A post I wrote and edited ages ago and never posted! It's actually quite nostalgic thinking back to my year abroad. Apologies for any possible mistakes in translation...
(1/5/11)
Wedding fever is still raging. It even made it into the sermon this morning at church. I tell you, the Germans are just as crazy, if not more so, about the monarchy as some Brits are! Even the local newspaper has jumped on the bandwagon and has printed a few articles, one making it onto the front page! Here's a few amusing snippets...
From a german tourist in London on Friday:
'Die Engländer sind verrückt, aber all so höflich.' - 'The English are mad but all so polite.'
One article commented on the length of the smackers William planted on his new wife upon that oh-so-famous balcony, revealing that the first lasted just 0.7 seconds. The latter was slightly more daring and lasted a whole 1.1 seconds.
I think someone has way too much time on their hands...
One article titled 'Longing for the Eternal' (Sehnsucht nach Ewigem), was of particular interest and which I discussed with my class today. Although the number of couples pledging their troth in Germany has declined over the last few years and the number of divorcees risen, still about 90% of young people who participated in a recent survey would like to have their own family one day. It seems, however, that marriage is out of fashion, so to speak. There is a great reluctance to make a committment which some feel is perhaps too restrictive on their personal freedom, especially in such an economic climate where mobility and flexibility appear to be the favoured job criteria. Fear that marriage probably won't last until death do us part and the court costs tied in with getting a divorce are also factors that put some people off. After all, some argue, it's only a piece of paper.
Yet, as the journalist points out, as soon as Catherine glided out of her car in her stunning, laced wedding dress, the whole nation, indeed the whole world, gasped, sighed, cried, sang and screamed almost simultaneously. As the couple met at the altar and nervously gave their wedding vows and immediately after as they trotted out onto the balcony, the sight of a newly-wed couple sent people all wobbly and gooey inside.
Here's what the journalist said:
'Eine Hochzeit ist das öffentliche Versprechen, für immer zusammenszubleiben. Man mag ein solches Versprechen für maßlos halten, da ja niemand ganz sicher garantieren kann, dass er es einhalten wird. Doch die Seele braucht solche Anklänge von Ewigkeit. Wo solche Versprechen verschwinden, bleiben sie als Sehnsucht zurück. Auch deshalb rühren Märchenhochzeiten wie die in London so viele Menschen.'
'A wedding is the public promise to stay together forever. We like to think of such promises as exorbitant because no one can garantee that such a promise will be stuck to. Still, the soul requires such peals of eternity. Where such promises disappear, they still remain as desires. For this reason fairy-tale weddings, such as the one in London, continue to deeply move so many people.'
It seems that although we cry that we do not want to be bound by an eternal promise because we claim it to be too restrictive, we still long after such oaths because we admire the sacrifice, the dedication and above all the deeply grounded love that a couple (hopefully) has for one another as they promise to cherish one another in sickness and in health. I think our souls require someone to say, 'I will love you no matter what and I am willing to die for you'.
But why on earth do we long after such desires in such a contradictory way. We want someone to love us unconditionally, even to death, and yet we reject all notions of stability as an infringement upon our individual rights. We want intimacy but desire to retain our independance. But therein is exactly the point. By loving someone so much so that you publicly declare, indeed actually bind two families together by a covenant, you give up rights to your own body. Or, more clearly said, you promise to cherish the other above yourself; to put them first as your main priority. You give up your rights to doing what you want.
These longings are no freak consequence of evolution. God is the institutor of marriage. It is a desire that He breathed into our souls when He created the first man and woman. Human, earthly marriage is wonderful. In fact, quite a few good friends are getting married this year and I am over the moon for them! Yet, we cannot just stop here. For what happens when we realise that, despite what the world tells us, we do not feel 'complete' in that other person. What happens to this longing when our spouse dies? What about those men and women who desire to be married and yet can't for whatever reason? What good is this longing after unconditional love in such a person? Is it just to go to waste?
The Lord God is described as Husband and Maker. 'Well, that's a funny concept', you say. 'How is God my husband?!' It's that we have the starting point wrong. Man is not the founder of marriage, God is. Man doesn't define the marriage oath, although we often like to think we can and do. God displays how a husband should act towards his wife. With tenderness, love and unconditional faithfulness.
If our souls' deepest desire and longing is to love and be loved even unto death, then God satisfies this over and abundantly in Jesus Christ. God is the ultimate Husband because even after His wife has cheated on Him and rebelled against his love and light, He still desires her! Jesus goes to the cross, He dies to declare His love for the Bride He is about to redeem, to wash and make lovely again. We gasped in wonder at Kate's beauty, well how much more should we gasp in wonder at how loving this God should be to die for a people, the ultimate Bride, who do not even desire Him? He pursues His people, He wins their hearts in the ultimate way: by dying for them.
So why do we still gasp at the beauty of the bride? Because in a sense her beauty is the result of promises come true, of desires met, of unconditional love which her husband swears to her and before God. She is radiant because he loves her. Sacrifice becomes the price of beauty.
Showing posts with label Germany. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Germany. Show all posts
Thursday, 12 January 2012
Sunday, 5 June 2011
München 1
Munich Town Hall complete with silly silver-painted man, who tried his very best to get my attention; well, as much as a mime stone statue-man is allowed to.
In the Second World War all that was let of the Marienkirche were these two towers. The rest of it was rebuilt post-wartime.
so good to listen to.
A very worried looking, giant stone Bismarck.Saturday, 4 June 2011
Stuttgart 2
So according to whoever created the Märchengarten, the story about David and Goliath is a myth. Basically, Goliath would pop up and tell you he's going to beat you up and then pop back down again. Yeah, that's exactly how I remember the story...ahem.
'Rapunzel, Rapunzel, lass dein Haar herunter!' so we shouted and so she did!
View of the Rapunzel tower.
Pretty walk way in the gardens around the castle.Monday, 30 May 2011
Heidelberg
Just a few from my travels...
