuing some humor and maybe a spiritually significant comment or two in otherwise mundane posts about my rather uneventful life. I really do not revise most of my posts unless I see some glaring spelling or grammatical error therein. Really, perfectionist though I may be in some things (like folding jeans when they come out of the dryer - has to be done just so to avoid wrinkles in all the wrong places), I don't spend much time revising my posts. Why would I spend time revising a post about buying a toothbrush, anyway? I blog for myself, yes, but I also blog for an audience. I primarily blog for my friends and family, allowing them to keep in touch with me, an otherwise horrible correspondent, but I have pretensions of blogging for a much wider audience. Maybe someday my blog will be discovered by strangers who are drawn to the clever words of this young woman. Not likely, but when are pretensions ever grounded in reality? I suppose my message to my reader is that I sincerely try to make my blog somewhat interesting for you! Here's hoping I succeed often enough that my readership does not dwindle away altogether. I want this place to be addictive...

All I have needed

I joined the church choir last week. So far it has been fun. My friend and I joined together, which has helped. There is at least ONE name I will remember that way (actually, I do know a few more than that). I like being in a church choir because it helps me to meet people who are not part of my default church clique. It also fits me well because it increases my ability to come up with a song for everything (in my family growing up there was always a song, so why change that now that I'm on my own?). In some cases it merely gives variation to a theme I have known for as long as I can remember singing church music. One of the songs we are singing is called "He's Always Been Faithful." It's taken from "Great Is Thy Faithfulness" and their shared theme is the story of my life. God has always been faithful to me. ALL I have needed His had has provided. I may harp on this over and over again, but if I do it is because I believe it. God has given me what I needed when I needed it and I can be confident that if He has not seen fit to give me what I think I should have it is because I do not need it. This is a lesson in gratitude as well as in contentment. I was reminded today of specific ways in which God has shown His faithfulness to me. One of my friends asked me if I was planning on getting a job for the semester and then told me that she may know of a possible lead for a job. If you read my post from this morning you will know that I am thinking of getting a job. Regardless of whether this ultimately leads to any employment for me, it made me remember God's faithfulness. The greatest "proof" I have that God will be faithful to me today and tomorrow and all subsequent tomorrows is His perfect record of faithfulness to me in the past. If I need a job, He will provide one for me. During my last semester of college I was looking for a job. I did some online searching and applied at one place that proved to be a dead end. Through a series of events that are far beyond coincidental I ended up with a job offer over the telephone from a man I had never met. There was no application and no interview and for all I know there were no other people they even considered for the job. The phone call said the job was mine if I wanted it. My general philosophy is that God will always provide what we need but that we still have a responsibility to take initiative and look for a job if a job is what we need and have faith that God's plan will be made clear in due time. "You can't expect God to just drop a job in your lap." That's what I said back in college, but God went beyond my expectations and dropped a job in my lap. It may never happen that way again, but I expect God to go beyond my expectations in new ways. God does not lack for creativity in how He faithfully provides for us and blesses us. Perhaps I don't need a job after all, but if I do, He will provide it according to His own perfect plan.

"This I recall to my mind,

Therefore I have hope.

The LORD's lovingkindnesses indeed never cease,

For His compassions never fail.

They are new every morning;

Great is Thy faithfulness.

'The LORD is my portion,' says my soul,

'Therefore I have hope in Him.'

The LORD is good to those who wait for Him,

To the person who seeks Him."

~ Lamentations 3:21-25

Back to school

My second semester of graduate school begins today. I am not ready for this to happen to me! I had five weeks off between semesters and could have used another one or two (I still have a paper to write for one of my fall classes - yikes!) before starting again. I am glad that my Monday class is not until 3:30, however. The first day of class tends to be a bit crazy on campus, especially when one is attempting to find a parking spot. Today should be especially fun since it is snowing. Snow has a habit of covering the lines painted in parking lots and makes parking all the more interesting. Fortunately for me most students are done with classes by 3:00, so hopefully they'll be gone and parking won't be a problem. Also, the snow is supposed to stop by the time I have to leave, and maybe, just maybe, they will actually plow and/or salt the roads by then, too! In the meantime I will amuse myself by watching cars lose traction as they make their turns in front of my window and wish that universities called snow days as quickly as the high schools do. Two inches of snow overnight and it would appear that they have the day off today... Speaking of snow, it is actually cold enough to snow - the temperature is supposed to be around 30 degrees all day. It has been unusually warm this January, with 17 days this month with a high temperature above freezing and 4 days with high temperatures above 50 degrees. I like the "warm" weather, but those who like to ski on "real" snow are probably happy that it remembered, at least for today, that it is indeed winter in New York.
Back to the subject of school, it would appear that my books are going to cost significantly less this semester than they did last semester. Last semester I spent about $700 on books for three classes (ouch!). This semester I have purchased books for two of my three classes and have spent less than $300. The third class didn't have any books in the campus bookstore and doesn't have a syllabus posted online, so I don't know how much the rest will cost. At least it appears that my classes will have a lighter reading load in general that they did last semester. Last semester I had 4 books to read every week for most of the semester and this time it would appear that I won't have to average more than 2.5 books per week. Woohoo! I'm also thinking about maybe getting a part time job to help lighten the financial load so I don't have to rely so heavily on student loans. Having a slightly more strict schedule might help me develop at least a smidgen of discipline...
"For we hear that some among you are leading an undisciplined life, doing no work at all, but acting like busybodies. Now such persons we command and exhort in the Lord Jesus Christ to work in a quiet fashion and eat their own bread. But as for you, brethren, do not grow weary of doing good." ~ 2 Thessalonians 3:11-13

