Found; In Translation

My R&F Story

2011-10-23T21:59:00.000-04:00

Some of you reading this may remember that I considered becoming a licensed esthetician not too long ago. The cost of the program, however, was unaffordable being unemployed. I considered the field because I learned a lot about skincare from having to work on my own skin. Some of you reading this may recall when I switched gears and began to create a website offering the information that I learned for a price. I now plan to teach and share it for free with my customers and the team of consultants that I am building. I can help people to achieve and maintain their best skin with my knowledge and an arsenal of award-winning products that I use and fully endorse.

I had flawless skin effortlessly until the age of 19. Despite going to some of the best places in NYC for facials like Mario Badescu and Christine Chin and trips to numerous dermatologists, it took over ten years to get my skin’s changing condition under control. It wasn't until somewhat recently that I managed to get what started out as breakouts, and got worse with medication and inconsistent information between what estheticians would tell me and what dermatologists would prescribe, under control. In retrospect it seems that what I learned by firsthand experience bridges the gap between the professionals in skincare. The information I will share will cover this and be especially beneficial for skin that breaks out. This information, however, will simultaneously apply to aging concerns; the same method that I used to nip acne in the bud is the one I use to delay aging.

My business website which you can see here has a tool where you can answer a few questions and the Dr.’s recommend the product regimen that is right for you. I am pleased to say that I used the tool, to try it, after using the product regimen of my own choice and it is exactly what the Dr’s recommended after I answered the questions. The key is the regimen because that is where I am seeing a huge difference in the appearance of my skin.

I became more interested in becoming a Rodan and Fields consultant after using a sample of a product, a really good exfoliant to be exact. Then the regimen that I chose at the time of enrollment arrived and my skin literally transformed with initial use. People have even remarked. I realize it’s the comprehensive system in the regimen of products. I wasn’t using one and my skin was OK. But I’m surprised at the appearance of my skin with just the use of the regimen. My skin has achieved a glow that I couldn't get on my own. That’s when I knew I could do this business. I’ve been on the buying end when I didn’t know what I do now about skincare and I can indentify good products when I use them. Then I realized that I could do what I initially set out to do, to build my business; by equipping people with the knowledge that will help them to be successful. People of all backgrounds can do this and are doing it successfully. But I think everyone would agree that knowledge is power.

Skincare professionals know that sun exposure is what accelerates aging the most. While that may be true, in an interview I once read, the CEO of Victoria's Secret said that "joie de vivre" is what makes a woman beautiful. I agree; but most of us could probably benefit from a bit of exfoliation and a little lesson or perhaps review on cleaning and exfoliation.

The news for anyone reading this is that I can coach you to have great skin and to be successful in this business. My own support comes from two very successful team members right here in S.E. Michigan. One of them is a retired teacher at the age of 29 and was awarded for becoming the first millionaire with the company. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that she and her husband are devoted to giving back in outstanding ways; they fund start-up businesses and have created a foundation for women. It makes me think: We the people, for the people.

What a great place to be and what a breath of fresh air this opportunity is. I became a business owner overnight. The start-up cost was low; I got personalized business websites, corporate leadership and support, brand recognition, publicity from beauty editors, a network of stellar professionals all over the country and products that are making my skin better. I didn’t have to send a resume. I was instantly employed. I’m also enjoying the possibility to connect with network professionals around the country. It is somewhat of a social remedy to the isolation that can beset the unemployed. Further yet are the incentives and rewards to perform. A hybrid Lexus would not be bad; neither would the iPad by the holidays. I’ve never had incentives to perform at my job. I did so out of my work ethic and conscience.

People still spend money on skincare, even in this economy. Our growth is staggering. The anti-age market is estimated at 2.5 billion here in the U.S. and there are plans to go global. This business is creating wealth and prosperity that gets funneled back into the economy. I love this business model. I recently read in Money Magazine that 53 is the age you are most likely to make your best financial decision. I don’t know their ages, but I know Dr. Rodan and Dr. Fields are within that age range and they most certainly made a wise financial decision to open the distribution channel for their products to direct sales.

The possibility to pay off my student loans, for example, and my dream to own and operate a farm for the livelihood as well as the lifestyle is within reach. I’d like to devote time to subjects like my art and writing. It seems the better I do financially the more my time would be freed to give back in ways meaningful to myself and others. What is your dream? What would you do if you achieved financial freedom? Because that is what this business opportunity is; a rare chance to work for financial freedom or to supplement/diversify your income.

If you would like to learn more about this opportunity, shoot me an email me at ddboata@nyu.edu to start a conversation or message me on facebook. I can coach you to have your best skin and to be successful in this business. I am looking for motivated, coachable individuals who grasp the vision to, like me, take it and run while the opportunity is here. 15 hours a week is all it takes. Men, this isn't just for ladies. You are most certainly welcome to join.

If you think the business side of Rodan and Fields is not for you but you would like to discuss your skincare concerns with me and learn about the products, feel free to write to me at my email address above or message me on facebook as well.

Click here to watch the video I created at the time of my intial idea for a skincare website. I am now in the process of creating a new video and website offering the same information but incorporating Rodan and Fields, for free, for my team members and customers.

360 Degrees

2011-07-13T20:42:00.009-04:00

Wednesday, July 12, 2011

A few months ago I posted a status expressing gratitude by writing something like “hallelujahhhh” and the song “Jehovah Jireh.” I didn’t elaborate, but I would like to now.

Until recently, I lived with chronic pain for nearly 14 years. I was about 19 when I, in the presence of my mom, complained to the doctor about pain in my jaw. He took my head, turned it from side to side, looked at me and told me I was okay. It was terribly irresponsible. In retrospect, I’d even call it malpractice.

I’d never heard of TMJ, referred to now as TMD in the medical profession, but he must have. I spent a little over the next ten years trying to overcome it holistically; through diet, yoga, acupuncture and a lot of hope and faith that it would eventually go away. I learned more than I otherwise would have about health (like many people do when faced with a condition to overcome). Adversity is a great, if not the best, teacher.

Speaking of which, I managed to work as a teacher. When I think back I don’t even know how I did it. I was sober, too. I mean I didn’t even have a drink to relax. In fact that was one of the reasons I delayed seeing a doctor, again. I didn’t want to take medication. I was afraid of becoming addicted to drugs. It felt like I was stuck between a rock and a hard place, but I became weary of life.

It was debilitating and unbearable. On a scale of 1 to 10 it was a 10 almost every day. There wasn’t a time within this period that I didn’t feel discomfort. Sometimes it would form deep in the socket of my eye and stay there for days. It made everything I had to do extremely difficult. I didn’t do anything except what I had to; isolating myself from people and places.

The first doctor, after performing tests and finding no cause, put me on medication. I felt like I was on heavy drugs… Make a longer story short, we found two combinations that worked; a muscle relaxer together with an anti-depressant. The reason it worked was because the anti-depressant would keep me from becoming drowsy from the amount of muscle relaxer that it took to keep the pain under control.

About a year and a half ago, shortly after I moved to Michigan, I was out of the muscle relaxer for nearly 3 weeks for reasons that I won’t go into, unless anyone wants to know. The anti-depressant alone did nothing for the pain. I was racked with it the evening I went to see a young woman I’d recently discovered, an excellent blues guitarist, perform at a venue about 30 minutes from where I live. I deliberated going mainly because I didn’t have a designated driver. I knew I would want to drink in place of the muscle relaxer so that I could enjoy the show. It took too much alcohol to ease the pain. I was embarrassingly intoxicated by the time I left - getting (regretfully) behind the wheel of my vehicle.

I was at a gas station when the police approached me. Someone had made a call… My vehicle matched the description. I cooperated – up to a certain point. I got out of my handcuffs, twice, for no reason other than because I could and it gave me a sense of control in a situation where I had none. One of the three officers handling me broke and, as a result, deformed my finger putting the pair of child cuffs on me the last time (I have thin wrists).

Anyways, upon the suggestion of doctors, I went to see a dentist about the pain earlier this year. He made me a type of a retainer that I wear nightly and throughout the day. I feel like it saved my life. It isn’t clear what causes TMD. It is more common in women than in men. My bite somehow shifted. Each time I chewed, thus, it was wreaking havoc. The solution was unexpectedly, though not surprisingly, simple. I slowly eliminated the medication and as of recently I am free of both – pain and medication.

I have to attend AA, weekly, as part of the consequences of the OWI charge. The first time I went, when it was my turn to share, I talked about the Lord’s Prayer. It was only in the last five years that it occurred to me the Lord is the Bread in the context of it (Luke 11:11). I’d always thought of it as the kind that we eat as part of a sandwich. Therefore I consider it a revelation; one that I am most pleased to share with others but especially with people struggling with self-control. (Luke 5:31)

I was the last person to share at that first meeting. We ended, to my pleasant surprise, by standing to hold hands and pray the Lord’s Prayer together. I felt so blessed and honored for the opportunity to share the revelation just prior to, “Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. ” It made it all worth it…

Pheonix Rising

2010-08-13T22:49:00.004-04:00

can you see the people dancing in the water?
in the glistening surface of the waves
under the California sun
they were having so much fun

no, how do you see them?
I see them now
I saw them then
I see me now

little left to learn
endless opportunity
"young buck"
vain vanity

What would you have me do for you?
continue to bless me with your presence.
I didn't write it down
I see me now

where do you see them?
in the movement of the waves under the glistening Sun
you have to take your eyes out of focus
and hocus pocus

dancing harder than on Kho Pangan
on a full moon party
fished from shore
in the sea

the grooves
the moves
the obstacles produced
the challenges induced

territory navigated
gashes of the Giant Squid
water bursts out
a meal turned fluid

the fisherman and the sea
who would believe
were dancing in waves
the path is paved

by, Daniela Boata
Friday, August 13th, 2010

Work

2010-06-15T21:51:00.004-04:00

A friend recently sent me a message asking me to share my testimony. Well with the visibility of facebook activity some of you may have come across a thread I participated in recently. In that thread my “calling” was questioned. I’d like to take the opportunity to respond to it since the content of my communication in the thread was mainly directed to the status it pertained to. By doing so I’ll be simultaneously sharing a bit of the bit of my testimony that I’ve rarely mentioned in bits I’ve shared.

“What makes you think you are the chosen one,” I was asked. I initially said I didn’t believe in such a thing because, having Jesus in mind, there is a single chosen one – the Messiah. It occurred to me afterwards that perhaps by “chosen one” he meant chosen to know what I claim to by revelation. Because he pointed out the times I stated that God had revealed, to me, what I communicate and share. So it seems he was questioning my calling because I’d said that. It was odd to me because I’m giving God the glory being fully aware and convinced of:

1 Corinthians 4:7
For who makes you differ from another? And what do you have that you did not receive? Now if you did indeed receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?
I suppose if I wanted to boast I would lie and take the glory.

Questioning my calling for not doing that is disturbing and perplexing… I shared the blog post titled “Woman” with the daughter of a pastor in the church community I was raised in. She responded by asking me if I ever attended Time Square Church in NYC. The wife of one of the pastors preaches there… That was all she had to say.

The communication I share(d) is in writing, not in a church – either behind the pulpit or on the premises as I have long ceased to worship the Father according to the traditions practiced by the church. Therefore it makes no difference if a man or woman is behind the pulpit in a church to me (although I admit it was uncomfortable to listen to a female in that context). The only commandment Christ gave before he died was to, “do this in remembrance of me.” We all know the context. Have you considered that every Christian denomination interprets and observes this symbolically? I can’t think of any denomination that does not. This includes Catholics, Protestants, Adventists, Mormons, even non-denominational; all of which strongly oppose each other. It doesn't add up. Do you see that? I didn't, but now that I do it's clear as day. Looking at this further serves as a perfect example of what is in question about my calling and the permission it seems I may be violating by speaking.

Are you fully convinced the Lord’s commandment at the last supper, the Passover feast, is being performed by the practice you observe? I didn’t even question it. What I did question at one point, about 5 years into my faith, was “how to do this.” By “this” I meant the faith. It was in a prayer. I’d been attending church, seeking answers to questions I was grappling with from leaders, hanging on to my faith for my life – spiritually. I had lost it in the course of those first five years. I couldn’t imagine the joy and peace I experienced at the onset of it to ever go away (although, sadly, church members warned me it would). Throughout that time I was attending church and taking the communion. There was a particular event that worked to bring me back into the life I became painfully disconnected from, desperately missed and yearned for. But to make a longer story short, some time after the event and in the course of attending church and asking leaders for guidance with no resolve, I gave up and relinquished the how’s and what to the Lord. I asked him to guide and teach me, returning to the source I’d trusted from the beginning, and with full assurance I felt somewhat relieved.

The next 5 years were a period of exponential growth by means that any sane person would not enter into Lamentations 3:20 if they knew what was ahead of them. But just as I couldn’t conceive the extent of what lie ahead, could I anticipate what would follow. It was every single bit worth it.
The time was more like a period of great tribulation rather than a trial; beyond comprehension. In one word: searing. Among the revelations, yes revelations, that came to me during that time was that the Lord’s Prayer is in actuality the communion. We all know and have more than likely considered “Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors” to mean regular bread.

John 6:58
This is the bread which came down from heaven—not as your fathers ate the manna, and are dead. He who eats this bread will live forever.”

It occurred to me out of the blue one day, in that part of the prayer, as I silently uttered the words. I’d been, at a loss for how to, praying the actual prayer for a time. I hadn’t sought an alternative interpretation. I had not even questioned the practice.

The feeling that came with the realization was paralyzing. It was jolting and somewhat frightening. I was speechless and stunned. But there was no doubt as I began to consider it and read the word with it in mind. There was no way I could return to taking it as the piece of bread and juice. It became a heresy to me in fact and I am not ashamed to call it as such. In fact it brings me great joy to call it out. Because this relatively small observance, in contrast to all the work that goes into the busy schedule and activities of the church, that no one really ever thinks about until it comes around (usually once a month) is robbing believers in Christ of their livelihood. You don’t know what you are missing until, like a child, you begin to grow. There is, likewise, a way to. The body along with all of creation serve to explain spiritual truth. You have to know the word is written in such a way that only believers can understand it. Otherwise anyone could attain the life of God without believing in the work of God.

John 6:29
Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.”

You have to be weary of literal, physical interpretations of the word if you want your faith to count for what it can. There is a way to eat spiritually. The faith is not about feeling warm and fuzzy, pumping or getting pumped up. If you want it to actually rebound to the glory of God, store up a reward for your effort and experience the “breadth, and length, and depth, and height” of it while you have the opportunity then consider that we are called to work.

My obligation is to be obedient. My meat, furthermore, is to do the will of him that chose, yes chose – like you if you’ve been, me. It feeds me to do the work I did the time to be able to do. I’m grateful for a truly equal opportunity employer. 13 years now into my faith I’ve attained the wherewithal and courage to communicate what I’ve learned and was not able to hold inside myself indefinitely. In fact it gives me great joy to do the work I’ve been graciously and magnificently equipped to do; despite appearing as a fanatic and false prophet (although not even self-proclaimed. It really is a wonder (especially for people who are just reconnecting with me since high school I’m sure) and a testament of God’s word:

1 Corinthians 1:26-27
Glory Only in the Lord (I kept this title which appears in the NKJV)
For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty;

Ephesians 3:20-21,
Daniela

Congregation

2010-06-14T14:56:00.005-04:00

Below is the first of a series of electronic letters I sent to Mr. Harold Camping of Family Radio in 2006. He was interpreting scripture from the book of Jeremiah to mean the present time is what he describes as "the end of the church age." I do believe there is such a thing, but not as he suggests; believers are to come out of local congregations. This implies that local congregations were the "divinely appointed institution" that he says God, like biblical Israel, is no longer using. In the book of Romans the apostle Paul explains that Israel is blinded to the faith until the number of Gentiles is fulfilled. In this sense I would agree the present time is the end of the church age since I believe we are on the brink of the prophecy's fulfillment. If God is calling believers out of local congregations that means he called them into them in the first place. This is where I disagree and not, by any means, with congregating and fellowship.

Scripture does not reconcile local congregations to be the church God gave Paul the task to establish. I addressed this here, and in a series of letters that provide further explanation into the points, issues and concerns introduced in this first letter. In their original form, they could use some editing but the content is in tact. The rest will follow. It's a lot of work to look up the verses I reference, but worth it. I hope to know your thoughts and feel free to ask questions in a comment to further the learning of us all. (He does not address it in the Open Forum that evening, by the way, or at all.)

From "International Dept."
Sent Wednesday, May 3, 2006 5:05 pm
To Daniela D Boata <...@nyu.edu>
Subject Re: and again I say, Rejoice
Hello, Thank you for writing. I will give Mr. Camping a copy of your
very interesting e-mail. He may answer some of your comments at the
beginning of the Open Forum program. If you want a copy of any of the
books that Mr. Camping has written such as "Wheat and Tares," "End of
the Church Age and After" or "Time Has an End" please request them and
also send your mailing address. May the Lord bless you and your
family. In His service, Sheila

Daniela D Boata wrote:
> Dear brother Camping,
>
> You have invited listeners to your radio ministry to share their
> comments with you on your teaching of the gospel. I would like to
> respond to this call.
>
> I do agree with the method of interpretation you use to understand the
> gospel. You teach that the whole Bible is the gospel and that the
> method of interpretation is comparing scripture with scripture. You
> teach that the Bible is written in parabolic language. You teach there
> is a hidden spiritual meaning woven throughout the scriptures. We agree
> that only the believer can know this hidden meaning by the person of
> the Holy Spirit according to His divine will and purpose; it is not
> something learned through our own intelligence (Colossians 1:25-6). I
> also agree that the word of God spoken through his holy prophets
> applies today as it did in the day that it was written.
>
> Your understanding and teaching of true worship is absolutely true and
> according to scripture. You teach that true worship is to bow down
> before God and that it is between “me and God” and “not us and God”.
> You teach that fellowship is with our Lord as we pray and read his
> word. This also is true and I am glad you are teaching this. You may
> also add that we fellowship when we witness, for in this is our
> fellowship with the Lord most active. You may also add that a powerful
> and effective witness is someone who walks in the Spirit (Galatians
> 5:25) (I Corinthians 2:4-5, 4:17) (I John 5:6).
>
> We know that Paul was given the task to establish the church. How then
> can the church that God gave Paul the task to establish be a “local
> congregation” when Paul states in I Corinthians 15:9 that he persecuted
> the church of God? Consider also Romans 16:5.
>
> On this subject, I heard you teach on the Open Forum that the local
> congregation was a divinely appointed institution, because in the
> beginning of the “church age” the Bible was not available in written
> form (as it became over time) and many people were illiterate. This is
> COMPLETELY contrary to the gospel. The Bible is the gospel and the
> gospel is Jesus Christ whom we know through preaching and faith by the
> work of the Holy Spirit (John 16:13) (I Corinthians 1:21) (I
> Corinthians 2:10-12, 16) (Romans 10:17) (Romans 1:17). Let God be
> praised; for salvation does not depend upon literacy, or even physical
> print of the word. On the contrary this is how the gospel in the hands
> of carnally minded individuals has been thwarted over the centuries.
>
> I also heard you teach on the Open Forum that today there is nothing
> wrong if believers come together to fellowship but that they must be
> careful not to make any rules, not to form a group. Is not this
> precisely what the Lord declares (I Corinthians 1:10, 12-13, 15, 3:21-
> 3, 4:6-7, 15-6) (Galatians 5:5, 6:4) (II Corinthians 13:5) (Philippians
> 2:2, 12-3) (Acts 4:32) (John 17:23)? Since tares have existed at any
> time within local congregations, scripture does not reconcile local
> congregations as the divine institution God gave Paul the task to
> build. Christ is not divided (Mark 3:24-5).
>
> It cannot be said that “God is finished using the church as an external
> representation of the kingdom of God”, anymore than it can be said
> that “God is finished using the nation of Israel as an external
> representation of the kingdom of God”. You know that a person may be
> understood as a nation, a kingdom, a city, and a land. God on the
> contrary established the nation of Israel. The nation of Israel is the
> born again believer (Matthew 4:17) (I Corinthians 4:20). Jesus is
> Israel, the kingdom of God (Hosea 11:1, Jeremiah 1:6). We, in him, are
> in the kingdom and represent the kingdom. In other words we in him are
> in the person of God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and represent
> the person of God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Israel; holy
> land of God (I John 4:13). The believer always has been the divine
> institution, in conjunction with the Word of God, written in the heart
> (Jeremiah 31:33); that no flesh should glory in his presence (I
> Corinthians 1:29).
>
> God redeemed the land of Israel from being a physical land, that is,
> from death. This is two fold, in the sense of the physical land of the
> earth and in the sense of our physical nature, but one in the same
> thing, since both are of the earth. Paul explains this in I Corinthians
> 15:44-50. We know that God never intended that a man would live,
> through the work of obeying the law, which is through the power of the
> physical flesh, but through faith in Jesus Christ by his Holy Spirit
> (Romans 8:3-4). This is the gift of God. It is the very fruit of the
> work of God (Colossians 1:27), the miracle of the new creature (II
> Corinthians 5:17); Israel, born, of the Spirit of God. Therefore God
> did not “finish using the nation of Israel as an external
> representation of the kingdom of God”, but rather he established Israel
> in his image; a holy land, a holy person, in and by Christ Jesus
> (Romans 9:3-8).
>
> When we read a book such as Jeremiah, we must understand Israel, Judah,
> and Jerusalem in this context. It remains the believer and the
> unbeliever. Since most of the world has heard the word they have come
> under the law. We may also understand physical Israel, the unbeliever,
> to be Israel according to the flesh under the law, and physical Judah,
> who is under the word, as the Gentile unbeliever.
>
> In reference to the book of Jeremiah, and the major events of the
> captivity of Israel and Judah in Babylon, the destruction of Jerusalem
> and the temple, and the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem
> unto the Messiah the Prince (Daniel 9:25), here is something to
> consider. Jeremiah himself is a picture of Jesus. Jeremiah
> means “Yahweh uplifted”. Read Jeremiah and all of God’s word with this
> in mind, since the gospel is Christ and the whole Bible is the gospel;
> especially where God has written his name I AM.
>
> In examining the major historical events surrounding the captivity,
> destruction and restoration of Jerusalem, we see that the second time
> this particular pattern reoccurred was when Jesus was crucified. He is
> Israel, Judah, and Jerusalem, the physical Temple that was destroyed by
> the Babylonians. He is the spiritual Temple that Babylon did not
> destroy. When He was arrested in the garden of Gethsemane he said this
> is your hour (Luke 22:53). When He was before Pontus Pilate, he told
> him he had no power over him except that it was given to him (John
> 19:11). Jesus commands us to go into the world and preach the gospel to
> every creature (Mark 16:15) as Jeremiah prophesied to the inhabitants
> of Jerusalem to go into Babylon and plant gardens and be fruitful
> (Jeremiah 29:5-6). The captivity would be long but the Lord would
> surely perform his good word (Jeremiah 29:10). We know that to preach
> the gospel is to be fruitful; to plant gardens and multiply. (I
> Corinthians 3:6-7). All those who do not obey the word of God, that is,
> who do not believe the gospel (I John 5:3), and do not obey the command
> to go into “Babylon and plant gardens and be fruitful” are in danger of
> the wrath of God (Romans 1:18) (Matthew 3:10) (Romans 11:21) (I Timothy
> 2:15). We know that God destroyed Babylon (Jeremiah 51) and will
> destroy Babylon (I Corinthians 15:51-54).
>
> The Holy Spirit abandoned the church when he was given into the hand of
> Babylon. The church was the disciples, the believers. The time right
> before this was a period of great tribulation, as Jesus was faced with
> the task of obeying the voice of God unto death. Judah went into
> captivity, the Temple was destroyed, and the Temple became restored and
> built. He IS with us unto the end of the world (Matthew 28:20) as we
> together with God the Holy Spirit build his Temple (I Corinthians 3:9).
>
> Signs and wonders do accompany salvation (Daniel 6:27). The miracle of
> being born of the Spirit of God is wondrous (I Corinthians 4:20) (Luke
> 4:14) (Luke 24:29) (Ephesians 1:19) (Acts 4:33). A tongue that blesses
> the Lord, at the moment of salvation, and begins to speak in his name
> as a new born child of God, which belongs to a mouth that used to be
> full of bitterness and cursing (Psalm 10:7) is a new tongue and a
> wondrous sign (Mark 16:17-8). There are signs and wonders belong to the
> person born of the Spirit of God, that glorify God, that we must
> recognize as true, rejoice in, and nurture; not condemn. And yet the
> greatest sign and wonder that glorifies and testifies of God is when we
> love one another. It is the power of God (Galatians 5:6) (John 13:35,
> 15:17).
>
> Many people have been fascinated with the subject of the end of the
> world. But this is not the gospel (Luke 21:8) (Jeremiah 29:28-32) to
> speculate on the day and time, even if we can know. This agrees with my
> own experience. I grew up hearing this message. It did not compel me to
> seek the Lord, nor does the message of the end of the world support me
> now in my walk with the Lord. The most effective testimony of the Lord
> before I was born of the Spirit of God was the love of Jesus Christ two
> very important people in my life emulated. The gospel supports this
> experience (I Corinthians 2:13).
>
> Consider the message you are broadcasting around the world. This is an
> enormous responsibility; and opportunity to glorify our Lord. On the
> contrary to what you are teaching, it is when we enter the church that
> we begin to experience tribulation, whether we attend a local
> congregation or not. Furthermore we experience great tribulation as we
> mature in the Lord, as he himself did (Philippians 2:8) (Matthew 10:38)
> (I Corinthians 15:31). We by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit reprove
> the world of sin (John 15:18-20, 22). It is especially for this reason
> that we who know the Lord as our Savior support one another in love
> (Galatians 5:13-5, 26) (Philippians 2:3) and teach doctrine that
> supports his commands (Mark 1:15) (Matthew 10:7-8).
>
> Sincerely your fellow laborer in the Lord,
>
> Daniela Boata
>
>