This strange brass monkey was at the entrance to the old bridge and there's meant to a funny story about it..which I've forgotten. Oh yeah, and it has a hollow head with human-like features.
Look what I found!
The main street in Heidelberg
B amongst her amazingly well colour-coordinated companions.
View from the castle at evening time.
This strange brass monkey was at the entrance to the old bridge and there's meant to a funny story about it..which I've forgotten. Oh yeah, and it has a hollow head with human-like features. 
View of the old bridge.
Look what I found!
The main street in Heidelberg
B amongst her amazingly well colour-coordinated companions.
View from the castle at evening time.
German students really knew how to make a student prison look cool. Some of the jokes and songs written on the walls about certain professors were pretty fun.
Tuesday, 24 May 2011
He died for the depraved.
On Thursday I visited a concentration camp in Nordhausen, just over the old border with the GDR and into north Thüringen. This used to be a working camp where the V2 bomb, responsible for some of the damage during in London and also in Antwerp, was manufactured.
Looking around the place in the bright, hot sunshine, the birds singing and the flowers and grass in bloom it was really difficult to take in that in only the space of the first 7 months about 5000 prisoners lost their lives. Many of them were political prisoners arrested for their affiliation with resistance groups, though there were still quite a few Jews transported there for their skills in engineering as well as many prisoners of war.
The bombs had to be made in work chambers in the heart of one of the hills. 12 hour shifts in temperatures between 0°C and 8°C, plus the damp atmosphere; lack of warm clothing; disease and beatings; prisoners having to watch while others were hanged and left hanging sometimes for hours above their heads while they carried on working underneath the swinging bodies; lack of sleep and the almost daily occurance of waking up to find that you were sleeping on a dead body; just some of the horrible facts I was told. Only if a prisoner was of apparent use to the system by way of his qualifications would he receive marginally better treatment.
The accounts of brutality, executions, pure torture and the sheer death toll were quite emotionally overwhelming. If I was in any doubt at the utter depravity of the human heart I certainly do not doubt it now. True, we're not perhaps as bad as we ever could be, but it's a sobering thought to think that some of the officers had families themselves and were capable of providing a loving and warm home to their own wives and children, all the while either enforcing or inflicting torture upon other fellow men for the sake of a wicked, racist endeavour. Not every officer always conceded of course, though neither did they remain in service long if the Gestapo got a whiff of their 'treachery' to the Nazi regime. However, the fact that the human heart is capable of being so treacherous, so deceitful, evil and contradictory should make us all shudder.
Jeremiah 17:9 says, 'The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?'
The average person, when he hears of incidents on the news, of murders or rapings, of arson or terrorism can't quite believe how or why anyone would do such a thing. Often the only way he tries to explain it is by condemning the perpetrator as particularly evil and so as an almost completely different species to himself. Either way, he tries to distance himself from being classed as evil. He kids himself into thinking that he could never commit something so despicable, so evil.
The scary news of the Bible is that every heart is deceitful, every heart is rotten at the core and desires anything other than to do what is right. I may look on in disbelief and sheer horror at the Nazi crimes of WW2, but I can never say that I, left to my own devices, would never do such a thing. God's Word doesn't let me.
John 2:23-25 says about Jesus, 'Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus in his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man.'
The same people who believed in his name would soon be shouting for him to be crucified. Jesus is not fooled by notions of good-will, by emotional eagerness, or outward signs of affection and love. He sees right to the core and what He sees He declares as utterly depraved. He doesn't need anyone to tell Him the thoughts and intentions of anyone's heart. He sees the evil of our nature and He condemns it as evil. So in God's sight, without His intervention, His grace, I am just as capable of committing the same despicable crimes as a Nazi officer. Shocking, but true.
But how much more wonderful then are those verses in Romans 5:
Looking around the place in the bright, hot sunshine, the birds singing and the flowers and grass in bloom it was really difficult to take in that in only the space of the first 7 months about 5000 prisoners lost their lives. Many of them were political prisoners arrested for their affiliation with resistance groups, though there were still quite a few Jews transported there for their skills in engineering as well as many prisoners of war.
The bombs had to be made in work chambers in the heart of one of the hills. 12 hour shifts in temperatures between 0°C and 8°C, plus the damp atmosphere; lack of warm clothing; disease and beatings; prisoners having to watch while others were hanged and left hanging sometimes for hours above their heads while they carried on working underneath the swinging bodies; lack of sleep and the almost daily occurance of waking up to find that you were sleeping on a dead body; just some of the horrible facts I was told. Only if a prisoner was of apparent use to the system by way of his qualifications would he receive marginally better treatment.
The accounts of brutality, executions, pure torture and the sheer death toll were quite emotionally overwhelming. If I was in any doubt at the utter depravity of the human heart I certainly do not doubt it now. True, we're not perhaps as bad as we ever could be, but it's a sobering thought to think that some of the officers had families themselves and were capable of providing a loving and warm home to their own wives and children, all the while either enforcing or inflicting torture upon other fellow men for the sake of a wicked, racist endeavour. Not every officer always conceded of course, though neither did they remain in service long if the Gestapo got a whiff of their 'treachery' to the Nazi regime. However, the fact that the human heart is capable of being so treacherous, so deceitful, evil and contradictory should make us all shudder.
Jeremiah 17:9 says, 'The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?'
The average person, when he hears of incidents on the news, of murders or rapings, of arson or terrorism can't quite believe how or why anyone would do such a thing. Often the only way he tries to explain it is by condemning the perpetrator as particularly evil and so as an almost completely different species to himself. Either way, he tries to distance himself from being classed as evil. He kids himself into thinking that he could never commit something so despicable, so evil.
The scary news of the Bible is that every heart is deceitful, every heart is rotten at the core and desires anything other than to do what is right. I may look on in disbelief and sheer horror at the Nazi crimes of WW2, but I can never say that I, left to my own devices, would never do such a thing. God's Word doesn't let me.
John 2:23-25 says about Jesus, 'Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus in his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man.'