That Night

This is a poem that I discovered just a few minutes ago (amazing what happens when I actually start to read all of those books that I own). It is of a rather "Christmasy" feel, but I liked it well enough that I will ignore the calendar. The author is unknown.

That night when in the Judean skies
The mystic star dispensed its light,
A blind man moved in his sleep--
And dreamed that he had sight.

That night when shepherds heard the song
Of hosts angelic choiring near,
A deaf man stiffed in slumber's spell--
And dreamed that he could hear!

That night when in the cattle stall
Slept Child and mother cheek by jowl,
A cripple turned his twisted limbs--
And dreamed that he was whole.

That night when o'er the newborn Babe
The tender Mary rose to lean,
A loathsome leper smiled in sleep--
And dreamed that he was clean.

That night when to the mother's breast
The little King was held secure,
A harlot slept a happy sleep--
And dreamed that she was pure!

That night when in the manger lay
The Sanctified who came to save,
A man moved in the sleep of death--
And dreamed there was no grave.

Jet lag

Jet lag - it's a real pain! It caused me to sleep until noon yesterday and I am sure is responsible for my inability to sleep soundly two of my first three nights back in New York and my current state of tiredness. Paranoia about mice might also contribute, but it would seem that they have not been particularly active in my apartment since I returned. Mice. No standing on a chair and screaming (mostly because there is nobody in my apartment to do anything about it), just a paranoid shudder. Apparently they liked the dishes I didn't get washed right away. Interesting that I had two major household tasks that I liked to put off most - laundry and dishes. The laundry procrastination was solved by weekly laundry dates with a friend, and it looks like the dishes procrastination might be solved by my abhorrence of rodents in my living space. If it teaches me to be more disciplined, it might just be a good thing after all.

Taking the advice of a philosopher

The Greek philosopher Thales wrote, "Know thyself." (I admit I had to look up who said this - how on earth am I supposed to remember this guy if he doesn't have something named after him, like Socrates' Socratic Method, Phythagorus' Pythagorean Theorem or Heimlich's Heimlich Maneuver?) I have taken his advice and would refer the reader to a previous post in which I predicted that I would like Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire better than The Chronicles of Narnia. I finally saw the Harry Potter movie yesterday and enjoyed in immensely, more than I enjoyed Narnia. I know myself well enough that I was able to accurately predict which movie I would like better. Perhaps my education has taught me something after all!
Speaking of movies, I just found out today about The End of the Spear. I think I am going to have to go see it! It is the story of the 5 missionaries killed in Ecuador 50 years ago today (the most famous of whom are Nate Saint and Jim Elliot), and I have heard from someone who saw it (it is to be released in theaters on January 20) that is it very well done. As it is an independent film, it may or may not be easy to find theaters that will play it, but I will certainly try!

Falling for an advertisement

I am generally amused by the television commercials I see and am not in the least bit tempted to purchase whatever life-enhancing product is presented. Generally the only exception to the rule is if I happen to see a commercial for a product I am already using and would buy without the ad (Old Navy clothes, for instance). Perhaps some of this is because of which TV channels I watch. I usually watch TV Land, and apparently I do not meet the advertising demographic of that particular channel (they sell power chairs for the immobile and pain reliever - methinks perhaps they are anticipating slightly older viewers). There is one commercial that worked, however, and, $108 later, I am now the proud owner of an Oral-B Triumph toothbrush. The commercial showed the typical people with nice smiles and perfect teeth, but what sold me was the animation of how the floss-action brush head works. It does a better job cleaning between your teeth as well as just the readily-accessible surface than your standard, arm-powered toothbrush or older models of the electric toothbrushes. I think they discovered something amazing about advertising: advertise the product and people might actually buy it! I hate beer commercials that advertise suggestive dancing and tight abs, as if suddenly by drinking ____ beer (there are several that advertise this way, so pick your favorite) you will gain sex appeal. Somehow I don't buy it. Too many commercials are like that - they don't bother telling you about the product, just why you need it or how it will revolutionize your life. Anyway, the toothbrush is great. I have gained a new appreciation for cleaning my teeth. It leaves my teeth feeling as clean as if I had just come from the dentist, but the cleaning process actually feels good! Do I need it? No, but I think it is still a somewhat practical purchase. Everyone appreciates good oral hygiene in other people, and it gives me that confidence I need to receive passionate kisses at any time, knowing that my teeth are very well cleaned! (Not that I expect any such kiss - see the kissing purity test below...)