Soul

2010-05-16T18:45:00.001-04:00

Kingdom

2010-04-08T19:23:00.002-04:00

In the post titled King I laid a foundation for the allegorical aspect of the Word. Believing folks are rather resistant to the idea, I’m finding, although the Apostle Paul’s writing in the New Testament clearly demonstrates the allegorical function of the events in the Old Testament. The allegory contained in the history does not discount it. On the contrary it presents the immeasurable depth and abounding richness of the work.
Along with the allegorical aspect there are patterns and symbols to observe. This was the reason I started my explanation with the story of Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel, the father of the 12 tribes. Egypt is one of those symbols. It symbolizes death. Joseph, sold into slavery by his envious brothers, however, became a ruler in the land of Egypt. Death, in this instance, symbolizes life since Israel and his family had been saved going into it during the famine. The story lays the foundation for the spiritual reality of salvation: Life by means of death. This was and is accomplished in the new covenant God made.

Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: (Jeremiah 31:31)

Leah, Jacob’s first wife, was the older sister. There is a pattern of the younger as being preferred to the older.

“…the older shall serve the younger."(Genesis 25:23)
Just as it is written: "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated." (Romans 9:13)

Jacob had to marry Leah. He loved Rachel. He passed on his inheritance to Ephraim, the younger twin and son of Joseph, before dying. Joseph likewise was the younger firstborn. He was the first to Rachel but second next to Reuben - the first born of Leah.
The allegory in the preference is explained in further detail in Romans 9. The new covenant is likewise allegorically the younger, the preferred and beloved. The language in the Tanach indicates the covenant is a marriage relationship.

“Return, O backsliding children,” says the LORD; “for I am married to you… (Jeremiah 3:14 )

Leah symbolizes the Law which preceded the righteousness of the Law by faith i.e. the Old and New Testament. The death of Rachel while giving birth to Benjamin in Bethlehem points to the younger covenant in several ways:
• She was the younger sister and beloved wife
• Benjamin was the younger brother of Joseph
• Benjamin was the only son of Israel born in the land of Canaan
• Jerusalem, the site of the Temple, would be in the land of Benjamin
• Israel called his name to mean “son of my right hand” as she died

“Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a Man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through Him in your midst, as you yourselves also know Him, being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death; whom God raised up, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that He should be held by it. For David says concerning Him:
‘ I foresaw the LORD always before my face,
For He is at my right hand, that I may not be shaken.
Therefore my heart rejoiced, and my tongue was glad;
Moreover my flesh also will rest in hope.
For You will not leave my soul in Hades,
Nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption.
You have made known to me the ways of life;
You will make me full of joy in Your presence.’
“Men and brethren, let me speak freely to you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his body, according to the flesh, He would raise up the Christ to sit on his throne, he, foreseeing this, spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that His soul was not left in Hades, nor did His flesh see corruption. This Jesus God has raised up, of which we are all witnesses. Therefore being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He poured out this which you now see and hear.
“For David did not ascend into the heavens, but he says himself:
‘ The LORD said to my Lord,
“ Sit at My right hand,
Till I make Your enemies Your footstool.”’
“Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.” (Acts 2:22-36)

Israel/Jacob had likewise placed his right hand over the head of Ephraim, passing on the birthright to him, before dying in Egypt. Joshua, the leader of the Israelites into the land of Canaan, likewise symbolizes the new covenant. Along with sharing the same name as Jesus, he was of the tribe of Ephraim. We know that only Joshua and Caleb of all the souls that were led out of Egypt, because they believed God and Moses when it came time to enter the land, did in fact enter it. Caleb’s portion in the land was in Judah. Benjamin’s portion of land was likewise in Judah. Judah and Benjamin remained unto the rebuilding of the Temple in which Jesus stood when he spoke the words:

Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. (John 2:19)

The house of Israel had been:

…So Israel was exiled from their own land to Assyria until this day" (2 Kings 15:29, 17:22-23)

The disciple writes of Christ stating:

But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. (Matthew 15:24)

We see this again in the following address to the Jews:

Unto you first God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in turning away every one of you from his iniquities. (Acts 3:26)

The following scripture presents the reoccurring pattern set forth by Joshua in the Torah:
Esaias also crieth concerning Israel, Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved: (Romans 9:27)

Judah (Caleb) and Ephraim (Joshua) essentially entered the promised habitation because of their faith. The land of Canaan is now the immortal kingdom of God. Death is the means of entrance by faith in the operation of God. It is not to be feared. The giants have been slain (represented by Caleb who took Hebron by slaying the giant). The calling into death is the reoccurring pattern set forth in the beginning. Egypt symbolic of death is, again, the place of refuge and life – because Jesus was made a King in Egypt.

So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt. (Genesis 45:8)

When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, "It may be that Joseph will hate us and pay us back for all the evil that we did to him." So they sent a message to Joseph, saying, "Your father gave this command before he died, 'Say to Joseph, Please forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, because they did evil to you.' And now, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father." Joseph wept when they spoke to him. (Genesis 50:15-17)

Judah and Benjamin are the key to salvation as laid out in the story of Joseph, the division of the land and the Kings of Israel. Judah, son of Leah, represents the covenant of the Law whereas Benjamin, son of Rachel, represents the covenant of faith. Together there is reconciliation between the two covenants. Ephraim and Manasseh, born in Egypt, represent the Jews and Gentiles. The crisscrossed placing of Jacob’s hands as he blessed them indicates the reversed order of salvation by faith in the resurrection of Christ from death. In the Torah, King Saul preceded King David. King David’s heir, Christ Jesus, precedes Saul – of Tarsus. The two kings, like Leah and Rachel, represent the two covenants.

that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself…(2 Corinthians 5:19)

For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Juda (Hebrews 7:14)

Saul of Tarsus, of the tribe of Benjamin, is a fulfillment God made to King Saul. The kingdom was prophesied by the prophet Hosea:

As He says also in Hosea:
“ I will call them My people, who were not My people,
And her beloved, who was not beloved.” (Romans 9:25)

Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; - the Apostle Paul (Ephesians 3:8)

Removed

2010-03-27T22:09:00.002-04:00

I've attained the emotional stability

Protecting fiercely

I get it now

Casual love, how?

Unspoken agreement

In seeking fulfillment

Unconflicted

Willfully restricted

Now that I can

It's not who I am

A prisoner to what I see

Blind before made free

From trying to get what I need

With unfulfilling greed

To living to give

Fearlessly live

Nurtured by the unseen

Little's what it used to mean

Surrendered the magical

Is rational

by, Daniela Boata inspired by the movie Vicky Cristina Barcelona scribbled this out on a Wednesday morning in traffic court

Grbavica

2010-03-21T23:51:00.000-04:00

Please excuse the long lapse in my blog and those of my cherished adoptees! I was very glad to see some newcomers. Thank you for your interest. Thank you Dyanna for your continued appreciation, encouragement and support. I was hoping to find a way to connect my communication on Facebook with the blog. Since the program I tried to incorporate didn't seem to do what I have in mind, I had to choose between the two forms of media... But I'm returning to the blog as the main source for the content I share on fb. It feels great to be back.

You may find me easily on fb by the way. I am the only Daniela Diana Boata. There are often interesting discussions that occur. Feel free to request me as a friend.

Grbavica is, a suburb in Sarajevo and, a movie I recently checked out from the library. I came across the CNN article below whilst doing some research on some questions that came to mind after watching it. It turns out the "Monster of Grbavica" was just found! Interesting sequence of events it was for me i.e. I see the movie, do some research, find the breaking news. Below the article you will find a quote. It is part of a comment I found in a discussion thread on the movie. What struck me was the similarity of what happened with what is happening now. I've been contributing to an ongoing discussion on the subject of Israel and its support by the United States. Many of my friends are avid Jewish supporters of Israel and the IDF. Do you see what I see?

* Please note, the sender's email address has not been verified.

You have received the following link from ddb223@nyu.edu:

Click the following to access the sent link:

'Monster of Grbavica' held in Spain for Bosnian war crimes - CNN.com*


Get your EMAIL THIS Browser Button and use it to email content from any Web site. Click here for more information.

*This article can also be accessed if you copy and paste the entire address below into your web browser.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/europe/03/02/spain.bosnia.war.crimes.arrest/index.html

...Milosevic's desire to remake their country as "Serboslavia" and started planning their exit. Milosevic realized he couldn't stop these republics from seceding, so he decided to make the best of a bad situation by creating a Greater Serbia with parts of Croatia and Bosnia. Much of the hysterical anti-Muslim propaganda which led to the Bosnian war was, in fact, invented in Serbia.

A rotten leader duped his people and set them on the path to war and isolation. It's happened frequently throughout history, and not just to Serbia.
http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0464029/board/nest/86388952?d=155305229&p=1#155305229

King

2010-03-02T04:08:00.001-05:00

"In the days of Pekah king of Israel Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria came and captured Ijon, Abel-beth-maacah, Janoah, Kedesh, Hazor, Gilead, and Galilee, all the land of Naphtali; and he carried the people captive to Assyria ... The people of Israel walked in all the sins which Jeroboam did; they did not depart from them, until The Lord removed Israel out of His sight, as He had spoken by all His servants the Prophets. So Israel was exiled from their own land to Assyria until this day" (2 Kings 15:29, 17:22-23)

It has taken me a while to provide what is being asked of me to explain, on Facebook, because I haven’t known where to start. It takes going back to the story of Joseph and his brothers to understand the connection between the promise G-d made to Saul, the first king of Israel and Saul of Tarsus, better known as the Apostle Paul. It also takes going a little further back to the story of Jacob. Then the intricately woven details throughout the word reveal the undeniably divine work, and the picture, presented in, by and through the gospel comes into focus.

Bear with me as I try to be as concise as I am thorough. It will happen that the ground covered will give way to more than the connection in question. (Albeit there is to date much more covered and to be uncovered.)

Jacob was the younger twin of Esau; born holding the heel of his brother. He fell in love with Rachel. Rachel was the younger sister of Leah. Together with their handmaids, they bore the 12 founders of the 12 tribes of Israel. Israel, meaning “God contented” in Hebrew, was the name given to Jacob after he wrestled with an angel. Rachel bore Jacob 2 sons, Joseph and Benjamin. Rachel died giving birth to Benjamin. He was the only son born in the land of Canaan. The family was traveling from Beth-el, the place where God spoke with and named Jacob Israel, to Ephrath. She called his name “son of my sorrow” but Jacob/Israel called his name “son of my right hand”. The place where she died was Bethlehem.

Micah 5:2
But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.

Joseph, favored by his father, was sold into slavery by his jealous brothers. In Egypt he became next to the Pharaoh in power. During the famine Israel sent all but Benjamin, the supposed only son he had left of his beloved wife Rachel, to Egypt to buy food. Joseph pretended he didn’t recognize his brothers, in Egypt, whilst weeping, and demanded they bring Benjamin from his father Israel, in the land of Canaan, to prove they weren’t spies. Simeon, a son of Leah, was kept in prison until their return. Judah, another of Leah’s sons, swore on himself to his father that he would bring Benjamin back to him alive.

So, skip ahead several hundred years, with all this in mind, to the time when the families of the sons of Israel were given specific territories in the land of Canaan. Joshua or Ieshoua, (the same Hebrew form of Jesus) after the death of Moses, led the new generation of the unbelieving one that had died in the desert into the habitation that was promised – the land flowing with milk and honey.

Israel adopted his grandchildren, Joseph’s twin sons Ephraim and Manasseh, as his own – granting Joseph two portions in his place in the land of Canaan for all that he had suffered and done for the family. However it was Ephraim, again the younger, who was preferred over the elder. In addition, he inherited the birthright out of all the sons of Israel because his father Joseph had. Reuben, his eldest son of Leah, had lost it for betraying Israel. When it came time that Israel blessed and passed on his inheritance he placed his right hand over the head of Ephraim before dying in Egypt. But his bones were buried in the land of Canaan.

Joshua, of the tribe of Ephraim, first gave land to Judah. Then, lots were cast and Benjamin was the first. The city of Bethlehem, the place Rachel died giving birth to the son of “Israel’s right hand“ along with Jerusalem, the home of the temple King Solomon would build, were both in Benjamin.

Simeon was the second lot that was cast. Benjamin and Simeon’s portion, along with Caleb – the only person to believe in God along with Joshua when it came time to possess the land, were in the land of Judah for its great size.

The third lot was for Zebulun, meaning gift or honor. Bethlehem is one of the cities Zebulun inherited.

Naphtali, the second son of Bilhah, Rachel’s servant, followed shortly after.

Then Rachel said, "With mighty wrestlings I have wrestled with my sister, and have prevailed"; so she called his name Naphtali." (Genesis 30:1, 3, 5-8)

Naphtali inherited Hazor, one of the towns inhabited by the descendants of Benjamin, after their return from Babylonian Captivity. Nazareth, where Christ would live, was too.
"Now when He heard that John had been arrested, He withdrew into Galilee; and leaving Nazareth He went and dwelt in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, that what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled: "The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, toward the sea, across the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles - the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region and shadow of death light has dawned." From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, "Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand." (Matthew 4:12-17)

It’s possible some may already see the connection(s). Keep them in mind and/or share them as a comment. I'll share what I see and understand in another post.

operation

2010-02-10T20:42:00.004-05:00

Yes, you are in the right place.

(If you are visiting for the first time, this is a new image - under construction).

All of the content and components are here and intact so you may browse and engage as usual. Bear with me... I've been at this for nearly 48 consecutive hours. I'm exhausted but super pleased with the progress - and the know how I'm acquiring in the process! It should all be ready very soon.

ether

2010-02-07T14:58:00.005-05:00

I was raised with the regard that drinking is a sin. Only since the onset of my faith have I ever felt, particularly drunkenness, as such. Last summer I allowed alcohol back in my life after a long hiatus to prove a point. I'd wrestled with it in the past, not because I ever had a problem with it, but for the inevitable one two many which would result in the unbearable, in the words of Paul, sting of sin.

1 Corinthians 15:56
The sting of death is sin...

The point was to the people I was hanging out with. We knew each other because we were raised with the same religious doctrine. Most of them don't go to church. When I appeared on the scene my sobriety, it seemed to me, was perceived as obedience to the ideals we were raised with. It couldn't be further from the truth. It does have everything to do with my faith, but my faith has very little to do with the church. It was through prayer and searching that I encountered Christ, outside and in the middle of the night. And what it has to do with my faith is not so much that it's a sin even but that my perspective, and my lifestyle consequently, changed with the knowledge of the Son of man.

It bothered me and I realized that even out of church... well it's like you can take the person out of church but you can't take the church out of the person.

Colossians 2:23
These things indeed have an appearance of wisdom in self-imposed religion, false humility, and neglect of the body, but are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh.

In my case, the same can be said. But the church inside of me is the power that created an altogether new pleasure to put all others into a different perspective. Is it possible to live without pleasure? Trying to abstain and then failing creates a vicious circle for the believing person who perceives certain pleasure as sin. A good indicator when in doubt is the sting. If you don't feel the sting, chances are you're not experiencing the pleasure in the faith either. It surpasses all others.

1 Corinthians 6:12
All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.

Joanne Shaw Taylor - Your Time Has Come

2010-02-02T23:32:00.001-05:00

I'm speechless, proud and utterly enthralled by this young woman's mind blowing art and talent. In this video she's playing with her US, Detroit based band. I saw them live last night almost by accident. My friend kinda had to drag me out because I was feeling tired. My eyes popped out of my head and jaw dropped from the moment they began to the end of their short set. They will be making their way back to the venue where this video took place actually in just a couple of weeks! In the meantime I've been exploring her music and have included two more phenomenal performances (albeit with different bands). Detroit based Layla Hall, the drummer in this video and band, however, is a sensation in her own right! (and super sweet). She and Joanne, "Joan" she goes by rather, were grateful for the appreciation and admiration I shared with them after the show.

White Sugar / Rude Mood. Joanne Shaw Taylor

2010-02-02T23:04:00.003-05:00

Joanne Shaw Taylor - Blackest Day

2010-02-02T23:04:00.001-05:00

home

2010-01-28T02:07:00.003-05:00

It has been several months now of living in the long awaited (five years give or take) place of my own - again. The time and space has and continues to be absorbed and utilized productively. I wouldn't have imagined myself relocating to Michigan when I first came out here, almost a year ago now, to visit family and to work on developing an idea I had for a website. It was an idea born out of those years of struggle and wait - every aspect of my life being tried to the point of bitter and brutal defeat... It was faith that kept my head up and continues to. Experience has molded me and, consequently, in terms of the idea I had, my vision. I'm elated to present it soon.

Pearl Jam at the Spectrum Night 1 10.27.09 - State of Love and Trust / Mankind

2010-01-17T17:06:00.001-05:00

My friend asked me who my rock and roll/actor boyfriend is. The possibilities ran through my mind. "I have to think," I told him.

"Jesus; my rock star..." He wins because he already has - by conquering me.

But if I had to choose an actual rock star it would be Mike McCready. The video is the end of one and the beginning of another song.

The end of the first, minutes 2:00 to 2:12...

Deceiver

2010-01-12T18:01:00.015-05:00

The new rotation around the sun has gotten off to a wonderful start due entirely to my perspective on life. While the circumstances surrounding it continue to be challenging, the stamina obtained from the healing that's occurred, on many levels, along with the accumulation of strength over periods of grueling endurance provide me with an increasingly and progressively clearer vision in more than a decade now of finding my bearings in a new territory.

In Becoming, a post written in December, I shared my philosophical case for the invisible reality of my faith. It's something I rarely do because, first of all, it doesn't need it. Second my case for it, true and accurate as it may be, is powerless in realizing itself in the life of the individual reading it. The power lies in the operation created by the Creator - believing, simply, that Jesus Christ is alive.

Hence the philosophical/scientific case for the invisible Christ - again not because he needs it but because I can and wanted to. The case lies in the understanding that we as individuals are not what we see either.

I'd like to leave the philosophical explanation of the above to the post devoted to it and return to the spiritual understanding providing the insight to begin with (and for the reason I mentioned in the beginning); because my wits are not the source and, consequently, my aim is not intellectual glory.

It's understandable but at the same time a curious thing, to me, that persons sharing my faith express a common sentiment upon learning of my stance on views held commonly among the denominations of Christendom. The practice of water baptism, for one, and a perhaps entirely unanimous view, that is including Protestants and Catholics, on the practice of the Holy Communion.

The sentiment repeatedly expressed, to quote a person I was having a discussion with on Facebook, is the following:

"... if we influence others with our observations that are not rooted in the Word, but in our opinions, we are positioning ourselves not where God wants us to be..."

The consensus is the understanding which I've articulated in previous posts such as Water, for example, but more often have and do in person when the occasion presents itself, is of my own invention. There is always a word of warning that comes along with the assumption. It doesn't offend me because I can understand the reluctance and fear to believe outside of long held practices believed to be necessary and productive.

I haven't said anything in defense because I have not felt the need to defend what is neither my invention or will to even understand. My will, rather, was and has been to be OK. Wired, if you would, in such a way as to feel maybe more than others, I know the utility has been in the agitation in settling for anything less than peace in my heart. Perhaps this is, and in fact I'll go so far as to say I know this is one reason (along with being unlikely) that I would come to know what I've learned, see and know. Because I struggled with the aspect of having to stand out in the way I inevitably would by going public with the "opinions" I've been "influencing" people with.

One of the most important and liberating things I've learned is non judgement. I don't judge a person who shares my faith by the practices they observe or don't observe. There's a verse that explains this:

Romans 14:22
The faith which you have, have as your own conviction before God...

Fellow believers are often caught up in what other people are doing or not doing. It's counterproductive to the growth of a believer. And personal spiritual growth ought to be the goal - and is the end of the practice of worship.

Denominations define the practice of worship, more similarly than different, and for this reason obstruct the spiritual growth of a believer in Christ. If I strive to do one thing it's to promote the understanding which has caused me to prosper spiritually. It conflicts with the teaching - commonly held beliefs and practices naturally come under attack in other words, but that is not the goal. Again, I do not judge a person by the way in which they practice their faith. More precisely, I do not judge them as being saved or unsaved, right or wrong. Christ himself came not to judge but to save, did he not?

Each believer has access to the authority for instructions on how to worship God according to knowledge and productivity. It is my sincere belief therefore that others will for this reason arrive to the understanding I seem to be inventing. This is what the following two verses are about:

Ephesians 4:13
Till we all come in the unity of the faith...

and

Ephesians 4:16
...maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love.

(I'm including these last few verses to express some of the relevant thoughts I've had. )

2 Timothy 2:19
...The Lord knows those who are His...

Acts 24:14
But this I confess unto thee, that after the way which they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers...

Romans 10:2
For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge.