The same people who believed in his name would soon be shouting for him to be crucified. Jesus is not fooled by notions of good-will, by emotional eagerness, or outward signs of affection and love. He sees right to the core and what He sees He declares as utterly depraved. He doesn't need anyone to tell Him the thoughts and intentions of anyone's heart. He sees the evil of our nature and He condemns it as evil. So in God's sight, without His intervention, His grace, I am just as capable of committing the same despicable crimes as a Nazi officer. Shocking, but true.
But how much more wonderful then are those verses in Romans 5:
'For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.
For one will scarcely die for a righteous person -though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die- but God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Since, therefore, we have now been justified by His blood, much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God.
For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life.
More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.' (vv6-11)
Thank God that He does not leave our souls to rot in the stench of evil but that through His Son, through the Spirit working in us, He provides a way for the human heart to be saved, transformed and regenerated to His praise and to His glory.
For one will scarcely die for a righteous person -though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die- but God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Since, therefore, we have now been justified by His blood, much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God.
For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life.
More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.' (vv6-11)
Thank God that He does not leave our souls to rot in the stench of evil but that through His Son, through the Spirit working in us, He provides a way for the human heart to be saved, transformed and regenerated to His praise and to His glory.
Friday, 8 April 2011
Sinfonie der Herzen
I'm off to a ladies' conference tomorrow wahooo! And it's all in german, wahooo! And I have to be at the train station at 7am...er. A bit of a saturday morning killer I suppose, but I'm sure it'll be worth it. I'm heading off to Bad Gandersheim to the Bible School (Glaubenszentrum) there with my lovely friend Christina. It all sounds pretty good but you can't always tell with these things. The school itself seems pretty charistmatic, or at least it seemed so the last time I was there for a Prayer and Praise evening. But as to where they actually stand on some theological issues, I've yet to discover. It's good timing anyhow what with our GDW studies!
Thursday, 24 March 2011
Countryside snaps
These a few of the pictures I took when I went on a bike ride in late January on a beautifully crisp, sunny day. Who said Germany isn't beautiful?
South of Kiessee looking east.
From the top of the Weir south of Kiessee.
Just LOVE this green :)
Cycle path back towards Göttingen looking northwards.
South of Kiessee looking east.
From the top of the Weir south of Kiessee.
Just LOVE this green :)
Cycle path back towards Göttingen looking northwards.
While I'm in the spirit of catching up on old photos (and because I've got my USB working again, yay!) the next few posts might be lacking on content but will hopefully be a little prettier and interesting than my usual messy ramble.
From my balcony. Early January
My Mum has been sending me such lovely postcards which always cheer me up :) Aren't these pretty?!
And here's my 85 Euro bike (Bike no.2). After one week the dynamo head came off, so that had to be replaced. Whilst in the shop I found out that the wire attached to the front lamp was faulty and needed replacing, so that had to be redone. Then in the second week I fell, quite spectacularly, off my bike after skidding on ice and smashed the front lamp. Then in the third week my chain broke and had to be fixed. I tell you, God gave me A LOT of grace to deal with this and not get angry.
From my balcony. Early January
My Mum has been sending me such lovely postcards which always cheer me up :) Aren't these pretty?!
And here's my 85 Euro bike (Bike no.2). After one week the dynamo head came off, so that had to be replaced. Whilst in the shop I found out that the wire attached to the front lamp was faulty and needed replacing, so that had to be redone. Then in the second week I fell, quite spectacularly, off my bike after skidding on ice and smashed the front lamp. Then in the third week my chain broke and had to be fixed. I tell you, God gave me A LOT of grace to deal with this and not get angry.
Wednesday, 23 March 2011
Berlin (2)
Berlin- post well overdue (1)
Some snaps I took before christmas (and epically forgot I hadn't put them up) from when I went to Berlin to visit a friend from university.
Somewhere Unter den Linden.
Apologies, this was the best shot of the Brandenburger Tor I could get as it was all cordoned off due to a bomb scare!
N- posing as a lefty left left. The guys we borrowed it from were thrilled!
In the Holocaust Memorial, just to show you how tall those blocks are!
Me posing in front of the British Embassy.
Somewhere Unter den Linden.
Apologies, this was the best shot of the Brandenburger Tor I could get as it was all cordoned off due to a bomb scare!
N- posing as a lefty left left. The guys we borrowed it from were thrilled!
In the Holocaust Memorial, just to show you how tall those blocks are!
Me posing in front of the British Embassy.
Thursday, 17 February 2011
Hauskreis
In about an hour I'll be off to house group and will be leading the Bible Study on Romans 3. Amazingly I don't feel nervous about it and I can only see that as answer to prayer. I'm not wholly convinced that what I've prepared is going to be awe inspiring, but I trusted God when I started it and still trust Him now to challenge the hearts of those in my house group, particularly as we're dealing with the righteousness of God and our justification. Please pray that this would be a God-centred study and that we wouldn't get side-tracked. We desperately need to understand what it means for our hearts to be totally depraved and how and why such a righteous God should choose to make such sinful people righteous in Christ. Pray for a deeper and more God-glorifying understanding of the gospel in all of us.
'For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.' Romans 3:22-25
'For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.' Romans 3:22-25
Friday, 4 February 2011
What have a horse, a frog and sandpaper got in common?
It's Friday and I have almost lost my voice. In fact I couldn't speak this morning and only regained just enough of my voice by the time I got to school to get through the lesson. I don't just sound like I've eaten copious amounts of sandpaper, but like I've eaten a horse that's eaten a frog that is now lodged in it's gullet, which has eaten sandpaper for the best part of six years. Oh dear... time for the expensive, german, environmentally friendly medicine and lots of tea.
Given that tomorrow morning I'm meant to be singing some christian songs and handing out christian tracts in Göttingen with a friend, I'm a little puzzled as to why I should get ill now. Part of me is like, 'yes! this means that I won't have to sing and embarrass myself...' or, 'whoop, maybe I can get out of the whole thing altogether'. Then the other half of me is saying, 'ah no... what a disappointment after all of the prayer and the excitement at the prospect of getting out to on the streets to tell others the gospel. Oh how lamentable that it's all going pear-shaped! Does God not want me to do this?'.
How fickle I am! On the one hand I delight in my illness because it may save my ridiculous and shamefully sinful pride, and on the other hand I am disappointed because things aren't going the way I want them to go! And these are all thoughts that I've had running through my head the whole day.
God is sovereign, maybe I just have to learn to be patient and wait for the answer rather than rushing ahead with my quick-fire logic to work out what's happening. Still, tomorrow hasn't yet arrived...
Given that tomorrow morning I'm meant to be singing some christian songs and handing out christian tracts in Göttingen with a friend, I'm a little puzzled as to why I should get ill now. Part of me is like, 'yes! this means that I won't have to sing and embarrass myself...' or, 'whoop, maybe I can get out of the whole thing altogether'. Then the other half of me is saying, 'ah no... what a disappointment after all of the prayer and the excitement at the prospect of getting out to on the streets to tell others the gospel. Oh how lamentable that it's all going pear-shaped! Does God not want me to do this?'.
How fickle I am! On the one hand I delight in my illness because it may save my ridiculous and shamefully sinful pride, and on the other hand I am disappointed because things aren't going the way I want them to go! And these are all thoughts that I've had running through my head the whole day.
God is sovereign, maybe I just have to learn to be patient and wait for the answer rather than rushing ahead with my quick-fire logic to work out what's happening. Still, tomorrow hasn't yet arrived...
Sunday, 23 January 2011
Satisfying Sunday
Ah, I feel like I've been fed today. We had Werner Gitt preach at church this morning, a scientist and writer. I bought two of his books and so far am quite encouraged by what I'm reading!
He also reiterated a point that I've heard mentioned a few times before and which I've been thinking a lot myself; that the church tends to have more believers who are scientists or mathematicians than those who study arts subjects. In maths and science the thinking generally tends to be based upon facts (or ought to be!) and this consequently structures the thinking that ensues. However, with the arts, if you even dare to come from the point of view that there is even just an inkling of, ooo dare I say it... absolute truth... then you're branded almost as an unworthy representative of the humanities department. Everything is quite free and easy concerning truth. In fact, the kind of philosophy of there being multiple truth and interpretation is rather glorified among the arts, whereas a more absolute fact seems to be the prized core of the sciences. This in turn makes it somehow more difficult for christians to stand for Christ in the humanities departments seeing as they are constantly intellectually persecuted.
As a language student I have often experienced in my seminars the constant battle against absolute truth, and a seemingly unhealthy desire for anything but a straight answer. I'm not saying that some texts are not ambiguous. Indeed some authors have written their plot lines with such intended complexity that often the reader is not meant to know what is really real or what is not, what is really right or what is really wrong. What I rather mean is that in the realm of text interpretation, there seems to be a kind of free for all in our universities. I have read some pretty weird and wonderful commentaries as well as some astoundingly brilliant ones on famous french and german literary works. It just almost seems to me that as long as you write with brilliance, so with a kind of intelligence that may not result in a reasonable answer but that displays that you have a knack with words and have read the works of every famous philisopher and can just about make worthy sense of them, then you'll have your work published. Ah, so this is perhaps turning into a rant about the arts... hey, I am an arts student so am perhaps more qualified to critise my own studies. Still, it's sad to see that there could be such an abundance of creative minds who could be working creatively for a creative God, but that due to their constant intellectual and consequent spiritual erosion, there are actually very few in the arts who are saved, let alone really standing for Christ in not just a fallen department, but a fallen society, a fallen world.
The rest of my day has been pretty good. There was another gathering of students at one of the church-owned student flats. Pizza was aplenty and conversation stimulating for a Sunday afternoon. A friend and I were discussing home schooling, the pros and cons and whether or not christians ought to send their children to state schools or not. If anyone has a particular opinion on this then please feel free to comment or to direct me to something that may be of interest.
I must say that having received my education from a local, state school I have seen both the benefits of social inclusion as well alternately just how very hard it is to be a christian as a teenager. God was very gracious in keeping me. In many ways, I think state schooling made me much more realistic about what standing for Christ really means than those I knew who attended church schools or who were home-schooled. I was one of only two christians, so far as I knew, in my year, with two christian teachers (who didn't teach me personally), my brother when he started high school and one other girl almost four years my junior in a school of over a thousand students. How surprised and how overjoyed I was to come to university and have the opportunity to be with christians every single day!! First year was amazing, really. Yet, I learned many valuable lessons about what it is to be different when I was at school though I was by no means an exemplary model Christian and often failed miserably. So, I'm undecided on the issue.
Friday, I went to see Black Swan. Very interesting film and so much to analyse! I only stopped dancing half way through first year and sort of regret it now seeing as I used to love ballet. Yes, you really do go onto the tip of your toes and yes, it is painful the first and second and third and potentially the next ten times until your feet get tougher and shoes are a wee bit softer. But it looks BEAUTIFUL! You just have messed up feet like mine and an uncontrollable urge to leap around the room doing pirouttes and rond de jambe and goodness knows what else when a wonderful ballet piece comes over the airwaves... And tap dancing is very cool- all of those rhythms! You thought those tap numbers in the black and white musicals were slightly old-fashioned right? Well, think again my friend, think again...
And with my reminiscing begins another week and a tune from Mike Oldfield – Harbinger. Playing the piano is Lang Lang, possibly one of the best pianists currently alive.
He also reiterated a point that I've heard mentioned a few times before and which I've been thinking a lot myself; that the church tends to have more believers who are scientists or mathematicians than those who study arts subjects. In maths and science the thinking generally tends to be based upon facts (or ought to be!) and this consequently structures the thinking that ensues. However, with the arts, if you even dare to come from the point of view that there is even just an inkling of, ooo dare I say it... absolute truth... then you're branded almost as an unworthy representative of the humanities department. Everything is quite free and easy concerning truth. In fact, the kind of philosophy of there being multiple truth and interpretation is rather glorified among the arts, whereas a more absolute fact seems to be the prized core of the sciences. This in turn makes it somehow more difficult for christians to stand for Christ in the humanities departments seeing as they are constantly intellectually persecuted.