Colossians 2:21-3
(Touch not; taste not; handle not; Which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men?
Which things have indeed a shew of wisdom in will worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body: not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh.

Matthew 5:20
"For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

Galatians 1:12
For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Acts 4:19-21
Whether it is right in the sight of God to give heed to you rather than to God, you be the judge;
for we cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and heard."

Nina Simone - Ain't Got No...I've Got Life

2010-01-01T22:46:00.001-05:00

Feelin' Good - Nina Simone

2010-01-01T22:43:00.001-05:00

haiku

2009-12-30T18:08:00.004-05:00

learning simplicity
holiday celebrations change like
summer to winter

this time
it's spring for the blossoming
of appreciation

the gift of Life
turned summer's burning anticipation
into winter

coldness pervaded
until the ray of Son permeated
into gratitude

a single season
now exists with the dawning
of the spring

hot is the noonday sun
in childlike anticipation of the gatherings
like once for gifts

cool is winter's window
steady knowledge beneath the white surface
of the mounting snow

leaves golden
to fall but the blossoming seed
remains secure

springtime made
one season this holiday season
celebrated celebration

Becoming

2009-12-19T12:17:00.008-05:00

In keeping with yesterday's topic, and taking the opportunity to explain the meaning of my blog, I think I may be able to also provide a quick explanation in a discussion I'm having with a friend on Facebook on the same subject: Art. (3 Canadian geese with one stone lol :) )

Yesterday's post titled NOW talks about my faith in the human spirit to want, and do, good. The innate and prevailing desire for good is what heals the human race as a body, of disease, just as the human body regenerates and heals itself.

Artistic creation is unique to human beings and, as I argued in my Master's thesis on the subject of identity, the rational means to understanding ourselves and the universe. I specify rational because science, rather, prevails as the "rational" means to... I presupposed on philosopher Charles Taylor's view of what constitutes identity before going on to add the role of aesthetics, the study pertaining to the arts, in the picture. I'd like to quickly share some excerpts from Taylor's Sources of the Self. But, first, I can't help but insert this bit by Lincoln Barnett from his book The Universe and Dr. Einstein (because I love it so much).

It is perhaps significant to man that in terms of simple magnitude he is the mean between macrocosm and microcosm. Stated crudely this means that a super-giant red star (the largest material body in the universe) is just as much bigger than man as an electron (one of the tiniest of physical entities) is smaller. It is not surprising, therefore, that the prime mysteries of nature dwell in those realms farthest removed from sense-imprisoned man, nor that science, unable to describe the extremes of reality in the homely metaphors of classical physics should content itself with noting such mathematical relationships as may be revealed (Barnett 1957, 21-2).

Pretty cool thought, isn't it? I'd like to return to sense-imprisoned man at sometime. But, for now, on to Taylor:

It has often been remarked that making sense of one’s life as a story is also, like orientation to the good, not an optional extra; that our lives exist also in this space of questions, which only a coherent narrative can answer. In order to have a sense of who we are, we have to have a notion of how we have become, and of where we are going… I have been arguing that the issue of how we are placed in relation to this good is of crucial and inescapable concern for us, that we cannot but strive to give our lives meaning or substance, and that this means that we understand ourselves inescapably in narrative. (Taylor 1989, 47, 51)

And on to some more from Taylor (because I love it so much):

Perhaps the best way to see this is to focus on the issue that we usually describe today as the question of identity. We speak of it in these terms because the question is often spontaneously phrased by people in the form: Who am I? But this can’t necessarily be answered by giving name and genealogy. What does answer this question for us is an understanding of what is of crucial importance to us. To know who I am is a species of knowing where I stand. My identity is defined by the commitments and identifications which provide the frame or horizon within which I can try to determine from case to case what is good, or valuable, or what ought to be done, or what I endorse or oppose. In other words, it is the horizon within which I am capable of taking a stand…
And this situation does, of course, arise for some people. It’s what we call an ”identity crisis”, an acute form of disorientation, which people often express in terms of not knowing who they are, but which can also be seen as a radical uncertainty of where they stand. They lack a frame or horizon within which things can take on a stable significance, within which some life possibilities can be seen as good or meaningful, others as bad or trivial. The meaning of all these possibilities is unfixed, labile, or undetermined. This is a painful and frightening experience.
What this brings to light is the essential link between identity and a kind of orientation. To know who you are is to be oriented in moral space, a space in which questions arise about what is good or bad, what is worth doing and what not, what has meaning and importance for you and what is trivial and secondary. (Taylor 1989, 27-8)

But if this is so, then the naturalist supposition that we might be able to do without frameworks altogether is wildly wrong. This is based on a quite different picture, that of human agency where one could answer the question, Who? without accepting any qualitative distinctions, just on the basis of desires and aversions, likes and dislikes. On this picture, frameworks are things we invent, not answers to questions which inescapably pre-exist for us, independent of our answer or inability to answer. To see frameworks as orientations, however, does cast them in this latter light. One orients oneself in a space which exists independently of one’s success or failure in finding one’s bearings, which, moreover, makes the task of finding these bearings inescapable. (Taylor 1989, 30)

The last part is perhaps my favorite: "One orients oneself in a space which exists independently of one’s success or failure in finding one’s bearings..."

This space is who we are. We are, consequently, not what we see. Man's artistic expression on the other hand reflects, and in my opinion proves, the activity Taylor describes - namely where he states, "To know who you are is to be oriented in moral space, a space in which questions arise about what is good or bad, what is worth doing and what not, what has meaning and importance for you and what is trivial and secondary."

So I think our creative activity, in other words, is an attempt to make good out of the bad, perfection from the imperfect, beauty as opposed to ugliness. It seems to be a physical acting out of the invisible activity Taylor describes as pertaining to the self. The judgements we make on works of art are sometimes unanimous and sometimes conflict, in the same way they do about people; because persons are works of art to begin with. And because we find ourselves in narrative, as Taylor suggests, we are always changing; particularly when we engage in communication. The continuous tension, in becoming, within the space which we exist portends to the artistic creative process; between the artist and the work of art...

We come away changed, to greater or lesser degree, for better or worse, with everyone and/or their works of art that we encounter. Such was and continues to be the case for me upon encountering Christ, and then his word, for example.

I hope this post sheds light on the enigmatic, perhaps, meaning of my blog where it reads:

THIS BLOG IS ABOUT
Art; in its fullness. Insofar as I see and understand, it's occurring as you read these words.

"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
-Antoine de Saint-Exupery

NOW

2009-12-18T11:33:00.005-05:00

On an optimistic note, rather, amidst the drudgery of mainstream journalism to report the dark side of the happenings in the world, I'd like to feed the human thirst for knowledge with the positive perspective through which I'm viewing life lately.

I'm probably not alone to notice and appreciate the paradigm shift to we the people in entertainment, socializing, journalism, entrepreneurship and, most importantly to me, religion. Regeneration and healing are a pattern occurring at large due, in the way I see it, to the technological innovations that are making it, together with the timing, possible .

The human need to share and participate is changing the way we are entertained. I see this in the surge of reality shows. It seems that as we were getting bored by passive entertainment the curtain was pulled on the financial institutions draining the economy. YouTube, Facebook, blogs, Tibesti, Ebay, Etsy and like networks demonstrate the current shift from the era of large institutions defining (and limiting our experience by doing so) the aspects of our lives pertaining to the networks mentioned. The financial collapse in the U.S. serves as a metaphor for the current era, in somewhat fearsome question, as it inevitably moves forward in ways I am actually excited about.

I'm fascinated by the body's capacity to heal itself. It too serves as a metaphor for the healing that occurs across the borders of our flesh. I believe in the human spirit to want and do good. This makes me less leery of others - regardless of spiritual orientation. I find this point of view to be personally liberating. I am thankful for and enjoying it. Because it does have everything to do with my religious faith. In the human desire for good, the bad heals - though slowly, surely. What's exciting about now is the advent of the technology that is connecting people. Because communication between persons who are driven to share by their love for what they know, as opposed to financial gain, expedites the healing process each member benefits from with time - secularly and spiritually.

Today

2009-12-15T18:41:00.003-05:00

Today I feel like writing, not because I haven't, but because I feel it's time. There have been long lapses between what used to be regular posts. I think my friend's wording, inadvertently, describes the reason best.

This past Thanksgiving I cooked a turkey in my lovely new home. I planned to surprise my grandparents with it. The rest of my extended family was getting together and they, unable to travel, weren't going. Well it was the first time using the oven to bake and to make a longer story short, it took a lot longer than anticipated. So with no choice but to spoil the surprise I called my grandpa to let him know because it was getting late. He told me that he and my grandma didn't eat turkey. Grandma ended up telling me, later, that I shouldn't have listened to him lol.

Well with no hard feelings, I pulled up a bar stool next to the oven and, perched on top of it, had a truly grateful Thanksgiving eating turkey out of the roasting pan. I'd planned to serve myself on a plate and sit at the table but, with the turkey sitting there already at my disposal and with the hunger after all those long hours of waiting, I was like aaahh what the heck.

There was, as I could have guessed, some concern expressed by the family. I stayed alone on Thanksgiving?! Why didn't I join them or go out with friends if the plans I had fell through? So I told the story to a friend who called, a couple of days later, for us to meet in New York City. It was funny for me to hear because I recently moved to Michigan. He's known me for quite a long time - about ten years. I was at a loss for what to say when the concern I mentioned was expressed. So I asked my friend to tell me how he would word the reason I stayed home, alone, on Thanksgiving.

"You carefully and silently appreciate life," he said. You don't need festive celebrations he went on, in more words or less, adding that having just moved I am, "maintaining my privacy."

Valentina

2009-11-22T21:23:00.002-05:00

Valentina
by, Daniela Boata

It's at once comforting and heart wrenching
To behold normalcy
The way I see
In Valentina

It's curiously odd
To behold normalcy
And feel sympathy
Or maybe it isn't

What is new under the sun?
I swim in the tears of humanity
I linger on the scars of depravity
And yet

Revisited by unfriendly reminders
With their gaping mouth open wide
As to swallow me alive
The sweet enduring reality comes into focus

Whilst on the brink of poverty
I am full with prosperity
In the knowledge that has set me free
The love that keeps me keeping up with him

Profession

2009-11-08T18:23:00.006-05:00

Profession

by, Daniela Boata

Homo sapiens

Know good and evil
Rule the earth
And make for people

My kin and I shall pass
Playing with a plant in the picture
Thirty years gone by
Now grown and mature

I ponder depths and heights
In a body made to procreate
My ears, my eyes, my bones and heart
Are marked to appreciate

The magic of life
Of being alive
In this equally vile and wondrous encasing
Fighting to survive

Working to achieve
By an unnamed profession
Not the wages
But to stand, undivided, in this succession

So that I may see
Even when it pains me
So that I may be awake
Unblinded by vanity

And so I traverse
This transient planet
Participating no longer with confusion
Or regret

Lackofinnovation

2009-09-07T15:50:00.005-04:00

Detached from television, I may be one of the last people to know about two series; a show called Californication and one called Dexter. I'm especially shocked and deeply confused about Dexter, although as I'm writing I guess it's more the lack of discretion on the part of the media. The unabashed acting out and portrayal of brutal violence as entertainment is beyond me. Perhaps the reason is because, um, it's against the law...?? (for one) I guess that's why Californication, equally unappealing, doesn't disturb me quite as badly. Because while I aesthetically favor the more discreet sort of intimacy depicted in movies aired on TCM (Turner Classic Movies), I'm more accustomed with the intimate choice of televised entertainment of the day i.e. no holds barred. I guess I don't know what's worse, the lack of discretion to televise Dexter or the seeming thirst for blood the demand implies.

life

2009-07-19T08:26:00.002-04:00

Matthew 8:21-22 (NIV)

Another disciple said to him, "Lord, first let me go and bury my father."

But Jesus told him, "Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead."

Eden

2009-07-18T15:32:00.015-04:00

Eve was formed from Adam’s rib, taken out when he was asleep. Adam was formed from the dust of the ground. Sleep (as well as dust) is a metaphor for death. The story of creation is in actuality the story of mortality.

John 11:11-4 (NASB)
…after that He said to them, "Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I go, so that I may awaken him out of sleep."

The disciples then said to Him, "Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover."

Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that He was speaking of literal sleep.

So Jesus then said to them plainly, "Lazarus is dead,

It seems, then, Adam and Eve were already asleep; before they ate of the forbidden fruit that is. Each event in the story, like the eating of the fruit, has a purpose and serves as a means to deeper understanding. I’d like to focus on this part for now:

Genesis 2:23-4 (KJV)
And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.

Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

In the New Testament, the Apostle Paul would state this was a great mystery.

Ephesians 5:31-2 (KJV)
For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.
This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.

It seems to me the mystery explains the arrival of Christ. He is the bridegroom who left his Father to come and be joined to his wife. His flesh, that is, his body would be his wife (See http://acupofjoe-daniela.blogspot.com/2009/06/woman.html.%20He). In the law, God had expressed that he was married to the Israelites. Born of a woman living under the law, the bridegroom came to be joined to the flesh that was already subject to his law; so that he could destroy its power to condemn.

Ephesians 2:8 (KJV)
For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

Mark 2:19 (KJV)
And Jesus said unto them, Can the children of the bridechamber fast, while the bridegroom is with them? as long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast.

Jeremiah 3:14 (KJV)
... for I am married unto you...

1 Corinthians 15:45
So it is written: "The first man Adam became a living being"; the last Adam, a life-giving Spirit.

In the creation of the living being, woman was formed out of man. In the creation of the life-giving Spirit, man was taken out of woman – physically and spiritually. The first is perhaps more obvious; the virgin birth. Christ’s death was, and is, the spiritual means of birth. The man was taken out of the woman his own flesh represented. His resurrected body, in other words, is the Mind that was in him - in an incorruptible and immortal body. He was the mother giving birth by the means of his death; birth to the Spirit of God.

John 16:7 (NIV)
But I tell you the truth: It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.

He knew what he came to do, stating the above shortly before his death.

Jesus always called Mary woman.

John 19:25-7 (NASB)
But standing by the cross of Jesus were His mother...

When Jesus then saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing nearby, He said to His mother, "Woman, behold, your son!"

Then He said to the disciple, "Behold, your mother!" From that hour the disciple took her into his own household.

The obvious here is the Lord's concern over the care of Mary. However I see something more. Mary and the disciple were yet to receive the Counselor Jesus promised to send. Mary was the disciple’s mother, and not Christ's, because she and the disciple were flesh. Eve, woman, was formed from a man that was sleeping.

John 3:6 (KJV)
That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

Touched

2009-07-14T16:34:00.014-04:00

Walking down a corridor not too long ago with a bag of recyclables to dispense, in the basement of the building where I'm subletting an apartment for the summer, I see the leasing manager with his daughter ahead of me. He's a relatively young man. We'd spoken recently and I wasn't aware he had a child. She was sitting on a cart - a makeshift ride he'd been using to pull her along.

He was fumbling through some keys to open a door as I was walking towards them. In the time it took to confirm to myself it was he I was seeing and the adorable little bundle of less than two years sitting on the cart was his daughter, in her mind, she'd scoped me out as well.

"Mommy," she said as I was approaching.

The approval of children means a lot (especially to me).

Definition

2009-07-12T12:02:00.005-04:00

Hebrews 11:1 (KJV)

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

The meaning of this verse occurred to me this morning, oddly enough. I've known of it for a long time.

Things hoped for are an unseen substance. The evidence of those unseen things is seen.

Referencing my own experience, I'd hoped to know the truth about God. The seen evidence of the hope fulfilled was my transformed lifestyle.

2009-07-11T06:17:00.000-04:00

Documentary

2009-07-08T17:54:00.013-04:00

Joy and pain, sunshine and rain as the song goes. I look back at the picture above and the poem below. I took it around the time I wrote it. I took the one above it today.

Standing Still Awaiting

by me; on this sunny Sunday day

July 27, 2008

Poetry recovered
Hope reclaimed
Standing still awaiting
Moments pass me by
Observing them amidst the stillness
Flesh begins to age
Moments recollected
Story told on face
Broken bones and laughter
Hidden deep beneath the surface
The pangs of birth reveal
A child unchanged in glory
Familiar becomes
As a long lost friend
Or first love
Recognized as having been
Wrought by heaven’s means
The soul returns to yearning
The comfort of a mother
And strength of a father
The affection of both
Though one may never offer
Hope reclaimed

Untitled

by, Daniela Boata

(a day in June 2009)

making sense

of the seeming senseless

that drives our senses

further into senselessness

structure

Institution

like a lighthouse

to ships lost at sea

the solid foundation of society

till the veil

like Toto lifted

to see a little man

dance little

man dance

Revolution

2009-07-07T11:12:00.004-04:00

Luke 8:10 (NIV)
He said, "The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of God has been given to you, but to others I speak in parables, so that,
" 'though seeing, they may not see;
though hearing, they may not understand.'

Howbeit most people employed in the religion don't see or understand, I've realized. Anyone can make a profession out of it. People, like myself (for a period of time), are robbed of what is freely given by self employers.

1 Corinthians 2:12 (KJV)
Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.

In the beginning I was blown away by the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom and of what is freely given to us of God until I became entangled in the seeming authority of my faith , in the hands of self employers, over the course of five years. It's by grace that I got out - to see and understand as I do now.

I experienced an overwhelming sense of gratitude yesterday as I was driving and thinking. My heart and mind have been pulled in different directions lately. It's a scary feeling, like being lost at sea; a sea of emotions I've navigated far and wide to know - and beware of. The sense of gratitude is for the higher knowledge of my Lord. I can imagine (because I have), but can't (because I have), what it's like to live without it. Living with the knowledge is my guide; keeping me from getting sucked back into the way of vanity and shallow pleasure.

Speaking of the secrets of the kingdom of God, I've long been aware now of the prophetic time we are living. These are the times Paul wrote about in Romans 11. It's an exciting chapter, to me, in the unfolding of the story. I can't wait.

In Talkin' Bout A Revolution by Tracy Chapman I think of poor people in the context of the word:

Luke 6:20 (NASB)
And turning His gaze toward His disciples, He began to say, "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

Poor people are gonna rise up

And get their share

Poor people are gonna rise up

And take what's theirs...

Finally the tables are starting to turn

Talking about a revolution...

And finally the tables are starting to turn

Talking about a revolution...

Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rZbvi6Tj6E

Finale

2009-07-03T10:35:00.007-04:00

...And now to resume and conclude on the comment I was so pleased to find posted by a friend of mine on facebook:

Lately I'm very interested in the role music and art play in our religious experiences. "Church" music and the performing of it seem to have this effect of precipitating serenity and welcoming God into our minds. A communion of sorts.

I would argue the role music and art can play in our religious experience of it depends on the quality of the work. The quality of the work depends on the artist’s state of mind. In music, there are two works of art: The song and the performance. Anyone can sing Amazing Grace; a person singing it from the heart, because they identify with the words, or a celebrity singer with a phenomenal voice.

My mind recalled the lyrics, following my encounter with the object of the song, when I was walking on that sunny day in West Palm Beach (see http://acupofjoe-daniela.blogspot.com/2009/06/expression.html) . I’d heard it enough times to recall the words I’d been indifferent to singing the song or listening to a performance of it in church. A once mundane hymn became alive to me, in other words, when I became alive, or awakened, to the same reality of the person who wrote it.

The communion between the work of art, the creator of it, the Creator and the audience was complete at that moment when I sang, I once was lost but now… was blind but now I see. Anyone can sing Amazing Grace, but not everyone can write it. Religious art thus has the capability to provide for such complex and dynamic communion. However, the participation in the communion provided by the work of art will equally depend on the state of mind of the audience. Again, I cite my own experience.

My question is this: do you think the creation of music and art has a different religious function or ... does it to bring about communion?

The function is first and foremost to communicate, by doing so it creates communion – to greater or lesser extent – depending on the work, the performance and the person engaged in the work of art.

Often I feel as if I am merely the conduit of the divine when I do music. Do you share this view?

I personally feel more than a conduit of the divine when I create.

Luke 6:40 (NASB)
"A pupil is not above his teacher; but everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher.

A teacher is able to communicate knowledge. Artistic expression, on the other hand, is actualized through artistic talent. This brings me to the next question:

One more thing if I might add, how do you view artistic expression?

Artistic expression is a vehicle to communicate delightfully and profoundly. It must be seized by artists! Or as Dylan Thomas wrote: Rage, rage against the dying of the light in “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night:”

How are artists supposed to relate to the divine?

My answer: as the divine (or as the teacher). I would argue the integrity of art is to communicate - deliberately. The use of metaphors in the Bible such as the ant, spider, lion, and a bear robbed of her cubs, flowers, stars, ground, water, fire, tree, fruit, snake, wolf, lamb, sheep, bread, wine and on and on… is his creation! This is alongside his written word, which also became flesh!

John 1:14 (KJV)
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us…

1 Corinthians 15:45 (NIV)
So it is written: "The first man Adam became a living being"; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit.

There is clearly one mind, at work, in his works. His work is a picture (pun intended) of artistic perfection . He is communicating deliberately, coherently, cohesively, delightfully and profoundly; incorporating the very fabric of existence as the medium to communicate the unseen by things which are seen (and written!). The ability to see, understand and experience the meaning thereof is the utterly speechless gift of the divine; since personally knowing the man is necessary for it. The ability, in conclusion, to be as the teacher means we can know to likewise communicate deliberately in our artistic expression as the divine - incorporating every means available... Rage, rage against the dying of the light!

mon rythme

2009-07-02T18:16:00.007-04:00

My Beautiful Night

Poetry recovered
Hope reclaimed
Dad says I don’t know how to date
The Lord my unceasing delight
Life’s taken on a brief flight
Live before it’s too late
Vanity; the way of life
Complacency; albeit strife
Like-minded soul my heart doth desire
To share the knowledge
Of life-giving fire

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3ltZmI5LQw

(Interrupting the current series of posts on the subject of my friend's comment on facebook to share a rhyme I wrote today and song to go with it.)

Expression II

2009-06-25T12:16:00.004-04:00

U2
Bono, vocals
Larry Mullens, Jr., drums
The Edge, guitar
Adam Clayton, bass

Also during the early days, Bono spoke to Larry about a local Christian-based fellowship group. Prior to that, Larry grew up with a traditional Catholic background, even serving as an altar boy in church. Larry, Bono and Edge attended the Bible studies with some of their friends from Lypton Village and became friendly with members of the Shalom Christian group. When Larry, Bono, and Edge were told that they should give up rock-and-roll a few years later, they chose to leave the Christian group, instead. Larry said about Shalom in U2 by U2, "The idea was to create a Christian community, where people would live and work under strict Christian standards, When you're young and impressionable it all sounds ideal. But there was something terribly wrong with the concept. It was a bit like the bigger the commitment you made, the closer you were to heaven. It was a really screwed-up view of the world and nothing to do with what I now understand a Christian faith to be. There was huge pressure to follow that path and what made it even stranger was that rather than it coming from the church leaders, it was coming from our friends. I learned a lot though and I also gained a faith I didn't have before, and that's still with me."
(from Larry’s Bio http://www.atu2.com/band/larry/ )

Along with Bono and Larry, The Edge began attending prayer group meetings in the late 1970s. The young men were in search of spirituality and the answer to the big questions, and consequently were torn between their Christian ideals and their rock and roll lifestyle. Larry and Bono quickly chose the band, but The Edge was uncertain to the point where he nearly left U2 during the October tour. But he took Bono's advice to follow his heart, and after a reasonable period of soul searching, he chose the band as well. The Edge soon realized he didn't have any trouble reconciling his beliefs with his music and lifestyle; it was other people who did. In his words: "there was no problem. It was other people's problems".
(from the Edge's Bio http://www.atu2.com/band/edge/)

I couldn't resist sharing this next bit from Edge's biography for the last part about the "gunslinger" because I love it so much! I think it's SO funny. It seemed necessary to include the author's critical remarks as a background to the Edge's own statement.