As a language student I have often experienced in my seminars the constant battle against absolute truth, and a seemingly unhealthy desire for anything but a straight answer. I'm not saying that some texts are not ambiguous. Indeed some authors have written their plot lines with such intended complexity that often the reader is not meant to know what is really real or what is not, what is really right or what is really wrong. What I rather mean is that in the realm of text interpretation, there seems to be a kind of free for all in our universities. I have read some pretty weird and wonderful commentaries as well as some astoundingly brilliant ones on famous french and german literary works. It just almost seems to me that as long as you write with brilliance, so with a kind of intelligence that may not result in a reasonable answer but that displays that you have a knack with words and have read the works of every famous philisopher and can just about make worthy sense of them, then you'll have your work published. Ah, so this is perhaps turning into a rant about the arts... hey, I am an arts student so am perhaps more qualified to critise my own studies. Still, it's sad to see that there could be such an abundance of creative minds who could be working creatively for a creative God, but that due to their constant intellectual and consequent spiritual erosion, there are actually very few in the arts who are saved, let alone really standing for Christ in not just a fallen department, but a fallen society, a fallen world.
The rest of my day has been pretty good. There was another gathering of students at one of the church-owned student flats. Pizza was aplenty and conversation stimulating for a Sunday afternoon. A friend and I were discussing home schooling, the pros and cons and whether or not christians ought to send their children to state schools or not. If anyone has a particular opinion on this then please feel free to comment or to direct me to something that may be of interest.
I must say that having received my education from a local, state school I have seen both the benefits of social inclusion as well alternately just how very hard it is to be a christian as a teenager. God was very gracious in keeping me. In many ways, I think state schooling made me much more realistic about what standing for Christ really means than those I knew who attended church schools or who were home-schooled. I was one of only two christians, so far as I knew, in my year, with two christian teachers (who didn't teach me personally), my brother when he started high school and one other girl almost four years my junior in a school of over a thousand students. How surprised and how overjoyed I was to come to university and have the opportunity to be with christians every single day!! First year was amazing, really. Yet, I learned many valuable lessons about what it is to be different when I was at school though I was by no means an exemplary model Christian and often failed miserably. So, I'm undecided on the issue.
Friday, I went to see Black Swan. Very interesting film and so much to analyse! I only stopped dancing half way through first year and sort of regret it now seeing as I used to love ballet. Yes, you really do go onto the tip of your toes and yes, it is painful the first and second and third and potentially the next ten times until your feet get tougher and shoes are a wee bit softer. But it looks BEAUTIFUL! You just have messed up feet like mine and an uncontrollable urge to leap around the room doing pirouttes and rond de jambe and goodness knows what else when a wonderful ballet piece comes over the airwaves... And tap dancing is very cool- all of those rhythms! You thought those tap numbers in the black and white musicals were slightly old-fashioned right? Well, think again my friend, think again...
And with my reminiscing begins another week and a tune from Mike Oldfield – Harbinger. Playing the piano is Lang Lang, possibly one of the best pianists currently alive.
Friday, 14 January 2011
First week back. RIP mein wonderschönes Fahrrad!
I'm having a funny time of it at the moment. I almost feel like a new person as if my eyes have been the most open this week to God's goodness than at any time over the last two months.
On Tuesday night I spent the evening with two christian friends, eating together and sharing just how much God has done in our lives. It was such a wonderful time of encouragement which I believe the Lord used to show me all of the good things that I had previously failed to see. To read the psalms together, pray together and just be built up as the three of us shared more of what was really on our hearts was, to me, such a privilege and a massive blessing. It was like God was saying 'See! Look at the friends I've given you. Look at how sinful the three of you are, but look at how I am making you purer in heart and mind day by day.' For a while I thought I didn't have real friends here with whom I could really share problems with and so I hid a lot of distress and discouragement away and tried to deal with it myself, all the while becoming more and more frustrated by the thought that no one really knew who I was or how I was feeling! However, I think those last couple of months had to be the way they were so that God could graciously make me see more clearly, more positively and certainly with far more thankfulness at what He has done and still is doing.
Wednesday, I was at an Allianz Gebetsabend -inter-church prayer meeting- that was part of a week of different Allianz meetings going on in Göttingen. It was run by the SMD (equivalent CU) and so mostly attracted students from the other christian groups in the university. Nevertheless, it was great to pray with others for Göttingen, for the university, government, persecuted christians in places such as Iran and Laos as well as to be reminded by our speaker of the importance of being persistant in prayer.
On Thursday I finished work at 9.30am (whoop!) and trotted off to a friend's house for a spot of breakfast that ended up turning into a six hour munch marathon with numerous cups of tea and coffee as we talked and talked and talked...
Right now, the guys who may be reading this will be thinking, 'aha! And now we have proof that all girls do is talk!'
Well, we were just on fire... talking about God's plan for the nations to be saved, missions and missionaries, evangelism, how to encourage our church and the other churches in the area, how and what to do concerning the needy people in Göttingen who are without the gospel, Israel, how our minds affect our hearts and how important knowledge and wisdom from God is.... quality stuff really that ended with prayer and a solemn decision to order some gospel tracts and spend some time distributing literature in Göttingen together, aiming to try and engage people in conversation. It became apparent that we have both had burdens on our hearts for a while concerning the way evangelism is done by the local churches. Namely that gospel events are good and ought to be carried out but that the majority of people will never ever set foot in a church. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that the lost will come to us and we just have to wait, but rather that we are given the command to 'go' and preach the good news of salvation to all people.
Again, it was a tremendous encouragement to me to find another christian girl who wanted to see God at work in Göttingen. I have to admit that I was surprised at myself to not only be agreeing to but suggesting that we go out and tract together! I remember being on MV a couple of summers ago, physically shaking and jumbling up my poor french as I attempted to give someone a christian leaflet -never really been that confident speaking languages, you may be surprised to hear- and yet this prayerful decision was one of the easiest and most joyful decisions I think I have ever made!
So, it's sort of funny really that after all that's happened over the last week that last night as I was on my way to Bible study, my bike should suddenly make a horrible, scratchy, clunking, chain warping noise and shudder to a halt just a few feet from my flat. Problem: the what-do-you-call-it that you can move to slacken the chain had completely sheared off and had sprung up into my bag wheel, there to be lodged, wrapped around chain and spoke and never to be moved...lovely. As it was dark and I couldn't see anyway I just had to chain my bike up and walk. I must admit, I was pretty puzzled as to why the metal should so suddenly decide to revolt and mangle the gears up, but I did have a chuckle about it. I found it rather amusing actually after so many encouragements that one of the few objects that is useful to me is now utterly immobile! At least I had the ability to laugh about the whole thing and be thankful that it didn't happen on the way to work or even worse, as I was heading down a rather steep mountain!
Please pray I'll be able to get something sorted out soon and not at too high a cost as I've been told that the repairs would cost at least 100 euros as this manufacturer of gears doesn't exist any more, which means that nearly all the gears, chain and gear-changer would have to be replaced...hehe, sounds familiar to a post I put up in October eh? Also, as I've borrowed the bike from my flatmate's colleague I need to check things over concerning the money with him. It seems that the bike was just old and was third-hand when it came to me, nevertheless I'd appreciate prayer for wisdom in knowing what to do.
So, the weekend is upon me once again. Lesson prep, japanese study, web-site design and cleaning await me tomorrow. Help! There must be something wrong with me...am I actually joyful about cleaning?
On Tuesday night I spent the evening with two christian friends, eating together and sharing just how much God has done in our lives. It was such a wonderful time of encouragement which I believe the Lord used to show me all of the good things that I had previously failed to see. To read the psalms together, pray together and just be built up as the three of us shared more of what was really on our hearts was, to me, such a privilege and a massive blessing. It was like God was saying 'See! Look at the friends I've given you. Look at how sinful the three of you are, but look at how I am making you purer in heart and mind day by day.' For a while I thought I didn't have real friends here with whom I could really share problems with and so I hid a lot of distress and discouragement away and tried to deal with it myself, all the while becoming more and more frustrated by the thought that no one really knew who I was or how I was feeling! However, I think those last couple of months had to be the way they were so that God could graciously make me see more clearly, more positively and certainly with far more thankfulness at what He has done and still is doing.
Wednesday, I was at an Allianz Gebetsabend -inter-church prayer meeting- that was part of a week of different Allianz meetings going on in Göttingen. It was run by the SMD (equivalent CU) and so mostly attracted students from the other christian groups in the university. Nevertheless, it was great to pray with others for Göttingen, for the university, government, persecuted christians in places such as Iran and Laos as well as to be reminded by our speaker of the importance of being persistant in prayer.
On Thursday I finished work at 9.30am (whoop!) and trotted off to a friend's house for a spot of breakfast that ended up turning into a six hour munch marathon with numerous cups of tea and coffee as we talked and talked and talked...
Right now, the guys who may be reading this will be thinking, 'aha! And now we have proof that all girls do is talk!'
Well, we were just on fire... talking about God's plan for the nations to be saved, missions and missionaries, evangelism, how to encourage our church and the other churches in the area, how and what to do concerning the needy people in Göttingen who are without the gospel, Israel, how our minds affect our hearts and how important knowledge and wisdom from God is.... quality stuff really that ended with prayer and a solemn decision to order some gospel tracts and spend some time distributing literature in Göttingen together, aiming to try and engage people in conversation. It became apparent that we have both had burdens on our hearts for a while concerning the way evangelism is done by the local churches. Namely that gospel events are good and ought to be carried out but that the majority of people will never ever set foot in a church. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that the lost will come to us and we just have to wait, but rather that we are given the command to 'go' and preach the good news of salvation to all people.
Again, it was a tremendous encouragement to me to find another christian girl who wanted to see God at work in Göttingen. I have to admit that I was surprised at myself to not only be agreeing to but suggesting that we go out and tract together! I remember being on MV a couple of summers ago, physically shaking and jumbling up my poor french as I attempted to give someone a christian leaflet -never really been that confident speaking languages, you may be surprised to hear- and yet this prayerful decision was one of the easiest and most joyful decisions I think I have ever made!
So, it's sort of funny really that after all that's happened over the last week that last night as I was on my way to Bible study, my bike should suddenly make a horrible, scratchy, clunking, chain warping noise and shudder to a halt just a few feet from my flat. Problem: the what-do-you-call-it that you can move to slacken the chain had completely sheared off and had sprung up into my bag wheel, there to be lodged, wrapped around chain and spoke and never to be moved...lovely. As it was dark and I couldn't see anyway I just had to chain my bike up and walk. I must admit, I was pretty puzzled as to why the metal should so suddenly decide to revolt and mangle the gears up, but I did have a chuckle about it. I found it rather amusing actually after so many encouragements that one of the few objects that is useful to me is now utterly immobile! At least I had the ability to laugh about the whole thing and be thankful that it didn't happen on the way to work or even worse, as I was heading down a rather steep mountain!
Please pray I'll be able to get something sorted out soon and not at too high a cost as I've been told that the repairs would cost at least 100 euros as this manufacturer of gears doesn't exist any more, which means that nearly all the gears, chain and gear-changer would have to be replaced...hehe, sounds familiar to a post I put up in October eh? Also, as I've borrowed the bike from my flatmate's colleague I need to check things over concerning the money with him. It seems that the bike was just old and was third-hand when it came to me, nevertheless I'd appreciate prayer for wisdom in knowing what to do.