The Edge's unmistakable guitar sound -- clean, sharp, incisive, and cutting-Edge -- is part of U2's trademark. The characteristic and mesmerizing sounds and the emotions he expresses through them make him one of the most respected guitarists in rock and roll. He has often been called an "anti-guitar hero" because of his aversion to the indulgent, showy style based on intense soloing of many contemporaries, preferring instead to play in often a technically undemanding and low-key, yet original, way. He is renowned for being a guitarist who is more concerned with sounds, texture and innovation rather than flashy technique...

"I suppose ultimately I'm interested in music. I'm a musician. I'm not a gunslinger. That's the difference between what I do and what a lot of guitar heroes do."

Last, but not least, from Bono’s Bio http://www.atu2.com/band/bono/:

As the lead singer of U2, one of the most popular and influential rock bands of the last 30 years, Bono is a figure adored and admired both within and outside of the music industry. As a rock star, his music with U2 has earned him legions of devoted fans across the world, whilst as a humanitarian and crusader for the world's poor, co-founder of organisations such as DATA and the ONE Campaign, he has gained deep respect from politicians and global statesmen as well as music fans. His rare ability to effectively straddle the spheres of both entertainment and politics remains rivaled by few in the realm of popular culture, and his determination to change the world for the better continues to inspire millions on both sides of the political divide.

Here' s a video clip from what seems to be the promotion of the ONE campaign; a performance of their hit One.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xh-ACkYmdc4

Expression

2009-06-23T10:33:00.003-04:00

Lately I'm very interested in the role music and art play in our religious experiences. "Church" music and the performing of it seem to have this effect of precipitating serenity and welcoming God into our minds. A communion of sorts. My question is this: do you think the creation of music and art has a different religious function or ... does it to bring about communion? One more thing if I might add, how do you view artistic expression? Often I feel as if I am merely the conduit of the divine when I do music. Do you share this view? How are artists supposed to relate to the divine? - my friend's facebook comment

I recently had the sincere pleasure of listening to the performance of a song by a young lady in church. The service seemed to be dragging along a bit, the people restless, until her voice rang passionately – reverberating, as if it were, through our souls. Our attention was suddenly drawn to the object of her song and the object of our gathering. I didn’t know the woman sitting next to me. But at the end of the song, when we simultaneously lifted our hands to wipe a tear, I felt like I did.

Speaking of church, they no longer want to buy my painting. It was suggested I keep it in case I become famous someday. It’s a representation of Malachi 4:2; a sunrise.

In Florida, in 1997, I was walking in the sunshine when the words and melody of the chorus to a song I’d heard came into my mind:

I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.

I’m reading the lyrics, now, I didn’t know then and feeling strengthened by a hymn written two hundred years ago. Communion…

Amazing Grace Lyrics
John Newton (1725-1807)

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.

T'was Grace that taught my heart to fear.
And Grace, my fears relieved.
How precious did that Grace appear
The hour I first believed.

Through many dangers, toils and snares
I have already come;
'Tis Grace that brought me safe thus far
and Grace will lead me home.

The Lord has promised good to me.
His word my hope secures.
He will my shield and portion be,
As long as life endures.

Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail,
And mortal life shall cease,
I shall possess within the veil,
A life of joy and peace.

When we've been here ten thousand years
Bright shining as the sun.
We've no less days to sing God's praise
Than when we've first begun.

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.

to be continued

Prelude

2009-06-22T00:42:00.002-04:00

I'm a victim of my own insides. There was a time when I wanted to know everything...It used to make me very unhappy, all that feeling. I just didn't know what to do with it. But now I've learned to make that feeling work for me. I'm full of emotion and I want a release, and if you're on stage and if it's really working and you've got the audience with you, it's a oneness you feel. - Janis Joplin

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVpDOIPx_sY

Her voice seems to strike every depth and crevice of suffering my heart has felt in the video above. I publish my blog on facebook. There, a friend of mine posted the following comment to my post titled Church (6/12):

Lately I'm very interested in the role music and art play in our religious experiences. "Church" music and the performing of it seem to have this effect of precipitating serenity and welcoming God into our minds. A communion of sorts. My question is this: do you think the creation of music and art has a different religious function or ... does it to bring about communion? One more thing if I might add, how do you view artistic expression? Often I feel as if I am merely the conduit of the divine when I do music. Do you share this view? How are artists supposed to relate to the divine?

I was thrilled to find it. This post is a prelude to the response already in the works.

Communion...

Ground

2009-06-19T12:07:00.006-04:00

A positive outcome of the horrid experience I mentioned briefly in yesterday’s post titled Sick is the inspiration that came to me to write this.

Genesis 3:17-8 (NASB)
Cursed is the ground because of you…"Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you

The ground, like the sexes in the post titled Woman (6/9), is an allegory - a means to understand reproduction; particularly of good, and evil.

Matthew 7:17 (KJV)
Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.

Fruit here is referring to a child – the fruit of the womb. The earth, the ground, can also be understood as a womb. So when the ground was cursed, the womb was also. It helps to remember man was formed from the earth. The curse itself, however, is an indication both ground and womb share the same allegorical function. The symbolic usage of the ground is especially useful because it liberates the understanding and concept of reproduction from sexual relations. The obvious picture and process nature readily provides is another utility.

Luke 6:44 (KJV)
For every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes.

1 Corinthians 15:37 (NIV)
When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else.

In this next verse, Christ was speaking of himself (shortly before his death):

John 12:24 (NASB)
"Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

Here are a couple prophesies on the subject from the Old Testament:

Ezekiel 2:6 (KJV)
…though briers and thorns be with thee, and thou dost dwell among scorpions…

Isaiah 55:13 (NIV)
Instead of the thornbush will grow the pine tree, and instead of briers the myrtle will grow…

The New Testament is essentially the creation of a new heart; through the birth, death and resurrection of a person containing this new heart. Christ was the new person.

John 1:14 (KJV)
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

He was the good seed, the good tree which would bring forth good fruit.

Galatians 5:22-3 (NASB)
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

Ephesians 5:8-9 (NIV)
For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light
(for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth)

1 Corinthians 15:45 (NIV)
(Adam is the Hebrew word for man by the way.)
So it is written: "The first man Adam became a living being" ; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit.

Against such things there is no law because of the life-giving spirit. The life-giving spirit is the resurrected Christ. In the flesh, he was the realization of the heart that defied the need for the observance of the law, to live the life of God, because he, simply, loved him.

Galatians 5:14 (NIV)
The entire law is summed up in a single command: "Love your neighbor as yourself."

Galatians 5:6 (NASB)
For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything, but faith working through love.

Galatians 4:6 (NIV)
Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, "Abba, Father."

A heart that loves God defies the need to obey and observe the law to know, live and experience the life of God . The Spirit of God is in actuality the new heart. Physically the heart is the same. The love for God is actualized in the heart by the knowledge of his person, by the giving of his Spirit. The heart otherwise desires the person of the flesh.

Genesis 3:16 (NIV)
To the woman he said…
Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you."

Here are some more instances of the allegorical usage of nature.

Matthew 13:22-3 (NASB)
"And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears the word, and the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.

"And the one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it; who indeed bears fruit and brings forth, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty

The soil can be understood as the heart.

Romans 10:10 (NIV)
For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.

The fruit, again, is the child. The first example can be understood as a miscarriage. The second example goes on to include the necessary fruitfulness of the child.

1 Timothy 2:15 (KJV)
Notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety.

The only way to be fruitful in other words is, in the words of Christ:

John 15:5 (NASB)
"I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

Hebrews 6:7-8 (NASB)
For ground that drinks the rain which often falls on it and brings forth vegetation useful to those for whose sake it is also tilled, receives a blessing from God;
but if it yields thorns and thistles, it is worthless and close to being cursed, and it ends up being burned.

The vegetation useful to those for whose sake it is also tilled refers to the actualization of the Old Testament prophesy:

Ezekiel 47:12 (NIV)
Fruit trees of all kinds will grow on both banks of the river. Their leaves will not wither, nor will their fruit fail. Every month they will bear, because the water from the sanctuary flows to them. Their fruit will serve for food and their leaves for healing."

As for the latter part of the previous verse from Hebrews, I’m working on a post devoted to the subject of fire.

Sick

2009-06-18T14:36:00.003-04:00

I'm trying hard to get back in here to write.

But I feel tired, drained and badly stricken.

Though I haven't heard the words, I'm aware of them.

Don't ask how, I just am.

Sources have confirmed my intuition.

A man, an acquaintance, gone sour - gone mad.

I feel like I walked into an ambush - just by having liked someone.

Proverbs 18:7-9 (KJV)

The words of a talebearer are as wounds, and they go down into the innermost parts of the belly.

They really do.

Church

2009-06-12T00:11:00.006-04:00

Do you think music is a tongue we can speak in to express the inexpressible, the relation to the divine?

It made me very happy to discover this question in the comments section of yesterday’s post titled “Tongues” because answering it inadvertently gives me an opportunity to discuss church as I’ve come to understand it. “I Am Church Is Not A Building,” reads a T-shirt I’ve seen worn lately. Church is not a denomination, either.

I found myself speechless when people, naturally, would ask to know my religion – at the first. It was funny. Prior to my dramatic translation into the kingdom of his Son,

Colossians 1:13 (KJV)
Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:

I may have readily said I was Christian or Pentecostal, since it's the way I was raised. I still have trouble answering the question. I’m actually irked by it – deeply. How can I ascribe the name of a religion to my life, or identify with a denomination, when neither produced it?

The Apostle Paul was given the task of creating the church. The life of God had been exclusive to the Israelites by the giving of his Law, to them, by Moses.

Ezekiel 20:11 (NASB)
"I gave them My statutes and informed them of My ordinances, by which, if a man observes them, he will live.

It didn’t stop there, however. The life of God would become attainable to all of humanity, by faith - and not by the work of the law.

Romans 3:20, 31 (NIV)
Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin.
Do we, then, nullify the law by this faith? Not at all! Rather, we uphold the law.

Galatians 2:15-6 (KJV)
We who are Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles,
Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

Galatians 3:11-2 (NIV)
Clearly no one is justified before God by the law, because, "The righteous will live by faith."
The law is not based on faith; on the contrary, "The man who does these things will live by them."

I Corinthians 1:1-2, 21-4 (NASB)
Paul, called as an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God…
To the church of God which is at Corinth…

Colossians 1:23-5 (NASB)
…of which I, Paul, was made a minister.
…on behalf of His body, which is the church…
Of this church I was made a minister…

Getting back to the body and the church, from the post titled “Woman” on June 9th, the previous scripture calls the mind of the body, as discussed in that post, to mind. The body symbolizes the church in that each member forms a cohesive whole. The church as a whole is subject to the mind of God just as Christ lived subject to him, the Spirit, in the body of his flesh. Paul, being fully aware of the implications, admonished the members of the body for dividing themselves:

I Corinthians 1:12 (NASB)
Now I mean this, that each one of you is saying, "I am of Paul," and "I of Apollos," and "I of Cephas," and "I of Christ."

The body surely became divided. The Apostle’s fear came true after his departure:

Acts 20:29 (KJV)
For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock.

Yet every Christian denomination to my knowledge shares one particular practice in common: a physical interpretation of the communion. Across the board in Christendom, to my knowledge, the communion is observed by a bread-like object and juice or wine to symbolize the body and blood of the Lord. So denominations (even nondenominational) share the definition of worship in common; because the communion is essentially worship.

Singing is an expression of worship incorporated, likewise across the board, in worship services – and in probably every religious gathering. Music is a language that transcends cultural barriers: language, ethnic, racial. This ability, together with its power to elevate the human spirit, is the reason there probably isn’t a single soul that doesn’t like it. Do you think music is a tongue we can speak in to express the inexpressible, the relation to the divine? Yes, this is how:

Ephesians 5:19 (KJV)
Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord;

Psalm 40:3 (KJV)
And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the LORD.

Revelation 5:9 (KJV)
And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation;

My spiritual life is the new song. My singing in church might elevate my spirit. But it’s the activity of worship moment by moment which expresses the harmony, inexpressible by words or instruments, in relation to the divine. It is, likewise, the power to elevate the human spirit. This is specifically why understanding worship is so important.

Tongues

2009-06-10T23:37:00.004-04:00

Proponents of water baptism agree the power of God is in his Spirit. In the Pentecostal tradition, for this reason, the Spirit is coveted by means of fervent prayer following or preceding the outward “symbol” of one’s decision to follow Christ by getting baptized in water. Speaking in an audible yet unknown tongue, or language, is regarded as an indication the person praying has received the Spirit of God. The basis for this practice dates back to the day of Pentecost. The Pentecostal denomination would draw its name and center its practices – namely the method of salvation, from this pivotal moment in history.

The second chapter of Acts curiously describes, however, the tongues spoken by the persons filled with the Spirit on the day of Pentecost as foreign languages.

Acts 2:1-11 (NASB)
And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.

And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting.

And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them.

And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.

And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven.

Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language.

And they were all amazed and marvelled, saying one to another, Behold, are not all these which speak Galilaeans?

And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born?

Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judaea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia,

Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes,

Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God.

I can, personally, understand the phenomenon very well. It would occur to me much later, however, that I too had actually spoken in tongues.

A devout Pentecostal asked me if I had spoken in tongues after I enthusiastically shared the story of the unforgettable night, the life changing experience of my repentance and faith in the risen Christ, shortly after it happened, in 1997. I knew the sound of the unknown tongue he was referring to because I’d been raised in the Pentecostal denomination. I remember feeling stricken by and deeply hurt by his more or less dismissal of it after I told him I hadn’t. Though my salvation appeared to be incomplete, I gave myself time to assess the situation I suddenly found myself in – namely the authoritative figure on the indescribably profound reality I was living.

The funny thing is the thought or even goal of speaking in tongues didn’t even cross my mind that night. I sought him, and then his forgiveness. It all happened very quickly. It was a series of events which took place according to God’s word, I would discover.

Romans 10:9-10
that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved;

for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

I didn’t know this, though I was doing at the time. And the last of those events was praising God, with a loud voice, in the Romanian language!

Furthermore, in my experience, I discovered the Spirit of God can be thought of and treated as a person (albeit I sought the Lord in tears). Yet it wasn’t a long, drawn out process like the Pentecostal practice (that stretches even for years for some people) of asking and pleading that defies this logic and even his word:

Matthew 7:7 (NASB)
Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.

Luke 12:32 (KJV)
Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

Woman

2009-06-09T11:06:00.004-04:00

A constructive comment on June 7th's post titled "If Muhammad Ali Can, So Can I" has led me to elaborate on woman as a biblical symbol. In that post, I cited verses that incorporate the woman to symbolize the follower of Christ. I left out the mother, incidentally; the most important female prototype - the child bearer.

In my experience, picturing Christ is most helpful when striving to understand his word.

Isaiah 49:15-6 (NASB)
"Can a woman forget her nursing child
And have no compassion on the son of her womb?
Even these may forget, but I will not forget you.
"Behold, I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands;

Isaiah 54:1 (NASB)
"Shout for joy, O barren one, you who have borne no child;
Break forth into joyful shouting and cry aloud, you who have not travailed;
For the sons of the desolate one will be more numerous
Than the sons of the married woman," says the LORD.

Galatians 4:26-7 (NASB)

But the Jerusalem above is free; she is our mother.
For it is written,
"REJOICE, BARREN WOMAN WHO DOES NOT BEAR; BREAK FORTH AND SHOUT, YOU WHO ARE NOT IN LABOR; FOR MORE NUMEROUS ARE THE CHILDREN OF THE DESOLATE THAN OF THE ONE WHO HAS A HUSBAND."

In this last verse, the Apostle Paul explains the spiritual reality of Christ as the Temple of God (originally in Jerusalem) and the mother of his children. Paul's children? Yes, in a sense. How can a man have a child? The answer, again, is most readily found in Christ.

He was the child of God, born of his seed - his word.

John 1:14 (NASB)
And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.

He is, as we have seen, mother and child. The death of his flesh is the means of spiritual birth; hence the reference, of being inscribed on the palms of his hands, in Isaiah 49:16. However the body of his flesh likewise carried a female connotation for this very reason. Since the mother and child are an expression of the father, the father (as mind) is indicative in a person's life.

John 10:37 (KJV)
If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not.

The works indicative of the Father are childbearing.

I Corinthians 3:6 (KJV)
I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.

1 Timothy 2:15 (KJV)
Notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety.

Given the background of the Old Testament, for example, it seems this last verse means to multiply the seed of God, as Paul explains in the verse prior to it, rather than man's.

I Corinthians 3:8 (NASB)
Now he who plants and he who waters are one; but each will receive his own reward according to his own labor.

You can see how there is a male connotation in planting and watering. There is likewise a female connotation in giving the increase. There are two sexless minds in the Garden of Eden; The Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. These are likewise known, regarded and referred to in the word as the mind of the flesh and the Spirit. The utility of the sexes is to provide an understanding into the organization characterizing both of these minds, and their reproduction.

The following scripture, along with the one I quoted in my initial post on this subject, are the basis for the doctrine limiting a woman's voice in church. Again, it's helpful to picture Christ - specifically as mother, Father and child.

Ephesians 5:23,29-30 (NASB)

For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body.
for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church,
because we are members of His body.

If those of you who are reading this are members of his body, this means your body is his - like Christ's body was God's. He lived, like a virgin and a loyal wife to her husband, in obedience to the Spirit. We in fact celebrate him for this reason. Had he lived to the satisfying of his flesh, he would have been like an adulterous woman and his kingdom, where immortality reigns, would have never come into existence. Jephthah's daughter, in Judges 11, affirms the female virgin symbolizes his living in obedience to the Spirit.

Getting back to the commentator's observation, in my recent post, here is the verse I quoted without delving deeper into the symbolic usage applying to it:

1 Timothy 2:12 (KJV)

But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.

The man in this context is the mind of God, the Spirit - the Father indicative in the works; the bearing of children.

Water

2009-06-09T01:46:00.003-04:00

Yesterday evening I had the pleasure of listening to a wonderful sermon at church. Though I’ve mentioned I no longer attend, I’m not sure I’ve been very specific about the reason. Last night’s sermon encouraged me to be. The preacher talked about going all the way, citing the very verse that had been on my mind lately:

Acts 20:20
And how I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you...

I have been afraid to go all the way, publicly that is, with the spiritual knowledge I’ve learned since the faith became a reality in my life exactly twelve years ago last month. The pressure seems to have built up like the contents of a volcano. I find myself unable to hold it in any longer.

Among the contents is the subject of water baptism. Water baptism in the Christian faith is regarded as a symbolic expression of a person’s professed faith in Christ. It had its symbolic utility under the Law of the Old Testament. John the Baptist was given the task to prepare the way of the Lord by baptizing people in water for the washing away of their sins. Jesus would be that water, by his selfsame cleansing Spirit, in the New Testament.

The Spirit descended upon Jesus like a dove at the moment he was baptized.

John 1:32
And John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him.

This action is perhaps the most explicit indication of water as a symbol of the Spirit of God. It may be helpful to understand the Spirit is mind – the mind of Christ specifically.

I Corinthians 2:11-2, 16

For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.

Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.

For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? but we have the mind of Christ.

The utility of water of course is in its ability to cleanse. The gift, of the New Testament, is in the experience the Law presented with symbolic activities and observances. Instead of being understood as the realization and fulfillment of water baptism, the following verse is the basis for the continued practice of water baptism!

Acts 10:47
Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we?

Moreover, water baptism is practiced as a symbol of one’s professed faith in Christ (as opposed to the washing away of sin)! I was baptized in water, personally. I did not know any better at the time. It had no spiritual value. There was no point. The symbol of having been baptized in water was, for example, the miracle of my changed heart, demonstrated by my love for God and people.

Luke 10:27
And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself.

It is not natural. It’s possible because by the Spirit, through the operation of repentance and faith in the name of the risen Son of God (as opposed to the work of the Law), the Old Testament prophesy became a reality:

Ezekiel 36:26
A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.

The presence of the Spirit, Christ being the very picture of the phenomenon, is the only symbol of value.

If Muhammad Ali Can, So Can I

2009-06-07T14:41:00.004-04:00

Someone asked to know what I think about the doctrine which limits a woman's voice in church. It's hard for me to determine how much the explanation will make sense to someone who doesn't share the faith. The reason is because it's a language. Teaching, it turns out, is more like translation. Translation consequently is a gift; otherwise one risks sounding barbaric.

So, at the risk of sounding barbaric, I would like to answer the question. There are two important symbols in the word of God as contained in the Bible. These are the adulteress woman and the chaste virgin. Here are two examples:

Hosea 3:1
Then said the LORD unto me, Go yet, love a woman beloved of her friend, yet an adulteress, according to the love of the LORD toward the children of Israel, who look to other gods, and love flagons of wine.

2 Corinthians 11:2
For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.

The latter verse seems to be regarded as symbolic, in my experience, representing a male and female in the faith. The prior verse generally seems to be interpreted literally. However it's a mistake. The same spiritual understanding must be applied. This means the adulteress woman, as a reoccurring symbol in the word, equally describes a man. Moreover, the context (I'm hoping) in Hosea 3:1 explains the meaning of the adulteress as a symbol.

Getting back to the question, it's important to apply the same understanding when interpreting the verse which, in turn, limits the voice of women in church.

1 Timothy 2:12
But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.

A Pillar of Beauty

2009-06-02T21:21:00.003-04:00

Today, as the Middle Eastern shop owner of a little neighborhood fruit market was guessing where I was from, in walked a man I hadn't seen in ages. I've known him and his family since I was a little girl. He has four handsome sons. A grandfather now, in his late sixties I imagine, he stood out to me this time around. He looked gallantly stunning. Years of virtue radiated from his countenance and as we spoke, in Romanian, I understood the reason why.

He extolled the importance of family and its values, while preserving (to me) the quintessential spark of romance. He spoke candidly, catching me, pleasantly, a little off guard with his insight (upon reflection). I don't remember how we got there. Perhaps it was the subject of my being single (as always) that spurred him to share a few words I'd never really heard spoken about married life.

It will take several years to adjust or to know each other he said, giving some detail. Maybe the reason I can't recall, as I often do, his eloquent speech verbatim is for the selective bit my mind has dwelt on since our talk. "...It will take time to know each other's dreams."

the Song

2009-05-30T00:56:00.004-04:00

...the beauty of talent

I had rocking out on stage together in mind. The collaboration in particular; each man playing his part, at his best. The song is a collaboration of sacrifice.

And so it goes, in life.

Harmony is a collaboration of sacrifice; a song among discord - my Life in this world. I am reminded of a verse I, didn't always but, now understand with certitude.

Matthew 16:25
For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.