So, the weekend is upon me once again. Lesson prep, japanese study, web-site design and cleaning await me tomorrow. Help! There must be something wrong with me...am I actually joyful about cleaning?
Sunday, 9 January 2011
Wintry Tales
My Christmas Creation! 
Der Nabel, Göttingen, with christmas lights and SNOW!
This is what they do to naughty children in Hameln, apart from having them whisked away by the Pied Piper that is...
Frost on the inside of the window at the top of one of the church towers in Hameln. There were quite a few steps to the top and it got narrower and more like climbing a ladder the higher my brother and I got!
The River Weser running through Hameln.
A House on the Weser, Hameln.It's just (or rather was) so like Narnia.
Friday, 3 December 2010
Cheer up, it's Friday!
Friday has never been a productive day for me. I get hopelessly distracted by the tiniest of things and simply end up draining the time away doing seemingly pointless and unfulfilling meanderings, pretty much just whatever takes my fancy. Oh and then I feel really guilty afterwards and hurriedly try to make up for lost time on a saturday- to little or no avail. But I reckon today's an exception!
There really is some satisfaction from doing the cleaning, or at least the satisfaction of getting an unavoidable and not always pleasant task out of the way. I have respect for housewives and cleaners. Anyway, cleaning is soooo much better with Einaudi's Nightbook played LOUD! It takes me back to good times at university and the time I went to see/hear Einaudi and his ensemble play 'Nightbook' at Warwick Arts Centre with Jasmine and Camilla.
I just always think it's incredible how particular tunes, smells, textures, colours remind me of certain people or places. There are quite frankly some pieces of music I just can't listen to without blubbing and others I'll quite happily leap around the room to like a crazed dancer -no joke, but another friend of mine dreamed one night that I was in front of our CU at uni in a sparkly leotard teaching the whole CU to dance... Not sure what's worse, that I wore nothing but a sparkly leotard or that she dreamed it at all!
Apologies, my Friday tendency to wander is kicking in again. So, this morning I listened to a talk by Don Carson which, I have to say, although was meant to be for new christians or interested non-believers, was nice and meaty. The series is 'The God Who is There'. I've also been going through Matthew in my quiet times recently and started Mark this morning. Honestly, I can't get over how refreshing it is to read the gospel accounts again. I feel it's made the humanity of Christ so much more tangible to me as I know I have a dreadful tendency to make God out simply to be a demanding Ruler, my mistake being that I sometimes find it very difficult to believe that God loves me and often miss out that all of His Laws are perfect and right and are for my good. That old sin, rebellion, stakes it's claims on my heart again. Often, I stupidly think that I can't always come to God with some of my shame, indeed because I myself am so ashamed of my sin that it can be difficult to grasp that His grace is unending and so deep that I could never reach the bottom of it even with all of the time eternity provides.
What is difficult at the moment and often unnerving, however, is how I have come to realise just how much of who I thought I was rested upon other people's opinions, or at least upon how they viewed me- or more accurately, how I perceived they viewed me. Such an identity is illusiary. If I'm honest, that kind of identity isn't really any identity at all simply because it is inconstant, it fluctuates from person to person so that you could theoretically be multiple identities at the same time. Man sees the outside and chooses what he wants to see. His perception is skewed and if a person tries to model him or herself upon such an unsteady, perceived image then he or she will be left bankrupt, robbed in fact of any personality whatsoever.
Thank God He's showing me this now. If having to speak another language and living in a foreign country has had to be the means for showing me this, then I am grateful. However, it does make me wonder what I am really like. Desperately sinful and ashamed for one, undeserving of any good gift, fit to be tossed aside, discarded and destroyed. I am without wisdom, intelligence, wit, honesty, love, patience, understanding, am prone to anger, heartlessness, cowardice, and harmful gossip.
But understading the gospel means that I am, yes, all of the above but God has so loved me even before the foundation of the world that He became flesh and lived exactly the way I could not, and died to scrape away the scum in my life. It is only understanding that who I am is actually a healed and new creation in Jesus Christ that there is true freedom. I have a far better identity in the One who was pierced and in whose righteousness I now stand than in any make-shift, skizophrenic, temporary identity I could ever create. Realising this daily is of course the hard part. It's easy to pander to human will and get swept along with the crowd. I was encouraged however skipping to 2 Corinthians this morning:
'For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.' 2 Cor 5:15.
Last night I went to house group and afterwards Lord's Supper at church, both were actually quite encouraging. I had forgotten just how great it is to pray with other christians and to share communion with believers. Praying in a foreign language is so much easier when you just pray! Just having something on your heart to pray about really means that you actually pray and stop worrying what complicated word order you're going to have to demonstrate where all three verbs appear at the end of the sentence...
Oh how I love german! It's mind-boggling most of the time yet shows another wonderful, complex part of God's creation. Language is so fascinating. Speaking of language, despite my love of all things german I simply couldn't face having to listen to a ridiculously squeaky and not-so-evil sounding Voldemort german dub and so must shamefully admit that I'll be watching the original version of Harry Potter at the cinema tonight. You just can't beat a bit of Ralph Fiennes.
Anyway, in random Friday fashion, check out Sara Groves. I just love her songs. She is so painfully honest in her lyrics, combines this with, I think, enchanting composition and solid Bible truth: Sara Groves – What Do I Know, and another I quite like is Sara Groves – The Word.
There really is some satisfaction from doing the cleaning, or at least the satisfaction of getting an unavoidable and not always pleasant task out of the way. I have respect for housewives and cleaners. Anyway, cleaning is soooo much better with Einaudi's Nightbook played LOUD! It takes me back to good times at university and the time I went to see/hear Einaudi and his ensemble play 'Nightbook' at Warwick Arts Centre with Jasmine and Camilla.
I just always think it's incredible how particular tunes, smells, textures, colours remind me of certain people or places. There are quite frankly some pieces of music I just can't listen to without blubbing and others I'll quite happily leap around the room to like a crazed dancer -no joke, but another friend of mine dreamed one night that I was in front of our CU at uni in a sparkly leotard teaching the whole CU to dance... Not sure what's worse, that I wore nothing but a sparkly leotard or that she dreamed it at all!