Drago

2009-05-28T23:21:00.006-04:00

My roommate hasn't known me long. But tonight as I was watching Rocky IV, with a vengeance, she asked me if I was OK.

The obstacles are brutal, the challenges serious. Little by little, taking down the ferocious giant - I feel like pumping some iron now. (Too bad the gym is closed)

Na Ri Na

2009-05-22T17:08:00.001-04:00

My lovely roommate shared this artist, song and video with me. I immediately fell in love with it. It's encouraging and inspiring, as a woman, for me to watch it actually. It may just be the first time feeling so by seeing a music video of women dancing in their bikinis. It's the culture, I realize.

I don't know this particular one well. But I get the sense these women are appreciated; more so than desired - though tastefully and naturally desirable. It gives them the comfort to express their femininity, and it's beautiful to watch. The boys will grow to be at ease with a woman's sexuality; like the men seem to be in the video. I've been around these kind of men and it's refreshing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eIV_i2iVys

revelation

2009-05-21T10:38:00.003-04:00

I've lived with a rather unique understanding of the Christian faith for some time now. Unique because I don't know anyone who shares it. It's the reason I no longer attend church actually. Last night I went public with it for the first time; at the church I attended with my family since I was a child.

It was a very emotional experience for me. I recounted being told twelve years ago by a woman, in the church, that the joy, peace and love I was experiencing at the onset of my faith wouldn't last. I went on to explain that she was right. It didn't. Together with the horrific glimpse I'd received into the future, five years later the reality rang louder than her words. But what she didn't tell me, and what I've learned since, is there's a way to keep it from fading away. It's, conversely, the way to keep it growing.

The knowledge is responsible for the experience people aspire to. It is my sincere pleasure to share it; but also a responsibility. I was a little afraid of being regarded as an outcast. It came as somewhat of a relief, afterwards, when the pastor suggested the church pray for me to get strengthened.

A longtime admirer since my teens came and sat next to me immediately after. I was still teary eyed and emotional. I was somewhat encouraged, thinking the elder came to offer her support. This is your church she repeated several times with a big smile on her face. She began to make small talk and would have proceeded. But I fixed my gaze on the pastor to discourage her. I thought about changing seats, but assured myself I could handle it. Later I would kick myself, because I couldn't. When the opportunity presented itself she told me about her grandson. Together with the women who crowded me afterwards to discuss my appearance, the experience left me feeling mauled, drained and like I'd been hit in the head with a 2x4.

This is my life.

Relativity of Reticence

2009-05-17T14:43:00.010-04:00

the beauty of talent

does she have any dreams?
you have dreams
so I think you're happier

ridiculousness of pride
tis naked before me
deep seated insecurity lies beneath

Proverbs 14:1
Every wise woman buildeth her house: but the foolish plucketh it down with her hands.

the beauty of hospitality
generosity
the value of my prolonged need and suffering

freed to give; is a gift
Acts 20:35
...It is more blessed to give than to receive.
a life of service...
(she secretly wished I would have gotten hurt)

Proverbs 15:17
Better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith.

Lamentations 3:26
It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the LORD.

untouchable
unshakable
sure foundation
Matthew 7:25
And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.

deception of vanity
is the glory of your flesh
glory; in the flesh
Psalm 119:19
I am living in a strange land: do not let your teachings be kept secret from me.

their piercing looks
desperation in her eye
desperation in his eye
why?
no regard
thoughtful acknowledgement
like a breath of fresh air
seedy look under my skin

instead of Reds, vitamin c and cocaine
like a reed shaken in the wind
frail like one
as I'm walking
my chest burning with anxiety
living on hope
II Corinthians 6:10
As sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things.
faith and love
clean air purges the stronghold of lurking shadows
shiny leaves spring
like my hope
bona fide
after the rain
I have a dream

my stand on gay marriage

2009-05-10T00:48:00.002-04:00

Homosexuality = sexual identity crisis

Marriage = commitment

It makes no difference to me if homosexuals are committed to each other or not.

There was a request to know my stand on gay marriage by a frequent commentator on my blog. You may view it in the previous post's comments section.

Less on Lesson

2009-04-28T22:49:00.003-04:00

The other day driving I swerved to avoid hitting a pothole and hit it smack dab in the middle. It made me think that if I wouldn't have tried, I probably wouldn't of hit it. And so it goes, and so it went - today...

I watched the Pearl Jam Crown of Thorns video incessantly. I think it was the words.

this is my kinda love
it's the kind that moves on
it's the kind that leaves me alone,
yeah this is my kinda love
it's the kind that moves on
it's the kind that,
it's the kind that...
leaves me alone

An old friend kept telling me that I need a man over the weekend. It got to me.

un

2009-04-28T00:55:00.004-04:00

Sweetness
by, Daniela Boata

The playing field is level
The lights in the houses are on
Community makes sense
Precaution does too
Eddie Vedder's voice
A well of emotion
He drew it out

Time and Space

2009-04-23T22:07:00.012-04:00

I found this on the Internet. It was taken in the night with a spotlight shining on the barn and using a camera with a slow shutter speed.

The Relativity of Being
by, Daniela Boata

The voice of wisdom

I hear it say

Boast not

Fret not either

There is a time

For everything

Under the sun

I've lived to know

Is true

A time to laugh

A time to cry

Tamed by a force

Like a wild horse

I await

The change of season

Though some things will never change

Unbearably livable

Till death do us part

Memorease

2009-04-15T17:55:00.016-04:00

Snapshots became a memory of Memorease. Taken discreetly with my camera phone at Espresso Royale; at two different locations in Ann Arbor, Michigan. The top was near closing time. I resumed writing after the turn I took for dinner. I walked into an Indian restaurant that has been here for as long as I can remember, not sure what I wanted to do, until the eclectic smell of exotic spices coerced me into staying.

My girlfriend's husband dropping a handful of small toys in her over sized red handbag. A chic young mother who's five or so year old boy and his cousin led me to; pointing proudly as I walked up out of the blue and sat next to her in church. Almost ten years had past since the time I last saw her dad, sitting to my left. His laughter and warm hug as I told him that I needed his wife's help after he asked me if I'm married felt nurturing. She's one of five sisters all married save the youngest; to suitable suitors.

Both of us wearing black with matching blond heads, I can feel the guys sitting behind me watch me intently. In front of them is a single young woman, one married, her husband sitting to her right. Their shy boy's blue eyes flash innocence at his mother's as he asks her something. I was too amazed to pay attention to what he was saying. He makes his way to his grandpa's lap and the guys behind me have the full picture.

My long ride home on the school bus surfaced into my consciousness as I drove passed a little house along the old route on my way to an Ann Arbor cafe today. Even my bursting bladder and stopping to pee behind the weeping willow trees, I used to love, at the edge of our long driveway on the, still, dirt road to our large house situated on a hill on ten acres of land in the country of Saline, Michigan.

The song Because You Loved Me,

For all those times you stood by me
For all the truth that you made me see
For all the joy you brought to my life
For all the wrong that you made right
For every dream you made come true
For all the love I found in you
Ill be forever thankful baby
Youre the one who held me up
Never let me fall
Youre the one who saw me through through it all

You were my strength when I was weak
You were my voice when I couldnt speak
You were my eyes when I couldnt see
You saw the best there was in me
Lifted me up when I couldnt reach
You gave me faith coz you believed
Im everything I am
Because you loved me

You gave me wings and made me fly
You touched my hand I could touch the skyI lost my faith,
you gave it back to me
You said no star was out of reach
You stood by me and I stood tall
I had your love I had it all
Im grateful for each day you gave me
Maybe I dont know that much
But I know this much is true
I was blessed because I was loved by you

You were my strength when I was weak
You were my voice when I couldnt speak
You were my eyes when I couldnt see
You saw the best there was in me
Lifted me up when I couldnt reach
You gave me faith coz you believed
Im everything I am
Because you loved me

You were always there for me
The tender wind that carried me
A light in the dark shining your love into my life
Youve been my inspiration
Through the lies you were the truth
My world is a better place because of you

You were my strength when I was weak
You were my voice when I couldnt speak
You were my eyes when I couldnt see
You saw the best there was in me
Lifted me up when I couldnt reach
You gave me faith coz you believed
Im everything I am
Because you loved me

You were my...

Im everything I am
Because you loved me
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/c/celine+dion/because+you+loved+me_20028446.html

by Celine Dion, had just been playing on the radio. The epic moment in time, when I was cornered and brought to repentance at the ripe old age of nineteen, in the middle of the night, in tears and supplication accompanied the song. The love song speaks volumes of the, and my, faith. Pulling into downtown Ann Arbor, the streets are familiarly adorned with University of Michigan students in the finally sunny spring afternoon. ACDC is playing, loudly, on the same childhood classic rock station I listened to growing up in the area.

"Thank you for dropping your chopsticks. You made my day," the elderly man said to me in the Wholefoods parking lot recently. "Thank you for picking them up," I said - not knowing what to say. I was reminded after watching a variety of colorful small birds feasting on the feed my aunt put out in a tree, she planted precisely for the possibility of what my grandmother and I were enjoying, from the kitchen window this morning. The experience had, I thought to myself, made my day.

Relationship

2009-04-13T14:00:00.009-04:00

Wow, even animals can't be trusted. They act cute when they want something. Ah but yes, this is the problem with humans. We can be direct about what we want. It seems most, if not all, of human behavior amounts to getting what we want. So we enter into mutually satisfying arrangements (ideally). Institutions provide a means to an insatiable end. The belly and the heart; work and marriage. All of our activities are driven out of our need to love and be loved. Why do you do what you do?

WARNING, battery exhausted my camera flashed. It was almost 6am. I was. Yet I was bombarded with loads of material to record upon coming home late one morning. Driving home was fun, at one point; just me and my loud music on the desolate highway, in the middle of the night, under the vast Michigan sky. This was after pulling over to sleep for a good portion of the night because I couldn't keep my eyes open for the hour long drive. My cousin is not at all keen on the idea of his property appearing on the Internet. No, not even the pictures of toys and dishes I took that morning. It was like the aftermath of a storm, walking into the kitchen; the storm of domesticity.

It begins with the courtship. The saying of the right words at the right time. It's funny because it just occurred to me in the last month or so that women are ring hunters and eager to have children. In all my years of living, I was totally clueless about this notion (like I was about animals perhaps) when the line was used on me. I thought they really wanted to have children. Yet now that I'm aware of it, it still couldn't work. Because I'm still not eager to get married or to have children.

No, I'm still not eager to "settle down" partially perhaps because I haven't been active to be tired. I'm looking for love for all the right reasons instead of "all the wrong places" like a song goes. I'm open to it rather for all... It could be anyone. Love is a choice, I've come to understand. A choice made possible when you have it to begin with. Though I would specify knowing, as opposed to having, love. It's why there neither is or has been such thing as a boyfriend for me anymore. Although many people treat marriage with the same level of respect, and vice versa. Commitment is a scary word for people not yet able to "settle down".

It's really quite funny, both the settling down and being unsettled, to me. Maybe because I don't fall into either category. Perhaps that places me into the category of the observer, or at least that's what I feel like. And I realize why people idolize artists. Occupying themselves with the bits that don't quite measure up to a life fulfilled in the institutions of work and marriage, they are the minority living mentally, if not physically, on the outskirts of the norm to communicate what is lost in translation but not forgotten.

When the music's over, turn off the lights, turn off the lights... the chorus of the song by The Doors, titled respectively, came into my mind as I was taking pictures. Here they were, two kids down the road, one on the way - with the house and belongings they're courtship bought. The chase is over. It's part of the fun. It's the part the rogues don't want to give up. This category of people falling onto the outskirts of marriage in adult life are as silly to me as married men, with the longing in their eye to be single, are. The beast must first be tamed before I enter into one, is all I have to say. Men could, and should, hold the same standard. For this, little needs to be said. A mutual recognition rather is something just as plausible as physical attraction.

Dad

2009-04-08T17:55:00.008-04:00

"What song are they singing," she asked me this morning as she stood next to me and in front of the window I'd opened to get some fresh air while sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee. "Twinkle, Twinkle," I said (after we'd established what the birds were doing).

"The alligator xylophone, " my once removed, two and a half year old little cousin suddenly remarked and ran to go find it. "Here Dan Ela," she said as she set it beside me. I had called it a xylophone once and she remembered. We had sang Twinkle, Twinkle together as I made out the tune and played it on the alligator xylophone the other night. I was amazed.

I was equally amazed at my thumping heart in the early afternoon. Though my aunt was here, the child plugged into me, and I couldn't do anything. I hadn't even been able to do so much as to wash my face. A friend was coming over. Crawling in the bathtub as I'm finally washing my face to get ready in time, I'm keeping an eye on her to make sure she doesn't open my shampoo and conditioner to eat it. Then managing to stay focused with her in between and pulling at my legs as I stood in front of the sink, I made a pause to instruct her that toilet paper was not a toy.

"It's easier when they're your own," said my friend coming over with the younger two of three children she has herself. I felt amped and, a bit, frazzled. The rest of the afternoon I spent at her mercy. It was OK. It's not everyday I get the chance to play with a precious two and a half year old little girl. She and her toy lizard got stuck in the lizard's mouth (between my thighs as I sat on the couch). Later, upon her urging demand, I drew some lizards on her kiddie easel with chalk (she likes reptiles). It was pushing on 5:30 pm. I'd hardly eaten. This time when I walked away, she stood behind and played by herself...

My aunt is my dad's brother's wife. "Was I like this?!," I asked her. She answered with a story about our coming to America. Her family and mine made the trip from the motherland to the U.S. together. We traveled to Bucharest and made a stop in Rome on the way. In Bucharest apparently I nonchalantly took a pee. My aunt told my mom not to worry. We were going to America and nobody would ever see us again. (I guess it was kind of a hillbilly thing to do in the capital city.) In Rome it was really hot and there was no AC. It's funny because as I'm writing this the recollection of my uncle's version came to me and made sense. He would say to me, "Come on, you take her." I would take you sometimes my uncle told me, but you only wanted your dad to carry you.

Domesticity

2009-04-07T21:45:00.007-04:00

Since arriving to Michigan, my experience has consciously resounded with the opening pages of En La Recherche du Temps Perdu (In Search of Lost Time) by Marcel Proust. It's one of the first and last works of fiction I began to read as a choice, outside of having to that is. I stopped there and never forgot it; realizing its reverence. His recounting of the experience of time and space resonated with the moving and settling into my paternal cousin and his wife's home in southern Michigan; between the first awakening from sleep into my new surroundings as well as the sounds, feelings and adaptation to it.

The first evening I stepped on and nearly tripped over the dog as I walked out of the bathroom, adjacent to the basement which now houses my bed and belongings, and into the blackness of the kitchen in the night. It was making my way up the stairs and into the kitchen the next morning that I found myself stepping on a dinosaur. Their two and half year old asked me to draw a brachiosaurus. I drew a cat's face to improvise. She didn't like it... She calls me Dan Ela. Their one year old son laughs when I laugh.

She said angrily, "She's not there" looking out of the living room window for me after I had gone, and her mother told her I went, for a walk. It felt like stepping into another time zone. The houses were built in the 1950's. I imagine the times as I look at them like people watch people. I think of it as house watching. I look with the same fascination and curiosity, wishing I had a camera to record and then thinking at the same time that it would ruin it. Ruin in the sense of obscure the experience. Sometimes I think the same of writing. Perhaps there is, no, there is. There is definitely something that transcends the material to communicate, express and articulate. Feelings. I think that's what it is.

I know that's why some people can have greater empathy than others. You can know how a person feels or must have felt. There was a schoolmate who shot himself in the head, recently. I can fully comprehend his state of mind. The destitution - the bleak terrain when the light of hope has been extinguished - is the point of no return. It breaks my heart because I've been there. Except that the darn light wouldn't go out. The smidgen kept me alive.

No, He did more than keep me breathing. It took more than that. I couldn't live that way either. Revenge is the inexhaustible fuel that drives this being to healing, and satiates its need for purpose with joy. I saw him laying in the casket. There was a woman knelt down weeping next to him when I walked into the room full of people sitting down watching, just watching. Some were talking. I saw two schoolmates I hadn't seen since high school. I looked at them. They looked at me. I turned around, signed my name in a book, and left.

The writing blues

2009-04-05T21:19:00.005-04:00

I'm in Michigan...

It was the first time embarking on the road trip, from Connecticut, at 2:30 AM.

It feels somewhat surreal. But life continuously seems to more and more while at the same time simultaneously becoming acutely real.

There has been so much I want to say, I had to break the ice of the reticence with this, at least, here bit.

All is well, very well; and tremendously interesting and intense...

monday - yesterday, today; Day is the same

2009-03-24T19:26:00.013-04:00

My friend Pete is the closest I come to calling a man one (because I tend to agree with Harry in "When Harry Met Sally"). I stopped by his work after the photo shoot. It's a bike shop in Manhattan's Lower East Side. We went to another bike shop, he works at, in Brooklyn. I really wanted to stay in Manhattan. But I'm glad we went there instead.

The energy was really nice. I had fun. There was one girl who brought her bike in to get fixed, the rest were guys who, along with her, all knew eachother. I couldn't tell who worked there actually. They all kind of were while hanging out at the same time. It's like that.

Her and I got a lesson on bikes: tires 101. I never knew there's a balloon like tube inside a tire. "It's like sausage," I said; the intestines inside the casing. Then someone made a reference to chitlins which I really appreciated, because I thought... it was really - funny. I bet Scott, the ultra cool owner, will never look at a tire the same way. I liked him, and all of Pete's friends, right away. I guess it makes sense.

call it what you will

2009-03-22T21:10:00.003-04:00

Untitled

Stand firm little girl
You know the drill

I needed her
Tomorrow she said, I hope you're OK
I called to ask his advice
He didn't call me back
I wanted to bring him a pie
He hung up the phone on me

I remember when they stood and watched
A 23 year old woman beat me
Break my nose when I was 13
My whole circle of friends
31 now not a lot has changed
Except the drill's been perfected

You still get your hopes up
Like you don't know better
Silly, silly girl
It's what I hate about you
You wear your heart on your sleeve
Like an idiot

And you'll keep doing it
The perfection
Is you know better
Than self destruction
For this I love you
I love you

rant on love; out of love

2009-03-22T11:11:00.003-04:00

A jealous soul tormented by its own unhappiness, the woman I wrote of yesterday, is still under my skin by her monstrous manifestation at the slightest provocation when I hurried her along with the funny story I was forcing myself to listen to out of sympathy, rather than sincere desire. Stuck between a rock and a hard place, I was. My head was bound to be bitten off either way; whether I listened or not. Because I'm not good at faking, and telling her the reason I had no interest was opening a can of worms. The can of worms didn't need to be opened to know the contents.

It's so revealing when people attack. This is the irony and a liberating secret for all of you to know when you are being so. Notice how the words the person speaks, when you are being attacked, are for their very own actions. It's amazing. You can avoid a lot of emotional pain and discord by being aware of this. Although, like I said, I'm still a bit shaken. It's a hard thing to bear. Perhaps it was unnecessary to allow her to spew her own self hatred on me for as long as I did - able to be unmoved by my awareness of it. I'm still learning. Relationships are difficult. But this realization has been tremendously helpful to me in avoiding confrontations and remaining unscathed by, inevitable, attacks in human relations.

She has no happiness with or within herself. Her relationships are based on need; because she can't be alone. But she spews on those she hangs with behind each and everyone of their backs. It's a miserable existence. One I sympathize with while trying to protect myself from it. We're not made of stone. We're a bundle of nerves, electrical impulses, hormones and chemicals. It's impossible not to be effected by our surroundings and circumstances. In my experience, my body became more sensitive and acute to feeling and, consequently, reacting to the scientific fact of the physical matter negativity (directed at me) contains. A dichotomy indeed. Happiness, thus, in my experience is a state of mind - a personal choice for me made easier by the ability to love. Because love on the other hand is a virtue; one that sustains me in hell. The ability to love is my happiness amidst inevitable suffering in this world.

It is the liberation from the relentless dynamic of give and take in relationship for the ever-present need of personal emotional fulfillment. The implications of the ability to love unconditionally and give are vast and priceless. I guess it's also why I find it weird to make money in a way. I would do everything for free. It makes me happy to make others happy. But most people think of sex and money in human dealings - because these are the primary means of emotional fulfillment. The belly and the heart are the organs dominating our emotions. Although the ability to love unconditionally is when the heart is liberated from the dominance of the sexual organs aka circumcision of the heart.

Life becomes so much more fulfilling when you are able to be sincere - when you are able to care for others like you do yourself or your spouse whom you wouldn't love if you didn't have intimate relations with. Try your love. I hope it is true. I have yet to share it with a man, romantically. But my knowledge of it protects me from the illusion so many people fall for and cooperate with. Don't divorce your spouse by all means. But if you are single or married, and unhappy, FACE THE TRUTH (as per March 20, 2009's posting).

Attacked to No Avail

2009-03-21T16:30:00.005-04:00

She comes over today wanting to tell me a funny story. I had no desire to listen to it after she attacked me last weekend when she was here. But I made an effort to listen out of sympathy for her emotional depravity. Unable to hide my reluctance, she attacked me again upon her disappointment. I brought up the incident over the weekend that left me uninterested to listen to her story. In return, she defended her insulting remarks; the reason I hadn't tried to resolve the hurt in the first place.

I was wrong, according to the bystanders, because I should have listened to her story. The insulting remarks were not insults, but rather the truth; I don't work. It wasn't an insult. She was right. The bystanders were upset with me that I didn't want to listen to her funny story because of their sympathy for the emotional depravity, to say the least, they too are well aware of. My feelings didn't count last weekend because I am healthy. She can insult me. Moreover, her insults are defended.

I don't work because I'm not earning money. This is the consensus. The 55k she makes a year is work. In the meantime she is full of bitterness, resentment, cursing and misery. Her 55k puts food in her stomach and a roof over her head. My life's work, which doesn't start at 9 and end at 5, is to provide for her emotional depravity. I do this through various forms of art; visual, literary and one on one when the opportunity presents itself. Work that apparently has no value - but people spend money on self help books and various other forms of healing arts. I guess I have to become a better business person and charge money for the work I freely do and give; because it's how I received it. I preferred to make money in a conventional job then do that. But that's a whole other story...

In the meantime, I find it interesting how she attacks my financial insufficiency. Whereas I work to provide support where her need is equally acute as the roof over her head and food in her belly. The serious problems she causes for herself and those who care about her, for the lack of emotional fulfillment and stability, are far less serious than my inability to provide for my own roof over my head and food in my belly - to those same people burdened by her vile disposition and behavior.

Value... The death grip of fear is the cause of the shallowness.

"Face the truth"...

2009-03-20T18:15:00.011-04:00

My anger resurfaced into tears, when I read about the recent indictment in the Austrian cellar case, today. In my time, no story impacted me as deeply or left me traumatized as I was when I first read about the horrendous atrocity suffered and endured by Elisabeth Fritzl; and her children.

Moved, I find utility being so, by the fierce desire to express the hard fact few people I think realize. Inundated by misconceptions, twisted interpretations, most people think of and/or are at least familiar with the idea of heaven and hell as places you go when you die - depending on whether you've been good or bad.

My question to you is how much further do you need to look - either to believe there is such a thing as hell or to think it's in some obscure place?

In yesterday's post I wrote about my recent acquaintance with a man who, although he refused to tell me his age, my mother and I both feel he must be in his 90's since he resembles my 91 year old grandfather. We were both equally shocked and disturbed by the thoughts that crossed his mind in his dealings with me. I said to her you would think at his age... She said, "It doesn't stop until they're six feet under."

It's true. The lesser known fact however is in the possibility of going to heaven before you're six feet under. Men and women can be liberated from the shame of our natural existence. What shame? The shame tucked, stored and justified away often times with a smile on the face. This is unless the spotlight of the justice system causes you to hide your face, as you may see Josef Fritzl doing here: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/us_world/2009/03/17/2009-03-17_incest_dad_trial_day_2_jurors_watch_vide.html

This was the part the article on the face, as interesting as it is, doesn't mention. In other words, what does hiding your face reveal about your personality?
Face the truth: How your features reveal your personality

So you show your face...

You may see and read in the link below Josef Fritzl no longer hid his face, after watching the video taped testimony of his daughter, in court, a couple of days into the trial. It was also upon listening to her "heart wrenching" testimony that he confessed to the charges. It seems there was no sense for him to try to hide anymore; not even beneath a blue binder.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/us_world/2009/03/18/2009-03-18_austria_dungeon_incest_dad_josef_fritzl_.html

The justice system some imagine encountering in heaven where God sits on a throne with a long white beard and a sceptre in his hand is different than ours. Besides the obvious (I hope), it's that it cures - spotlight or no spotlight. There is another light:

John 3:17-20
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son.

This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.

Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.

Insanity

2009-03-19T21:18:00.016-04:00

Hit, this week, by a hard blow of insanity culminating over years, I am driven to communicate; the utility of and solace I find in an unceasing, exceedingly torturous, personal experience.

It began with the, very well possible, last conversation I had with an ex-boyfriend who phoned me recently. I'm reluctant to even call him that because the relationship was really more just a flirty, short-lived friendship. Although after 9 years of being continuously phoned by him, he became more of an obsessive stalker. It got to the point that I made a police report somewhat recently. It didn't stop him from calling me. This last time, I decided I would confront him by making myself available to talk.

He told me he just wanted to be able to talk with me. He reiterated how difficult it was for him to express how much he loved me. Feeling, as if it were, sorry for himself he told me (again) I was the only person that talked to him about life, the world, the Bible. It struck me, and I told him, that it seemed useless since he is still in such an unhealthy state of mind. But curiously after all these years, and repetitious dialogue between us, it wasn't the absence of the talks that tortured him. It came as an epiphany and the reason why I said it could well be the last time he ever tries to make contact with me again. "Did you love me," he asked. "Tell me the truth," he said. I had to think for a moment. The answer was no and yes and, I wasn't going to lie. "No," I said. "Fair enough," he responded and apologized for bothering me.

Of course I loved him, like I do the 90 or so year old man I recently met, like I did the students in the schools where I worked, like I do all people. Herein lies the insanity. The reason it wasn't a lie was because I spoke to him in his language. If I would have said yes, he would have misinterpreted my love to mean something other than what it is, still.

Love is not a feeling. Its expression is sacrifice. My understanding, personally, changed instantaneously upon the knowledge of it. What is it then? A person actually. Who? Christ Jesus. How? Through the operation of faith in a specific and at a unique moment in my life when I was unprecedently real about myself. When? In the middle of the night at the age of 19. Where? West Palm Beach, Florida during my first semester of college. Yes, I was evil - I had done wrong - many wrongs. It was the truth I had lived with, hid and justified by comparing myself to other people; among other ways of living with the darkness of the past, that was present, in that particular life altering moment in time.

My understanding of love prior to that was my "first love" - my high school boyfriend. There is a reciprocal nature to love. The "stalker" loved me because I loved him. But now he, as difficult as it was for him to express the deep love he had for me, no longer does because he thinks I didn't love him. He will most likely still appreciate my care for him. But the obsession has ceased. While his need for love together with his unhappiness in life remains. Funny, isn't it? (not at all actually) Meanwhile, my love for him remains as it always has; unconditionally - as I am loved.

The 90 or so year old man I mentioned was somewhat of a shocker because like my mom said (because she met him), "You cared for him like you do your grandfather - you feel like you want to open the door for him." Widowed, it seems to me he wants to experience himself like the bachelor he never did. He made mention of "variety"... In the few times we got together and several unsuccessful attempts to learn more about my "romantic" life, he gave me an article he thought was so very interesting and that I should read. I gave it a quick glance to come across the words: women, sex toys and sexual pleasure. It was the last straw before I finally and cathartically gave him a piece of my mind...

Age really does not matter. I never thought it did. The only hope for dignified dealings was in the perhaps hormonal aspect the age represents. The dignified dealings were work related... But it seems he can really care less about helping me, and the others who would benefit from what I want to do between my art work and the website I'm working to create, with what he can. It's so much more rewarding, it truly is, to be emotionally fulfilled and liberated to see, and relate, humanely. This is the force driving the goodness men, in my experience, misinterpret and latch onto instead of realizing it for themselves... UGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! (I actually can't express that enough.)

My hope is to meet a like-minded man to be my husband and spokesperson for the opposite sex. I'd like to be able to say, "OK, you would like to speak with me, here, talk with my husband." Seriously. I'm really suffering with this. Help.

Showing

2009-03-14T02:05:00.004-04:00

It's 2am, but, I've just recently awoken. I laid down this afternoon after working nearly eighteen hours and sleeping for four to prepare for a successful day; just as I had anticipated. The work was to put the finishing touches on my latest piece. Together with the touches I began to add to it this week, I've worked on it for nearly a year.

This isn't taking into consideration the amount of time the piece was consciously formulating within me. It's a precious time in the making of art; like the unknown, obscurity of a being before its entry into the world. The first moment of contact (which I clearly remember ) is like the moment of conception. The fetus begins to take shape into the image of the artist. The entire process of creation, though I have yet to experience as a woman, I imagine, is equally grueling and exciting.

The driving force is love. Love for what? Well, I will tell you - as an artist. In the offering of the meaning of the finished piece for humanity. More so, rather, than the aesthetic of the physical aspect which must satisfy my personal standards. The same can be said, and I do, of my writing - since my art is a visual expression of it. Last night, a friend suggested to pretend I'm working on it for myself to ease the pressure of making it presentable for someone else. I am, I thought.

Well the man who came to take a look at it isn't an art enthusiast. I knew this. This was the reason I was so excited for him to see it; because I anticipated he was going to like it. I was wrong (though thrilled at the unexpected) when the painting I slaved over night and day for two whole weeks for my grandmother, to cheer her up in my absence and longing to see me, ended up being the admiration of my grandfather. But I was right about the feeling I had with this work and the person who came to see it.

He's an extremely intelligent and successfully retired man from the Orient whose particular taste gravitates, mildly as it is, towards oriental art. Believe me when I tell you I can discern between genuine admiration and flattery. He was very grateful for the opportunity to see it and to discuss my art with me. It was indeed his favorite piece; just as I had suspected and anticipated.

the happiness poll

2009-03-11T14:14:00.010-04:00

It's not just about physical health, said Eric Nielsen, a spokesman for Gallup. It's about their ability to contribute at work and be more productive, and it's about feeling engaged in a community and wanting to improve that community.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090311/ap_on_re_us/states_of_happiness

Yesterday I had one of those invaluable Facebook moments of reconnecting with an old friend I hadn't spoken to in years! He asked me what I've been up to. "Art," I said. "Lucky you," he replied." So then I said, "I don't know if I'd call it luck." He came back after a moment and said, "True, blessed perhaps. I actually don't even believe in luck." I wanted to make sure to recount the conversation word for word, so methodical me went back and looked (one of the nice features on Facebook).

So on going from being lucky to blessed... It seems to me the initial interpretation of my life's work as lucky is from the seeming appearance that I am doing what I want and, not only that but, something I enjoy. Perhaps, for this reason, maybe even taking it easy.

I'm currently working on putting the finishing touches on a piece before I publish the website I've been working on to showcase my art work with the hope, and need, to make an income at it. I will endeavor to be concise, since now I am in a race to pay my auto insurance (my cell phone has already been disconnected).

I know there are people reading this who don't need an explanation. But for many, including my dear mother, the need to explain is ever-present. Although I've resorted, more recently, to assuring her that I would explain by showing rather than verbalizing (repeatedly) the logic to my unconventional way of life.

By showing I anticipate the day when she will see the fruition of my activity over the last, well since I graduated from New York University in 2004 in particular. Because I have yet to establish my independence at an age when it's expected; and with the credentials to do so. While the time since has been extremely productive for me, it seemingly couldn't be further from for the lack of funds to show for it. We do esteem worth and measure value by material goods because they indicate hard work, perseverance, dedication - virtues rightly to be esteemed.

So, for some, my worth and the value I produce will be esteemed when I am paid. Although I am and have been by those who appreciate me. My work is an extension of myself. Myself is an extension of my faith; a blessing indeed, though not a choice. Conventional? It couldn't be further from it. Easy? Ditto. Fun? Sometimes.

I am thrilled for example at the thought of launching the website I have introduced and can be viewed at http://www.humaneresoarces.com/. This is because as the spokesman, Eric Nielsen (from the company that conducted the happiness poll), said about the criteria incorporated in determining the happiest US states:

It's about their ability to contribute at work and be more productive, and it's about feeling engaged in a community and wanting to improve that community.

Right now it seems my cousin's daughter, a brilliant and bright 18 year old computer science major, is going to help along. She is an example of the concept I'm working to broaden. She has offered to help for free. I will compensate her - with money I hope to make from the selling of my art work. Though she will gain more.

We grow as we work together; and rise to the high calling of our President to work together with him at rebuilding America. We introduce each other to people we know. We encounter possibilities, generate ideas, foster support and create communities that in turn shape society as we commonly desire it to be. It's a time to take back the land and not only rebuild America but reshape it with the higher consciousness this last election demonstrated on behalf of our generation. Quantity perhaps may become a lesser measure of value as we taste the goodness of contribution to our community; a blessing in disguise in dire times.

happy

2009-03-09T17:53:00.001-04:00

I love Brandon; the one and only follower on my blog

2009-03-08T11:42:00.006-04:00

An excerpt of dialogue between he and I on Facebook:

He wrote:
I'm just curious...
Between You and Brandon Phillips

Brandon Phillips
March 6 at 11:23pm
Does it ever get tiring analyzing life, faith, love, respect, etc. so much? There was a time in my life that I really tried to make sense of it all but the older I get, the more I try to accept, love and just be happy. I love and appreciate your insight, I really do, however, I know things weren't too easy growing up for either of us and there just seems to be A LOT to your words. A lot maybe from the past? An attempt to make sense of it all? I don't know. You've always been a very deep person, a person that I've appreciated knowing but D, it's been a long week and I just want to go to the beach, enjoy the people around me and accept that the world isn't perfect, nor are people and that it's alright that way. Feedback??

Brandon Phillips
March 6 at 11:31pm
And here's a glass of wine to relax with. Enjoy it with me.

(There was an image of a glass of red wine along with this message.)

Daniela Boata
March 7 at 3:45pm
hahaha
It WAS tiring to analyze; not because I twisted my brain to try to understand the subjects you mentioned but, rather, becoming the understanding I now communicate. And this doesn't get tiring. In fact it's my joy in life. Thank you for the feedback. Enjoy the beach. The glass of wine - thanks for the gesture. But I'm relaxed as I am. I wish you and others could enjoy my relaxation with me. Hence my endless drive and joy to communicate what I've learned, realized and live.

work

2009-03-07T11:22:00.003-05:00

The last several weeks have been wonderfully eventful with the emergence of HumaneREsoArCES (you may find a link to it on the right under My Website) and currently the development of a site to showcase my artwork.

It seems the professional help to develop HumaneREsoArCES is on the way. The two brothers working in IT seem to be unavailable to assist me further. So I've been busy working away at creating a website to function as a showcase of my artwork for the purpose I created the works in the first place: to share. It will also serve as a portfolio to present to galleries when the time comes. I have first to finish several pieces. The delay has been in the lack of space to create.

However with the encouragement of a longtime friend and fellow artist, Pete Pezzimenti, whose work is currently on exhibition in New York City and can be viewed online, I set up my easel in my tiny room. My artwork and supplies have been in storage here at my parents' house since I was forced, for financial reasons, to give up my Manhattan studio. It was a wonderful space - the kind personally conducive to creating visual art. (Thus it functioned in part as my art studio.)

I couldn't be happier, presently, surrounded by my artwork. It was necessary to take all of it out to photograph. I'll be able to start putting the finishing touches on the several unfinished pieces as soon as I get the website, of presentable pieces, up and ready; to add the works in progress when the time comes.

I look forward to being able to share them with you soon!

How to Get Ahead

2009-03-04T12:05:00.006-05:00

I'm on my way to pick up my frame. A little while ago I brought my custom framed diploma to the shop where I'd purchased it. There was a piece of wood missing from the bottom edge. I noticed it when I rearranged my room. It had literally been hanging on my wall; I was certain I didn't do it.

This was the second time damage to the frame was noticed. The first was by the salesperson who had assisted me. I brought it in shortly after picking it up to discuss the coloring of the matte against the diploma. He noticed a little hole and told me they could touch it up. Well this time when I brought it in the salesperson, reluctant to even consider the damage, pointed out all these little scratches I'd never even noticed.

I was convinced, at that point, the frame wasn't the best quality to start. It seemed it may have been from a bad batch. Getting it touched up again just didn't seem fair or acceptable. I spent a lot of money (custom framing is expensive to begin with). And because it was something important to me, I preferred to spend more for the quality of the the particular frame I chose.

They told me the company would not so much as look at or even consider doing anything with the frame after 12 months, saying they deal with them all the time and telling me how there was no chance, etc. I told them I believe in honesty and wanted to try.

So I wrote a little note explaining everything I pretty much just did here to send along with the frame. A week went by and I received a call from the salesperson at the shop. He told me the company was going to replace the frame for me. He exclaimed how surprised he was. I told him, "Let this be a testament of honesty." The company could have just as well denied the request. In that case, I would have still gotten ahead. You can't lose with honesty. Setbacks are only subjective. But for the person or company who gets ahead dishonestly the setbacks are real.

I was driving home with my cruise control set to the speed limit. Two cops passed me by and each time I felt so good. It's the same idea. I think the "internal critic, the fear that likes to dress up and parade around like rational hesitation" from the previous day's post, titled #76, is the same thing. On a daily basis it translates to living in fear - aka rational hesitation, or better yet, the devil's advocate. You have nothing to fear if you're not breaking the law; whether man's or God's. You may not believe God, in Christ - his work, but if you fear it's because you are breaking one or the other. And the peace and freedom that comes along with obeying man's law is similar to the experience of being liberated from the unseen fear living within the hearts and minds of men and women.

#76

2009-03-02T15:45:00.009-05:00

"The Way I SEE It #76"

(printed on the cup of my so so caramel machiatto from Starbucks)

The irony of commitment is that it's deeply liberating - in work, in play, in love. The act frees you from the tyranny of your internal critic, from the fear that likes to dress itself up and parade around as rational hesitation. To commit is to remove your head as the barrier to your life.

-- Anne Morriss

Starbucks customer from New York City. She describes herself as an "organization builder, restless American citizen, optimist."

So true! In my experience, however, my faith is the one commitment that allows for the liberation in work, play and love.

Love is the only force greater than fear. It is the power that overcame it, isn't it? Christ.

Faith is not blind optimism, but the "substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen (Hebrews 11:1)." The knowledge of the unseen love which works by faith manifests itself in my liberation to commit. I am clearly a different person as a result; particularly to those who've known me for a long time. I know all about the internal critic, the fear that used to "parade around as rational hesitation." Ahhhhhhhh the liberation indeed! I can't express it enough or thank God enough for it!

Angry

2009-03-01T12:29:00.008-05:00

Listening to Her Cry

He got his rocks off
And walked away not caring, if knowing
His insatiable thirst killed
Temporarily filled

When she cried to me this morning
I wished I could perform what she needs
She doesn't even realize
The reason she cries

I'm so tired, I'm so tired, I'm just so tired
She repeated at the first
But sympathized with the pain of another
When I blew her cover...

She's in so much pain, you don't understand
I could
You're talking about yourself
So I listened as she revealed it to herself

You there she would ask
Yes I said, as she asked for help
Listening to her cry
I prayed inside

It kills me
Because I've been there
And I know the way out
I too was once without

There is a power
To break the vicious cycle
Of hurting yourself more
Pain is an endless chore

Some manage better
For one reason or another
And carry on appearing fine
But hide it all the time

Unable to see her need
They call her disgusting and crap
Because they manage better
But are they better?

I don't care about getting my money back
The man in the movie said
I want my family
But it was her family

You see I said
You see he said
Paper doesn't grow food
Or buy the knowledge of the good

Love is not a feeling
Its expression is sacrifice, cowards
Man does not live by bread alone
And never has to be alone

Finally!!

2009-02-28T21:36:00.003-05:00

Hello everyone!

I am super pleased to introduce, briefly, (because I must take a hiatus from my computer - if I can manage...) the preliminary manifestation of a project I have long been nurturing, talking and thinking about doing.

Well, with some basic information on starting a website from two brothers working in the IT industry, I surprised myself and created the "holder page" you will see by visiting the site:

http://www.humaneresoarces.com/

"Unemployed" with no financial resources my dream seemed far from being realized. I took a leap of faith and posted my need for a tech person on Facebook. One of the brothers, just weeks from getting married, responded to my plea for help. It is one of the many blessings of sharing another cultural identity. We help each other out. His brother, living in another state as well, gladly became involved. It couldn't have worked out any better. It took two people between their busy lives and modern technology to point me in the right direction. I am eternally grateful...

I desperately preferred to sit next to one of them and explain what I wanted. In part because I couldn't wait for it to get done and partly because of the intimidating territory. The mere sight of script code is painfully overwhelming... But I'm feeling the kind of sense of accomplishment that comes along having tread the scary unknown to come out competent.

yay!!

So, about that hiatus... I look forward to hearing from you. There is a place where you may subscribe for information while the site is under construction. I couldn't wait; like this I'll be able to introduce it before it's ready. But you should already be able to get an idea of what it's about from the holder page.

yay, yaaaay!

Daniela

the FULLNESS of art....

2009-02-26T10:19:00.007-05:00

"Subject: dunno

Post this if you want. It's not all that impressive. But it speaks volumes about my life... I'm sorry if it sounded like I was mad at you for posting what I said. I wrote this tonight... "

(This is from the young man, a former schoolmate, who sent me his feedback in the February 21, 2009 posting called "solicited feedback." )

Another silver bullet passes through the cloud of smoke.

It hits just where I aimed.

The pain fades while laughing at me.

It knows I only killed it tonight.

Like a nightmare I can never stop waking up into

I am another step down the ladder everytime I wake up

Everything I love and care about is destroyed

My nightmares were never dreams.

A cruel trick played on a weak soul.

Choosing never to face all the good.

Responsible for everything, but incapable of loving.

I leave pain in my wake as I stumble through this life.

Fear me, run, don’t speak to me.

I know only how to be scared, and lash out.

My heart cannot trust.

I can not be fair and understanding.

If I make you happy in time I will hurt you.

Far more than I made you smile I will make you cry.

I don’t want to, but I am black inside.

I take comfort in nothing but your misplaced pity in me.

I speak my ridiculous pain from years of living with it.

Obviously one day I will meet the fate I deserve.

I have never wanted to reap the pain I have chosen through my actions.

But as a problem in so many lives I can’t avoid it.

Looking back I know I can’t ever fix even half of what I have done.

I know no other way to live.

Everything is a lie I wish was true.

I know I do wrong, I just won’t fix it.

Never luck, never a lack of kindness from others.

It’s always been just me

The icy path I walk is just my choice.

Too weak and stubborn to look into the light that has always been there.

Thank you for sharing this with me. It's impressive; not only aesthetically but most importantly, to me, in your honest articulation of yourself and your life experience. Few people have the courage to admit the feelings you eloquently expressed. Though everyone, myself included, can relate; to greater or lesser degree. The greater the degree the greater the hope. Here I am speaking from experience. Your capacity to feel is your strength. The last sentence demonstrates this; by the sense you have to recognize what you stated.

Thank you for and I accept your apology. Though, again, I was able to understand and didn't hold it against you. Moreover I sincerely appreciated the time you took to share your extensive feedback on my poem with me. Thank you for sharing yours with me! God bless

animal nature

2009-02-24T17:28:00.012-05:00

White Bengal Tiger
http://http//whozoo.org/students/deechh/bengal.htm

Celebes Monkey

Sexual
Presenting: Usually done with the female standing normally on all fours with its swollen genital area oriented towards the male and slightly raised
http://www.lpzoo.org/ethograms/FRMS/menus/newworldmenu/celebas2.htm

I stumbled upon the video, in the link below, through clicking on a gymnast which led me to a site called Chickipedia. Who knew? Well I'm sure many; as for myself I was clueless such a site existed. However, I was intrigued by the figure of the woman you will see in a video I discovered of her dancing (she is a backup dancer in Brazil). I love the movement, rhythm and feeling of dance. Latinos especially move in a way I've envied ever since I went dancing with my Venezuelan roommate on a trip to her home in Caracas during our spring break in college.

The dance in the video wasn't quite what I expected... I read through some of the comments; posted by men primarily. I'm sensitive to vulgar language and warn those who may be as well. I didn't appreciate the negative comments made about her figure, amongst others...

There was one comment I did like however. One guy said:

"The kid on the efin right makes the video."

I know his language didn't offend me in part because he literally wrote "efin" and, in part, because he was undaunted by this woman's mating call.

These boys, yet to become the fullness of testosterone, are able to look at this woman unlike the men who posted their comments. I wanted, but didn't, to post a comment myself. In it I would have said:

"I have yet to read, and would appreciate, the thoughts of a gentleman."

I see nakedness. Does anyone else?

And now, brace yourselves, for the Brazilian Booty Shaking in Front of Kids video:

http://www.break.com/index/brazillian-booty-shaking-in-front-of-kids.html

solicited feedback

2009-02-21T03:25:00.022-05:00

One of the nice things about growing up in a small town is the community I now have the opportunity and pleasure to connect with through Facebook. A lot of us go back as far as second grade (because that's when my family moved, from Texas, to Michigan). People add each other as friends now whether or not they hung out together or were in different grades. It's a very nice thing to experience. Such is the case with the young man, a former schoolmate, who sent me the feedback you are about to read. We chatted for the first time since becoming friends on Facebook last night. He referred to a guy, we both knew, as a "strange cat." I didn't appreciate the way he was talking about him. I asked, "Aren't we all?" He said yes that we all have our "oddities" but that we only reveal them to our closest friends. I told him I could see them regardless. He was very curious to know how. So I referred him to my blog and solicited his feedback. He sent it to me on Facebook and asked me to respond in return. I thought I'd take the opportunity and do so on here.