Apologies, my Friday tendency to wander is kicking in again. So, this morning I listened to a talk by Don Carson which, I have to say, although was meant to be for new christians or interested non-believers, was nice and meaty. The series is 'The God Who is There'. I've also been going through Matthew in my quiet times recently and started Mark this morning. Honestly, I can't get over how refreshing it is to read the gospel accounts again. I feel it's made the humanity of Christ so much more tangible to me as I know I have a dreadful tendency to make God out simply to be a demanding Ruler, my mistake being that I sometimes find it very difficult to believe that God loves me and often miss out that all of His Laws are perfect and right and are for my good. That old sin, rebellion, stakes it's claims on my heart again. Often, I stupidly think that I can't always come to God with some of my shame, indeed because I myself am so ashamed of my sin that it can be difficult to grasp that His grace is unending and so deep that I could never reach the bottom of it even with all of the time eternity provides.
What is difficult at the moment and often unnerving, however, is how I have come to realise just how much of who I thought I was rested upon other people's opinions, or at least upon how they viewed me- or more accurately, how I perceived they viewed me. Such an identity is illusiary. If I'm honest, that kind of identity isn't really any identity at all simply because it is inconstant, it fluctuates from person to person so that you could theoretically be multiple identities at the same time. Man sees the outside and chooses what he wants to see. His perception is skewed and if a person tries to model him or herself upon such an unsteady, perceived image then he or she will be left bankrupt, robbed in fact of any personality whatsoever.
Thank God He's showing me this now. If having to speak another language and living in a foreign country has had to be the means for showing me this, then I am grateful. However, it does make me wonder what I am really like. Desperately sinful and ashamed for one, undeserving of any good gift, fit to be tossed aside, discarded and destroyed. I am without wisdom, intelligence, wit, honesty, love, patience, understanding, am prone to anger, heartlessness, cowardice, and harmful gossip.
But understading the gospel means that I am, yes, all of the above but God has so loved me even before the foundation of the world that He became flesh and lived exactly the way I could not, and died to scrape away the scum in my life. It is only understanding that who I am is actually a healed and new creation in Jesus Christ that there is true freedom. I have a far better identity in the One who was pierced and in whose righteousness I now stand than in any make-shift, skizophrenic, temporary identity I could ever create. Realising this daily is of course the hard part. It's easy to pander to human will and get swept along with the crowd. I was encouraged however skipping to 2 Corinthians this morning:
'For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.' 2 Cor 5:15.
Last night I went to house group and afterwards Lord's Supper at church, both were actually quite encouraging. I had forgotten just how great it is to pray with other christians and to share communion with believers. Praying in a foreign language is so much easier when you just pray! Just having something on your heart to pray about really means that you actually pray and stop worrying what complicated word order you're going to have to demonstrate where all three verbs appear at the end of the sentence...
Oh how I love german! It's mind-boggling most of the time yet shows another wonderful, complex part of God's creation. Language is so fascinating. Speaking of language, despite my love of all things german I simply couldn't face having to listen to a ridiculously squeaky and not-so-evil sounding Voldemort german dub and so must shamefully admit that I'll be watching the original version of Harry Potter at the cinema tonight. You just can't beat a bit of Ralph Fiennes.
Anyway, in random Friday fashion, check out Sara Groves. I just love her songs. She is so painfully honest in her lyrics, combines this with, I think, enchanting composition and solid Bible truth: Sara Groves – What Do I Know, and another I quite like is Sara Groves – The Word.
Saturday, 20 November 2010
Herbstferien Antics 2. Leipzig
I have been completely useless at updating people on what I got up to over the autumn holidays! Here's a few more tasty morcels...hopefully.
Here is the Thomas Kirche where Bach composed many of his cantatas and had his works first performed here. There isn't much to it on the inside in that it isn't ornately decorated, but there is a memorial to Bach and flowers are laid on it daily.
And here's the man himself... looking very dour.
I have to say that I found Leipzig to be a really interesting place to visit. It was quite fascinating (in a geeky way) to see where Goethe stopped for a few pints and where he is supposed to have come up with a few ideas for Faust.
Oh and did you know that Bach wrote a song about coffee? I kid not. I have it from the coffee museum in Leizig (which was also very very cool because it was also still a cafe and all the way around the museum I could smell cake and coffee, yum) that in order to discourage his students from drinking too much coffee he thought he'd write a song about it! And you thought all these stuffy old composers where out of touch eh? Still, he probably had a point...
So, you've probably realised by now that I quite like looking at interesting buildings. I admit I am a bit geeky in that way. There's just so many cool things to look at in Germany. Nearly every little town has its own Town Hall, which generally tend to be really really old and often with lots of brightly coloured stripes, pictures of ancient knights, even gargoyles sometimes. Quite imaginative and sometimes a bit fairy-tale-ish (Volksmärchen is just a much better word, sorry) I've seen loads of dancing men -not literally of course, that practise was banned in 1982- on the tops of rooves and quirky ornamentations, not to mention that there seems to be a turret-frenzy. It's quite weird seeing the very modern against the incredibly old, especially all in one house!Anyway, here's the Rathaus in Leipzig. Not the best picture I think but it'll have to do folks. It was so massive and there was so much construction work going on that I couldn't really get a shot of it from farther away.
Here's the main high street. Cold, wet, not ideal weather for city touring but it made for a good excuse to sit in a cafe with my friend Vicky for an hour or two and sup coffee whilst savouring the delights of a humungous slice of german cake.
This was painted all the way across a massive wall next to a car park. This one depicts the fall of the Berlin Wall. The rest of the painting depicted Martin Luther and the march on Washington during the Civil Rights Movement and also something random with a hot-air balloon which I think was meant to stand for unity. My memory fails me now, that's what happens when you post things weeks after the event!
Finally, the river in Autumn.
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