The right columned self-bio is a little bit difficult to read, however I like your interest in poetry. The lack of words to change between topics and times in your life throws me and forces me to re-read, which I find clever. But upon reflection I want to ask if you got your degree in “passion” because that is how it reads. Furthermore “art” is not a faith. Unless you mean to say you believe in art. Perhaps I’m holding the word “faith” to mean something other than you do. I may be analizing too much into your cover main page, but it reads like an attempt at poetry that should have deeper meaning, but is lost because of crossed metaphors, similes and ideas. Sometimes people can pull those off if at the end of the written composition things all come together, but I can’t say I was impressed by how you pulled it together at the end. No offense honestly but, there were several areas you needed commas, a couple words to ellaborate, and often just plain and simply to word things better…What I like about what I have just said, is hope… I’m guessing you will think me a simpleton. I’m sure you will find my words simplistic and my opinions stone-age in their understanding. I have never found art interesting, and I’m pretty sure I never will. Being a color-blind man it’s a world I learned I could never understand from a very young age. My understanding of the violin and my love for music I think save me from being what most would call a modern day savage. I love math, and I love the certainty of science, so I apologize for my cold opinion of your page. I do hope you take my opinions as grains of salt poured into an ocean . If I missed a deeper meaning in your words it is solely because I am by no means a student of what is your world, and I apologize. So you know I do like your writing though… this one was about Christ

It seems to me you are a student of my world; you recognized Christ as the subject of my poem. Would you agree there is a connection between faith and art then? Does "myself as the point of reference" at the end of my profile make sense now? My art is an expression of my faith, only because I am an expression of the faith.

Sorry to disappoint you in your hope. Your feedback doesn't cast you as a "simpleton" to me. You express your appreciation of poetry from the start and later your love of music. Then you elude to your love of math and science, casting yourself as a "modern day savage" and apologize for not being a student of my world. You seem frustrated rather. I can understand and relate to it. You love the certainty of science because it gives you immediate, reliable information and doesn't make you have to work, or wait, to know.

We must not limit our creative distinction among the creatures of the earth. Art, beyond its more obvious utilities, is a faculty to understand just as math and science. For this, its scope must be broadened to its rightful place.

The first step is to understand it as a process. In the song Amelia by Joni Mitchell, at the end of yesterday's post, "who are you??" she sings:

People will tell you where they've gone
They'll tell you where to go
But till you get there yourself you never really know

The process can be frustrating. Whether it's in becoming or creating. I can only say so much literally, and now metaphorically speaking, in my profile. (You're only given a certain amount of space.) It took years, for example, before I was able to understand some of the deeper teachings of the Apostle Paul. On a secular level, there are meanings that occur to me out of the blue, knowledge of words like the name of the drink V8 and, most recently, the Motley Crue album titled "Slippery When Wet." (I know, I'm slow - call me a modern day simpleton.)

OK so now on to the poem, Untitled, you rightfully equivocated with Christ.
(This was from my February 16, 2009 posting called The Walls Do Speak.)

What of our activities… Is of importance under the sun

We are children of him and what we do or chose not to do matters not

mmmmmm no, not really...

As the sun sets and rises… do our hearts still…:
time rolls but do our actions show his love, this isn’t about you, but christians as a whole…
This is about me and people as a whole actually.

The face of the earth has changed.. …rise and fall:
curious about this one… are you referring to your native country?
No. I'm referring to the industrialized world with all its progress and technological advances that make our lives easier. The rise and fall is referring to our emotions.

With all the nuances:
I’m holding to this word… because of it’s deeper meaning… Careful with your use of it… a nuance is only a suggestion of a possiblitly of something… Only that, never something you can touch… odd to put in with words like aches and aggravations… They are far too easy to understand and often to easy to see with the naked eye. ,aches and aggravations

...

As cabs blast their horns And my blood soars in foot traffic:
I fully understand all of this. You are explaining your humanity and your inability to not become angry and frustrated by all that surrounds you.
Yes, and particularly in New York City. I was living in Midtown Manhattan and walking to work four times a day (I prefered my feet to the various forms of transportation). It was about a half an hour walk one way in a very busy area. I worked in the morning and then again in the evening teaching English as a second language near the Empire State Building. Walking home in the afternoon was particularly aggravating when people were on their lunch break. The grind, the hustle and bustle made me question, not only what of our activities under the sun are of importance but, how many people even stop to wonder, in this profound reality, as they're out there hustling and bustling.

To share in this dream The drink:
As a fellow Christian we both know the drink… it is his blood
Yes, though symbolic, it is experience when drank literally. This is done in a correct understanding of worship.

The bitterness and the gall:
It has never been easy to be a Christian, to share his story with people who have no interest in hearing it and especially those will be angry with us for bothering them with it
In my experience this has been a small part; becoming the story to share has been 99% of the bitterness and gall.

The sweetness To rejoice in awakening:
I may not be the same denomination as you but we all know our death will be our awakaning into a better place with our savior.
This is the point of reference from which I write, now.
A denomination would be like someone coming in and teaching you the meaning of this poem. The problem would be if the person did not confer with me to understand - as we are doing right now. The author has given us his selfsame Spirit to discern. Identifying yourself with a denomination is already believing a false teacher. The Apostle Paul clearly admonished against people saying, "I am of Paul" or, "I am of Apollos"; remember?

And delight in the work of thine hand:
Could be taken two ways… First being doing the Lord’s work is upon you perhaps… I don’t know you well enough to know if you do that, I am pretty sure I don’t focuse enough on him. The other meaning I could take of it is you are referring to all that he does…
The second meaning is accurate. The first, I'll let you get to know me and decide. There is a third meaning. It really needs to be experienced. It's indescribable.

By thy unfathomable wisdom, courage and pain Wrought again in this broken vessel:
I’m hoping you solely meant Christ dying on the cross for us… The broken vessel was his human body. The wisdom was God and the courage and pain was his son our savior
I most certainly did mean that. You're absolutely right, the broken vessel was his human body. The wisdom was most certainly of God and the courage and pain of, his Son, our savior. My human body is no different except in gender. The selfsame Spirit wrought again, by and through faith, because of the work he did; in the broken vessel of my flesh (have endured a lot of pain).

Thine legacy the fire consuming the pollution:
The legacy was about to begin, a new religion… Christianity was born, you were speaking of what was starting, but as you wrote those words is now a legacy… The fire was Jesus’ battle with Satan. The pollution was what Satan had done to everyone’s souls before and after God sent us his Son to prove righeouness can be had through him…
I am speaking of what is happening, on a personal level. The fire is the Spirit sustaining and overcoming the battle with the flesh; the mind, and consequently the body, of Satan. He's not the red charicature with horns, a tail and pitchfork.

That decieved, broke and damaged Bones heart and mind:
Is all of us, every person born into this world, the worldly body we use for just a while, Jesus never worried about the vessel he used for what was a second in reality…
Oh he worried about it alright. He cherished it and kept it spotless. "So are men to love their wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it." This can refer to selfless love of a partner, particularly when our love is first and foremost of God; by the Spirit that gives us a heart to love him as well as the power to love others as ourselves. This is the entire sum of the Law.

Feel the strength familiar and new:
The strength is through the lord Jesus… I’m pushing to understand familiar, perhaps you mean the innocence of when we were children but new I know, as I am sure u feel forgiven when you admit your sins

You are right on target with this one. Except the "new" refers more to the strength ten, now twelve, years into the faith.

Unlike anything I ever knew :
True… None of us will ever be able to comprehend the happiness we will feel when we join him…
The future tense is so sad and frustrating to me... only because you share the faith. You are missing out in other words. We are joined to him if we live in the Spirit...

How good it is to rest in thee:
I’ll bet most don’t realize you mean in now… living in his teachings and working what you can do in this world is what you are talkin about. Making a better life for another, and even sometimes finding out how to make yourself better with him…
You are correct, I do mean now. Resting in his word, that doesn't change, that I can continuously count on in every moment and place. Though making a better life for another only as he makes me better; especially after I found out how.

To rest with thee:
You seperated these statements to mean dying with the love of Christ in your heart…
Wow, I love the way you phrased this. Although you mean physical death, this is something I can say is true and a correct understanding. "Dying with the love of Christ in my heart," I will add, is also the activity producing the peace in the rest I refer to.

To be awake:
This is the most beautiful part of your poem, as it suggests the best part of our life…
It is the best part, and in the time, of my life.

Thank you! I'm glad you chose this poem; for the knowledge of your faith, your appreciation of it and the time you took to share your feedback with me. It has been a pleasure to discuss it. Thank you for giving me the opportunity. God bless

who are you??

2009-02-20T17:58:00.007-05:00

l'identite

Discombobulation

Alteration

Fright

Lose your sight

Find yourself

by, Daniela Boata

Angie Muresan's current post, "truth based on memory," to her blog inspired this post (you may find a link to it in the column to the right). The words of l'identite (identity) immediately surfaced, gently, upon the comment I posted after reading it earlier today.

Amelia by Joni Mitchell seems to echo the question...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6d2RG2Rl64

"Miss" Pavel

2009-02-19T18:48:00.007-05:00

The following is a continuation of yesterday's post and the dialogue between myself and Gringoman in the comments section. This photo captures the recent, last and final attempt to...

I didn't fall quite so hard as David for Uriah's wife, "Miss Pavel". Instead the last two years have been an attempt to explain why I couldn't be with him, when contrary to my will, I did fall - in love with him. Contrary to my will because I was hoping to meet someone I wouldn't have to endure the arduous task of appearing as a nun while holding myself back from being together.

Water

2009-02-18T12:41:00.004-05:00

Selected poems from The Walls Do Speak, as introduced in the previous day's post, continued:

Patience tried
Heart entwined
Struggle with humanity
No place for me
I let someone in my heart
Finding solace in the pain
by, Daniela Boata

The divine voice of thunder makes me glad
As the sky breaks into rain
On this summer New York City night
And I await as trapped water in the air
Expanding to unknown limits and depths
Until the voice of thunder speaks
by, Daniela Boata

Surrounded by fear
Encounter bitterness, resentment, competition
Where can I find comfort
Just...
I find no comfort
All comforts are no comforts
Nor have been for me
Anymore
For years
I've lived without any except Thee
And all would be nothing without Thee
And so I wait
For the soothing ointment of Thine touch
To heal this heavy aching in my heart
by, Daniela Boata

The fall lures me too
I recognize
Deception
Temptation
Illusion
But your love always wins
Shows me the way
Fills my heart
I want what you give
The fullness
Let me be true
Let me not be deceived
Let me not dwell in falsehood
And I realize what it means to fall for Uriah's wife
I too fell for another man's wife
by, Daniela Boata

I miss Pavel
I miss Pavel so much
by, Daniela Boata

"The Walls Do Speak"

2009-02-16T17:41:00.005-05:00

The following is from a collection of poems written on the wall of my midtown Manhattan studio: The Walls Do Speak; April to October 2007.

Untitled

What of our activities

Is of importance under the sun

As the sun sets and rises

Do our hearts still...

The face of the earth has changed

...rise and fall

With all the nuances, aches and aggravations

As cabs blast their horns

And my blood soars in foot traffic

To share in this dream

The drink

The bitterness and the gall

The sweetness

To rejoice in awakening

And delight in the work of thine hand

By thy unfathomable wisdom, courage and pain

Wrought again in this broken vessel

Thine legacy the fire consuming the pollution

That deceived, broke and damaged

Bones and heart and mind

Feel the strength familiar and new

Unlike anything I ever knew

How good it is to rest in thee

To rest with thee

To be awake

by, Daniela Boata

Angie's blog

2009-02-14T14:52:00.003-05:00

One Response to “quotes i’ve been meaning to share”

Daniela Boata Says: February 11th, 2009 at 3:17 pm

If we cannot accept the importance of the world, which considers itself important, if in the midst of that world our laughter finds no echo, we have but one choice: to take the world as a whole and to make it the object of our game; and the game is the only thing of importance in a world without importance. Milan Kundera

This is certainly a perspective and conclusion people share and come to. It equally describes the mind of psychopaths and saints. The only difference is in the object, and enjoyment, of their game.

(The above was my response to one of the quotes Angie shared in her blog post titled accordingly; you may see several other quotes she included in this post on the link to her blog in the column to the right.)

"The Robber Bride"

2009-02-09T18:42:00.008-05:00

My friend sent me the following message today:

"I have a quote I'd like you to expand upon. Use it sometime in your blog (if you dare!!!) because I really want to know how you'd apply it. I read this line in The Robber Bride, by Margaret Atwood:

So if Jesus died on purpose, why was it the fault of the Jews?"

Well, my dear, I dare.

John 4:22
You give worship, but without knowledge of what you are worshipping: we give worship to what we have knowledge of: for salvation comes from the Jews.

Jesus spoke these words to a Samaritan woman (a Gentile). The death of Jesus was one in a series of events in the work God began with Abraham and his seed.

It was not the first time. The temple Solomon built in Jerusalem was destroyed by the Babylonians. The temple where Jesus stood, and said he would "raise it up in three days," had been rebuilt after Israel returned from 70 years of captivity in Babylon. It was destroyed for the second time in 70 AD by the Romans. The temple was rebuilt again.

Recall the words spoken by the prophet Isaiah:

This is what the LORD says: Heaven is my throne. The earth is my footstool. Where can you build a house or resting place for me? Isaiah 66:1

God had in mind to build himself a "house"; a temple - a place of worship. The building, destruction and rebuilding of the temple Solomon built in Jerusalem was of the Jews. How was the destruction of the Jews if it was by the Babylonians? It was the result of their disobedience. The building, destruction and rebuilding of the temple God built - Christ Jesus, was equally of the Jews.

Isaiah 53:5
But it was for our sins he was wounded, and for our evil doings he was crushed: he took the punishment by which we have peace, and by his wounds we are made well.

The rebuilding of the temple is essentially the rebuilding of Christ; beginning with his resurrected immortal body. The operation of the new Testament became by faith - believing in the word of God, for his seed to multiply.

John 12:24
I tell you the truth, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.

John 1:11-4
He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.
Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—
children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.

Mark 4:20
And these are they which are sown on good ground; such as hear the word, and receive it, and bring forth fruit, some thirtyfold, some sixty, and some an hundred.

The task to include the Gentiles into the once exclusive knowledge of God, from the giving and work of the Law to and by the Jews, was given by God to the apostle Paul. He wrote the following letter to the "seeds" he planted in Rome:

Romans 11:1-18
So I ask, has God left his people? No, he has not! I myself am a Jew. I was born in Abraham's family. I belong to the tribe of Benjamin.
God has not left his people whom he knew from the first. Do you not know what the holy writings say about the prophet Elijah? He talked to God against the people of Israel.
He said, `Lord, they have killed your prophets. They have pulled down your holy places. I am the only one that is left, and they are trying to kill me.'
But what did God answer him? He said, `I have seven thousand men who have not kneeled down to the idol god Baal.'
So now some are left because God was kind to them, and chose them.
But if it was a gift because he was kind to them, then it was no longer because of the things they did. Or else a gift would no longer be a gift.
So what does that mean? The Jews did not get what they tried to get. Only the people God chose got it. The hearts of the rest of the people became hard.
The holy writings say, `God made them dull with sleep. He gave them eyes that could not see, and ears that could not hear. They have been like that until today.'
And David said long ago, `May the table where they eat be like a net and like a trap. May it make them fall down. May it punish them.
Make their eyes become blind so that they cannot see. Make their backs bent all the time.'
So I ask, `Have their feet been caught so that they have really fallen down?' No. But because they began to fall, the people who are not Jews were told how to be saved. That would make the Jews jealous.
The people who are not Jews have been richly blessed because the Jews failed. So it will be even better for them when the Jews no longer fail God.
Now I say this to you who are not Jews. I am an apostle to those who are not Jews, so I think highly of the work I have been sent to do.
I want the people of my own nation, the Jews, to be jealous. Then I may be able to save some of them.
God turned away from the Jews in order to bring the world back to himself. Then if that is true, when he takes the Jews back to himself, will not that be like making dead people live?
If the first piece of bread is holy, so is all the rest which came from the same bread mix. If the root of a tree is holy, the branches are holy also.
Maybe some of the tree's branches were broken off. And you, a branch from a wild olive tree, were made to grow on the tree among the branches. You then have the good water that comes from the root of the olive tree.
But do not think that you are better than the tree's own branches. If you do, remember it is not you that holds the root in place. But it is the root that holds you.

Some, as you may see in the link below, ironically mourn the destruction of the temple at the wailing wall - the portion of the temple in Jerusalem that still stands. You may see a picture of this in the following link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Wall.

MYSTERY UNRAVELS

2009-02-08T13:40:00.006-05:00

"Dreams unwind
Love's a state of mind
Dreams unwind
Love's a state of mind"

Rhiannon

Stevie Nicks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3KIlPUCSwE

love IS a state of Mind

When the dream becomes the waking moment
The waking moment becomes the dream
-Daniela Boata

Look in the Mirror

2009-02-04T16:14:00.010-05:00

Remember the Child

I want a baby to hold
All day
I said on Sunday

"I love you"
I miss him
"I love you"

A child made his way into my lap
One day
Resting his head upon my breast

I held back the tears
As my heart broke and healed
I floated out of the building

The child was held
Like she'd needed to be
The circle of love complete

Remember the child
Remember the child

by, Daniela Boata

"Baby Can I Hold You"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjRo_CHSdt0

matter of the heart VS. matters of the heart

2009-02-02T18:06:00.009-05:00

"the past makes its presence known"

Men are irrelevant. Women are happy or unhappy, fulfilled or unfulfilled and it has nothing to do with men. (Fay Weldon)

Where to start is the problem, because nothing begins when it begins, and nothing’s over when it’s over, and everything needs a preface: a preface, a postscript, a chart of simultaneous events. (Margaret Atwood)

The link and quotations above are an excerpt from my friend Angie Muresan's latest post to her blog. What a great quote and equally excellent title to go along with the concepts presented. I'm grateful for the opportunity it's giving me to expand on this truth as it applies to, the quality of, our lives. Since relationships, no matter the kind, make all the difference.

I'd like to start by rephrasing the quote and say:

WOMEN are irrelevant. MEN are happy or unhappy, fulfilled or unfulfilled and it has nothing to do with WOMEN.

Where to start is the KEY, because nothing begins when it begins, and nothing's over when it's over, and everything needs a preface: a preface, a postscript, a chart of simultaneous events.

When we consider that life doesn't begin when a baby is born, or end when a person dies, we can evaluate more specifically the equally true statements made about men and women. This is because it makes us evaluate the matters of our heart in relation to the existence responsible for our existence. If our heart were only matter, it wouldn't matter. We would be as content to eat and mate as all other living creatures.

Since it isn't, it does matter. While my previous and several other posts I've written may seem irrelevant to this subject, for some people, they are actually intended for this very purpose: helping people know where to look, where to begin.

a Tree; of Life

2009-01-28T13:30:00.011-05:00

"If only denominations could let go of their feelings of supremacy and entitlement over others. But how do you get that across to people who think that they are right and you are wrong? If you say something you are defensive and if you say nothing you agree?"

I'm responding to this portion of a comment made to yesterday's post titled, "How Shall We Eat". It is a good question.

It's important, first of all, to distinguish between denominations and actual persons. Denominations exist within all of the world's major religions. In a nutshell, they are the thoughts and interpretations, of individuals, on the sacred books belonging to the various ones; the Tanakh, the Bible, the Qur'an (I'm specifically mentioning these since I've offered my insight on the tension in the Middle East in the post, written on January 22nd, called "Holy land").

So it is, and always will be, impossible for denominations to let go of their feeling of supremacy and entitlement over others because it is contrary to the nature of humanity. Religion is just one stage, of many, to observe the activity we're discussing. The family is another, along with politics and the work place to name a few.

"How do you get that across to people who think they are right and you are wrong?" The answer is, simply, to eat. "You are what you eat," the saying goes. It couldn't be more true. We are told Adam and Eve died after eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. We are likewise instructed to eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Lord (please refer to the previous day's post - this is in no way referring to cannibalism). Eating in this context demonstrates the act of two becoming one. The proof is in the fruit of the tree. Christ is the perfect picture. The fruit, of the seed, of Life; the Tree of Life.

The tree is a reoccurring symbol in the Bible. The Lord refers to himself as the "vine" in the New Testament. The utility of the tree as a symbol, for a person, is in the obvious manifestation of a physical tree.

Luke 6:44 (NIV-UK)
Each tree is recognised by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thorn-bushes, or grapes from briers.

However, it also assimilates us with the earth and processes of nature. Perspective is essential to understanding the meaning of the parabolic language God uses in his word. Thus Christ, the manifestation of the word, spoke in parables. The miracles he performed likewise are parabolic. They demonstrate the miracle of the manifestation of Life to be synonymous with life as it would be and was to the blind he caused to see, deaf to hear and lame to walk. All of these individual miracles are summed in the act he performed when he raised a man from the dead. The particular examples of miraculous works provide us with the knowledge of the phenomenal implications being risen from the dead would, and do, have.

Perspective in this sense is unnatural. These physical miracles were a picture of the parallel facets of Life. The perspective to understand his word and, ultimately, everything is the miracle of God; namely upon faith in the name of his Son.

John 12:24 (NIV- UK)
I tell you the truth, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.

The tree, as a symbol, also puts men and women in the same category; giving each the same entitlement. Entitlement to what? Life, unparalleled in worth, as the miracles described above produce upon conception. Conception of what? The seed.

Mark 4:2-9 (NIV-UK)
He taught them many things by parables, and in his teaching said:

Listen! A farmer went out to sow his seed.

As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up.

Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow.

But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root.

Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants, so that they did not bear grain.

Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, multiplying thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times.

Then Jesus said, He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

The soil is the earth; the heart of all that grows is it not? The "good soil" is the heart of a person who receives the word.

Romans 10:8-10 (NIV-UK)
But what does it say? The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart, that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming:

That if you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.

There is no supremacy, lastly, besides the vine's; since without the vine the branches couldn't live.

John 15:5 (NIV- UK)
I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

Upon becoming translated from death to Life, at the point of conception, God will teach and grow the seed he planted into an unmistakable tree - by his power, for his glory.

Mark 10:27 (NIV-UK)
Jesus looked at them and said, With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.

Sometimes seeds are naturally anxious to get their point across. The intricately woven, complex work of the word is simple to understand as the seed grows into a tree yielding leaves for medicine and fruit for hunger. Arguments should subside on one side if not both. It also makes for a far more powerful witness to persons still in question of the validity of the word. So the one and only way to, "get the truth across to people who would say that you are wrong and they are right," is to grow in its light, first and foremost. This is why the knowledge of how to eat is important. I am able to and do communicate more effectively now as a result.

Ezekiel:47:12 (NKJV)
Along the bank of the river, on this side and that, will grow all kinds of trees used for food; their leaves will not wither, and their fruit will not fail. They will bear fruit every month, because their water flows from the sanctuary. Their fruit will be for food, and their leaves for medicine.”

Scripture reference:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=john%2015:5;&version=64;

How Shall We Eat

2009-01-26T23:38:00.015-05:00

1 Thessalonians 5:17 (KJV)
Pray without ceasing.

Before you read the list of various translations of the Lord's prayer, on the link you will find below these passages, please try to keep the following scriptures in mind:

John 6:27-9, 51-8, 60-3 (NIV - UK)
27 Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval.

28 Then they asked him, What must we do to do the works God requires?

29 Jesus answered, The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.

51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live for ever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.

52 Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, How can this man give us his flesh to eat?

53 Jesus said to them, I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.

54 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.

55 For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink.

56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him.

57 Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me.

58 This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your forefathers ate manna and died, but he who feeds on this bread will live for ever.

60 On hearing it, many of his disciples said, This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?

61 Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them, Does this offend you?

62 What if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before!

63 The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life.

John 4:24 (NIV)
24God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."

Luke 12:22-4 (NIV)
22Then Jesus said to his disciples: "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear.

23Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes.

24Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds!

This is the link I mentioned with the various translations of the prayer the Lord taught his disciples when they asked him to teach them how to pray. The very last translation captures the point unlike any other; the understanding of bread (I once shared myself) as the kind we eat with peanut butter and jelly.
The Lord's Prayer

Let's consider now the most important element of the entire finished work of the Bible in its conclusion, and completion, with the spectacular New Testament:

Matthew 26:17-9, 26-8 (NIV)
17On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, "Where do you want us to make preparations for you to eat the Passover?"

18He replied, "Go into the city to a certain man and tell him, 'The Teacher says: My appointed time is near. I am going to celebrate the Passover with my disciples at your house.' "

19So the disciples did as Jesus had directed them and prepared the Passover.

26While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, "Take and eat; this is my body."

27Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you.

28This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.

First, for those versed in the Old Testament, keep in mind the Passover. There is important symbolism in the contents of the feast. It bears significant meaning and understanding of Christ as the Passover. I may and would be happy to expand on this but would like to end here, for now, with a question:

Where, in the following,

..."Take and eat; this is my body." ... "Drink from it, all of you...

does it say to do so symbolically?

We eat without ceasing, even when our bellies are full; we graze continuously like the cattle of the fields - considering it's what we work for. What and if we ate a shoe when our belly aches with pangs of hunger?

This is the equivalent of eating the communion, which in turn, dear readers, puts all denominations into the same category. The good news is the large variety of denominations within Christendom can no longer claim superiority over another. The bad news is the depravity, I personally experienced before I learned to eat, that plagues the faithful.

The implications of this vital misinterpretation are vast and many; a can of worms I'll leave closed for the time being.

The scripture quoted within this post was copied and pasted from:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%204%20;&version=64;

"God of our weary years, God of our silent tears"

2009-01-25T11:51:00.005-05:00

'THE NEGRO NATIONAL ANTHEM'

Lift every voice and sing

Till earth and heaven ring,

Ring with the harmonies of Liberty;

Let our rejoicing rise

High as the listening skies,

Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.

Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us,

Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us,

Facing the rising sun of our new day begun

Let us march on till victory is won.

Stony the road we trod,

Bitter the chastening rod,

Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;

Yet with a steady beat,Have not our weary feet

Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?

We have come over a way that with tears have been watered,

We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered,

Out from the gloomy past,

Till now we stand at last

Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.

God of our weary years,

God of our silent tears,

Thou who has brought us thus far on the way;

Thou who has by Thy might

Led us into the light,

Keep us forever in the path, we pray.

Lest our feet stray from the places,

Our God, where we met Thee;

Lest, our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee;

Shadowed beneath Thy hand,

May we forever stand.

True to our GOD,

True to our native land

James Weldon Johnson June 17, 1871 - June 26, 1938

"At last"

2009-01-25T11:19:00.003-05:00

Beyonce's performance, of one of my longtime favorite songs, portrays along with the parallel meaning - understood by the celebration of the epic inauguration and the experience captured in the words of the anthem above - the beauty and fullness of art this blog endeavors to present.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-pzlZPRvx8

Holy land?

2009-01-22T20:38:00.012-05:00

Galatians 4:21-31 (KJV)
21 Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?
22 For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a freewoman.
23 But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the freewoman was by promise.
24 Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar.
25 For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children.
26 But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.
27 For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband.
28 Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.
29 But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now.
30 Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman.
31 So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free.

Here is another translation of the verse above:

21. Those who want to be controlled by Moses' laws should tell me something. Are you really listening to what Moses' Teachings say?
22. Scripture says that Abraham had two sons, one by a woman who was a slave and the other by a free woman.
23. Now, the son of the slave woman was conceived in a natural way, but the son of the free woman was conceived through a promise made to Abraham.
24. I'm going to use these historical events as an illustration. The women illustrate two arrangements. The one woman, Hagar, is the arrangement made on Mount Sinai. Her children are born into slavery.
25. Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia. She is like Jerusalem today because she and her children are slaves.
26. But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother.
27. Scripture says: "Rejoice, women who cannot get pregnant, who cannot give birth to any children! Break into shouting, those who feel no pains of childbirth! Because the deserted woman will have more children than the woman who has a husband."
28. Now you, brothers and sisters, are children of the promise like Isaac.
29. Furthermore, at that time the son who was conceived in a natural way persecuted the son conceived in a spiritual way. That's exactly what's happening now.
30. But what does Scripture say? "Get rid of the slave woman and her son, because the son of the slave woman must never share the inheritance with the son of the free woman."
31. Brothers and sisters, we are not children of a slave woman but of the free woman.
God's Word Translation http://gwt.scripturetext.com/galatians/4.htm

Tell me, ye that are zealous for the holy land, how are you different than the Crusaders?
Posted by: Daniela Boata Thursday, December 28, 2006 at 06:39 PM

Next, is the post I wrote the following day in response to a request to elaborate on the above:

In other words, what is the spiritual value of Jerusalem and, consequently, Israel "below"? The previous scripture informs us there is not. So, there is no reason to fight over Jerusalem as the "holy city" or Israel as a "holy land" because the place of worship is no longer in the temple which stood or now stands in Jerusalem; with the conclusion and completion of God's word to create a new covenant.

The Crusaders acted with this and the same ignorance people still fighting out of zeal for the mistaken understanding of the holy land do today. Crimes that most people who identify themselves as Christians would condemn (hopefully). So supporting Israel now as a politically national entity on the obsolete basis of it as the God-given land to the Israelites is acting out of the same ignorance.

It is the source that's driving the anger, hate and violence perpetually acted out in the region. The spiritual value of the city of Jerusalem, in the temple where Jesus stood and said,

John 2:19 (GWT)
..."Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up."

vanished away with the resurrected Christ who is "Jerusalem above".

And the temple, where he stood at the time he spoke those words, vanished away as he prophesied it would; with its destruction by the Romans in 70AD.

Hebrews 8:13 (KJV)
In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.

Here is another translation of the same verse:

God made this new promise and showed that the first promise was outdated. What is outdated and aging will soon disappear.
(GWT)

It was a God-given land.
Leviticus 20:22-3 (KJV)
22 Ye shall therefore keep all my statutes, and all my judgments, and do them: that the land, whither I bring you to dwell therein, spue you not out.
23 And ye shall not walk in the manners of the nation, which I cast out before you: for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them.

People are now at war in and for a land that has religious value in Islam, Judaism and Chrisitanity. However, of the three, Christians, at least, should understand there isn't any. I will add however that a Christian is Jewish when a Christian is Christian, and a Jew is Christian when a Jew is Jewish. The term Jewish seems to carry an ethnic and spiritual identity. But in actuality it is a spiritual identity. One most perfectly lived and exemplified, through the will and working of God, by Ieshoua. I like to use the Hebrew name for the Lord's Messiah because in my experience it seems Jesus, the Greek translation of his name, carries negative connotations from centuries of misinterpretation and abuse. Examples of this are in the variety of jokes people make about the man. I recently came across Ellen Degeneres's version in a video someone posted on Facebook (though I didn't have the interest to open it). The ethnic identity, getting back to the point, of the descendents of Abraham is Hebrew.

So if Christians and Jews would understand and assimilate themselves, as one, the fighting in the Middle East would more than likely cease. There would be no need to define and defend the borders of Israel. Since the spiritual identity of Israel is not, the land any longer or, exclusive to the Israelites (by the new covenant).

It is important for those who identify themselves as Christians or Jews to be for Israel according to the knowledge of God.
Posted by: Daniela Boata Friday, December 29, 2006 at 06:48 PM
http://www.allthingsbeautiful.com/all_things_beautiful/2006/12/demonizing_chri.html#comment-27033572

You may read the above comments I posted to a blog in their original form at the address above. You will find I've done some slight editing and revising to the original versions.

I would like to take the opportunity to add to the last statement made, "It is important for those who identify themselves as Christians to be for Israel according to the knowledge of God." The term Christian, in history, was given to persons associated with Christ. In other words, it wasn't a name the persons assimilated with Christ gave themselves.

I've been called a Christian. The sound resonates inexplicably sweetly within every time. Yet I would rather be called than to call myself by the name. It's funny because when I wasn't the spiritual identity, I called myself a Christian (because my family went to church). Moreover, I called myself by the denomination.

And no, I have not become assimiliated with the spiritual identity of those called by the name because my family took me to church (as has often been suggested). In fact the conception thereof did not occur in church but by myself, rather, in the middle of the night in West Palm Beach, Florida; outside and away from the campus dormitory I shared with several roommates my first semester of college. And after years of willfully going to church, afterwards, I no longer do...

2009-01-21T18:39:00.001-05:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCnBMeAWFXo

INAUGURATION

2009-01-21T13:03:00.015-05:00

A formal beginning or introduction

Inauguration, as defined above, resonates with victory and triumph. There is a parallel between spiritual and physical independence. These are essentially the main ideas in my last post called "Valyou". I am hoping to respond to the request, I found posted as a comment, to elaborate on the main ideas in it with the song and story behind Jean Sibelius's "Finlandia.

Here is an account of the history that led to the creation of the song (some of you may also recognize it as the hymn "Be Still, My Soul"):

"The music for the Finlandia Hymn was written by composer Jean Sibelius in 1899, while Finland was experiencing a rise in nationalism, beginning its rise against Russian oppression, and grappling toward independence as a nation.

The lyrics which are now most often associated with the work were composed in 1940 by V. A. Koskenniemi, when Finland had just finished fighting Russia in the Winter War. Finland had been independent since 1917, but in November 1939, Russia decided to "take Finland back" as part of World War II. After all, Hitler and Stalin had agreed that Finland could be part of Russia's piece of pie.

Everyone in Finland who was battleworthy went to repel the invading army — consider that the "everyone" was 250,000 (mostly civilian) men with 30 tanks and 130 airplanes trying to hold off 1 million soldiers, 3000 tanks, and 3800 aircraft.

That means for my generation that ALL our grandparents were in the snow-filled trenches in the forests, fighting for their lives and for the freedom of a little country with no allies of any kind. Almost everyone was missing at least one grandfather, because he had died in a snowy forest in either the Winter War, or the continuance war after. I was fortunate to have both of my grandpas — but neither would ever talk about what they went through in the war. My great-uncle recalled swimming away from the Karelian fortress of Viipuri (Viborg), when the waters ran red with blood. Someone once told me they had heard Peter Gabriel say in concert that a story of the same had been an inspiration for "Red Rain," but I've never been able to authenticate that any further.

Somehow, against such odds, we retained our independence, unlike so many other nations."

FINLANDIA HYMN
Oh, Finland look, it is your day that's dawning,
The threat of night is banishèd away;
The morning birds do trumpet in the brightness,
As if the heavens themselves did play;
Night's powers are conquered by the morning's lightness,
Your day is dawning, oh birthland mine.

Oh raise, oh Finland, oh raise up on high
Your head that's crowned with deeds of bravery;
Oh rise up Finland, all the world doth know
How you have banishèd slavery;
You bent not under the oppressor's throw
Your day has dawnèd, oh birthland mine
http://alaydhien.blogspot.com/2006/12/lyrics-to-finlandia-by-jean-sibelius.html

I'm hoping the following lyrics to "Be Still, My Soul", sung along, as I mentioned, to the same tune as "Finlandia" will illustrate the meaning to the statement I made at the end of "Valyou":

The dream of individual surplus and harmony however is realistic, in a deficient economy or a flourishing one. It's why I made the statement in an earlier post that no form of government is better than another. It's personally, as I've also mentioned in a previous post, my wealth. It lies in the ability to see all persons as equal and to judge not a person on the content of their character (or be deceived by the content of their things and/or appearance)."

"Be Still, My Soul"
Be still, my soul; the Lord is on thy side; Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain; Leave to thy God to order and provide; In every change He faithful will remain. Be still, my soul; thy best, thy heavenly, Friend Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

Be still, my soul; thy God doth undertake To guide the future as He has the past. Thy hope, thy confidence, let nothing shake; All now mysterious shall be bright at last. Be still, my soul; the waves and winds still know His voice who ruled them while He dwelt below.

Be still, my soul, though dearest friends depart And all is darkened in the vale of tears. Then shalt thou better know His love, His heart, Who comes to soothe thy sorrows and thy fears. Be still, my soul; thy Jesus can repay From His own fulness all He takes away.

Be still, my soul; the hour is hastening on When we shall be forever with the Lord, When disappointment, grief, and fear are gone, Sorrow forgot, love's purest joys restored. Be still, my soul; when change and tears are past, All safe and blessed we shall meet at last.
http://www.lutheran-hymnal.com/lyrics/tlh651.htm

January 3rd's posting called "Flesh" elaborates on the subject of character as I referred to it. This is how my faith, rooted in the entire context of the Bible - the Word of God - who became flesh, liberates me to, "see all persons as equal and to judge not a person on the content of their character (or be deceived by the content of their things and/or appearance)" and, thereby, is my wealth apart from national circumstances.

John 1:1-13 (International Standard Version)
1In the beginning, the Word existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2He existed in the beginning with God.
3Through him all things were made, and apart from him nothing was made that has been made. 4In him was life, and that life brought light to humanity.
5And the light shines on in the darkness, and the darkness has never put it out.
John's Witness to the Word
6There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.
7He came as a witness to testify about the light, so that all might believe because of him.
8John was not the light, but he came to testify about the light.
9This was the true light that enlightens every person by his coming into the world.
10He was in the world, and the world was made through him. Yet the world did not recognize him.
11He came to his own creation, yet his own people did not receive him.
12However, to all who received him, those believing in his name, he gave authority to become God's children,
13who were born, not merely in a genetic sense, nor from lust, nor from man’s desire, but from the will of God.
http://bible.cc/john/1-1.htm

Valyou

2009-01-19T14:51:00.007-05:00

"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."

-Martin Luther King, Jr. from his speech "I have a dream"

It seems, among others I perceive, the consideration that comes along with the stillness occurring as our purchasing power is limited, literally, or implicated by fear in our troubled economy, is a blessing in disguise.

Questions of what is really important, the grind of the machine obscures in its path of production, may surface into consideration for some. I consider this a good thing and one of those inevitable and reoccurring principles in life - that anything worthwhile is wrought through some sort of pain, suffering and sacrifice.

I was forced by similar circumstances, financially, as some of you may know from previous posts, to consider what's really important much earlier; upon the difficulty I had returning to the "job market" after graduating from New York University five years ago. It was a humbling and, for that reason, a very good and useful experience for me to go through. Money was never an issue for me. There was the support of my parents to fall back on but I'd always worked, starting in high school and throughout college - wanting to contribute to and support the financial obligation to get to where and what I wanted.

But when it became an issue... it made me realize how much of my time was spent spending money; especially living in New York City. But I imagine the same could be said of persons living to acquire things - bigger and better. It can and does dominate the lives of many people - the purpose, the meaning being defined inadvertently by a system I will not criticize. I am grateful rather and have benefited as a result of countless lives intricately woven to produce and create the quality of life I've lived.

Yet I've experienced great deficiency within the quality of life that attracts people from all over the world to this country. It seems Martin Luther King's dream has manifested itself like a blossom: "I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal". I see it as a teacher; the consciousness coming into awareness more and more with each generation. The part that strikes me the most, however, in this excerpt from the Declaration of Independence is the term created.

It seems most people, myself included, think of the term equal as, well, it is here in its entirety:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Yet along with the obvious understanding of equality as expressed above, I see and understand "equal" in terms of character. A dream of universal harmony is unrealistic when we consider it. The Bible, the premise on which this fundamental statement was made, elaborates on this subject. But the right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness remains and always will subjective.

The dream of individual surplus and harmony however is realistic, in a deficient economy or a flourishing one. It's why I made the statement in an earlier post that no form of government is better than another. It's personally, as I've also mentioned in a previous post, my wealth. It lies in the ability to see all persons as equal and to judge not a person on the content of their character (or be deceived by the content of their things and/or appearance).

"4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days"

2009-01-15T19:44:00.012-05:00

Ro mania...

Cristi Puiu's film titled "4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days" was awarded Best Foreign Film of 2008 by the New York Film Critics Circle earlier this month. I've long wanted and have yet to see it myself; especially after the feeling I had on New Year's Eve.

I accompanied my parents to the home of their (and my) friends. The couple have a son within the same generation as myself ("y" I was recently informed; ages 11-31...) He couldn't make it however so it was just the five of us (or six including their big, black, fluffy cat I desperately wanted to squeeze and torture a bit with love but he wouldn't let me...).

It wasn't the first time I felt a sense of isolation when my parents and the lovely couple reminisced about certain things that pretty much just flew over my head. It's similar to feeling left out of the conversation in a group of people speaking a foreign language. The twist, however, is that I do. In fact Romanian was essentially my first language. I remember learning English; it was effortless as a child.

You would assume the woman of the house were French by the way she speaks it. I know because I lived in France for seven months to know what a native speaker sounds like - myself sounding nowhere near... . She was born to an upper-class family in Constanta, a city bordering the Black Sea, on the far eastern and opposite side of the country from where I was. French and, later, Russian were the main languages taught in school. She began since as long as she can remember teaching it now, along with the Spanish she acquired later in life, as a profession in one of the county's public schools here (earning a six figure salary doing so!).

She retold the story of her heroic grandfather, a military commander, who served and was recognized by the king of Romania, for his successful defense against the invasion of Germany during WWI. She told of a time he physically bound a commander and took charge over his orders in one of three epic battles that led to defeat. It seems my mind always needs to be refreshed when it comes to history and particularly when it comes to wars. Here's a bit of background information, on the events taking place in Romania at the time, from Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_I_of_Romania:

King of Romania
Ferdinand succeeded his uncle on the latter's death (Carol I died without issue) as King of Romania on 10 October 1914, reigning until his own death on 20 July 1927.
He was the 1,174th Knight of the Order of the Golden Fleece in Austria in 1909 and the 868th Knight of the Order of the Garter in 1924...

World War I
...Despite the setbacks after the entry into war, when Dobruja and Wallachia were occupied by the Central Powers, Romania fought in 1917 and stopped the German advance into Moldavia...

The outcome of Romania's war effort was the union of Bessarabia, Bukovina and Transylvania with the Kingdom of Romania in 1918. Ferdinand became the ruler of a greatly enlarged Romanian state in 1918-1920 following the Entente's victory over the Central Powers, a war between the Kingdom of Romania and the Hungarian Soviet Republic, and the civil war in Russia, and was crowned King of Romania in a spectacular ceremony on October 15, 1922 at the historic princely seat of Alba Iulia, in Transylvania.

Despite his heroic service her grandfather was sent, along with the rest of her family and all those considered to be intellectuals and upper-class citizens, to forced labor upon the occupation of Russia that followed years later. Forced to live in barracks and cut stone in the mountains, I asked her, "They were treated well though, right?" She, along with her husband and my parents, just looked at me...

Her parents eventually returned to their beautiful estate on the Black Sea to find a Russian military man living there with his alcoholic wife who had a habit of hurling bottles and glasses at the ornate tile structures that accentuated the luxurious and precious decor of the house. She and her family were able only to stand by and hear the ruckus and destruction of their home from the other side of the house they now lived on and shared.

I was dumbfounded by the abuse but more so by my ignorance of it - particularly as it pertained to the people with whom I shared an identity with. It wasn't the first time I felt this sense of disconnectedness. While living in France as an international student, I had the pleasure and opportunity to meet students from Romania. Thrilled to be able to communicate with them, I also sensed how little we shared in common culturally.

They never cease to astound me with their intelligence. My upbringing gave me an insight to it that makes me feel more proud than inferior. I'd heard my dad exclaim disbelief at the math I was doing in school for years. In middle school they had done that in elementary, in high school... I recently had the opportunity of meeting a beautiful girl, a model and student living in Bucharest, through Facebook. She blew me away with her ability to communicate in English - albeit in writing. She actually "sounded" like a native speaker. It's just one of the several languages she speaks at just eighteen years of age.

I stated "parental" education most importantly makes the difference between a law breaker and a good citizen in my post titled "Flesh" on January 3rd, 2009. I learned afterwards in talking with my dad of the expression "ie lipseste sapte ani de acasa" (he's missing seven years from home). It's what the kids used to say of a classmate that didn't know how to act - including greeting an elder! School began, for them at least (I don't know if it has changed), at the age of seven. You were expected to know how to behave - thus the saying. It was shameful not to.

Language became a subject of interest to me. I've realized, through experiences of the sort I described, it is the epitome of a culture. Though I share little in common with Romanian people, the little I share is the key to the connection. However, I am interested now and grateful for the ability to know more of it, with films such as Cristi Puiu's "4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days".

Aaaaaaaaaaahhh! Art

LOVE Heeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaallllllllllllllllls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2009-01-12T22:03:00.004-05:00

In the somewhat tragic love story between Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin I mentioned and gave as an example, in yesterday's post, of what most people (including myself) have felt when it comes to love, the following song sings it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pHNkOQCIzk

"Dancing to the Rythym of My Cells"

2009-01-12T21:18:00.005-05:00

Yesterday's posting, titled "A Higher Love", contains the poem of today's title. The following lyrics to Brian Adam's "Everything I Do" sings it. It didn't always. In other words, it didn't until I knew a higher love. Upon hearing it one day, I found myself unable to think of any other person - though I knew I'd loved.

Look into my eyes - you will see
What you mean to me
Search your heart - search your soul
And when you find me there you'll search no more

Don't tell me it's not worth tryin' for
You can't tell me it's not worth dyin' for
You know it's true
Everything I do - I do it for you

Look into your heart - you will find
There's nothin' there to hide
Take me as I am - take my life
I would give it all - I would sacrifice

Don't tell me it's not worth fightin' for
I can't help it - there's nothin' I want more
Ya know it's true
Everything I do - I do it for you

There's no love - like your love
And no other - could give more love
There's nowhere - unless you're there
All the time - all the way

Oh - you can't tell me it's not worth tryin' for
I can't help it - there's nothin' I want more
I would fight for you - I'd lie for you
Walk the wire for you - ya I'd die for you

Ya know it's true
Everything I do - I do it for you

2009-01-11T16:49:00.002-05:00

"I love women as an object, the beautiful women, the mannequins, the models. This is the inner painter in me. I never tell them I love them. Je t'aime... moi non plus (I love you... me neither) expresses erotism overcoming sentimentalism… So many songs about romantic and sentimental love, encounters, discoveries, jealousy, illusions, desillusions, betrayals, remorses, hatred, etc... Then why not devote a song to a sort of love much more current these days: physical love? "Je t'aime" isn't an obscene song, it's very reasonable to me, and fills this gap. Its explanation is that girls say "I love you" during sex, and the man with their ridiculous virility doesn't believe them. They think the girls only say it as a result of enjoyment, of pleasure. I guess I believe the girls, or maybe that's a result of my fear. But that's also an aesthetic step, a search of absoluteness"

-Serge Gainsbourg
On the meaning of his song "Je t'aime moi non plus"

Well Serge, as some of you may know, dated Jane Birkin. They were somewhere around 20 years apart in age. She left him for a man close to her own age when she was around the age of 37. He was devastated. In fact I was even sad when I read the story in a Vanity Fair article some time ago. I was sad because he died, eventually, in his fear; without ever knowing love.