P. Jon says that the shepherd would anoint the sheep with oil to protect them from insects that would lay eggs in their nostrils, so that larvae would travel up to the brain and cause excruciating pain. But the shepherd cannot anoint them until the sheep stops fidgeting and banging its head against trees to lessen the agony.
How to be anointed has not changed - be still and humble yourself, "you will seek me and find me when you seek me with all of your heart." Spirit, how can I have and talk about so much head knowledge about you and how to seek you, and still know you so little. Help me grasp you and find you. On my own strength, there is no way to start fresh and walk out assured, no way to protect myself against the little things that fester and cumulate and ravage just as much as the lions and bears.
where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom
-----------------------------------
an afterthought -
Everyone who has been born again receives the Spirit. Maybe I am expecting the Spirit to show up in a way that is different from the way He will show up or is showing up right now.
homesick
Sunday, May 30, 2010
second cor ten five
NIV "We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ."
The Message puts the last part this way: "...fitting every loose thought and emotion and impulse into the structure of life shaped by Christ."
The Message puts the last part this way: "...fitting every loose thought and emotion and impulse into the structure of life shaped by Christ."
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Slowness, according to TWBTA
An excerpt from the essay "Slowness" on the Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects website (it's great to have time to browse random firm websites)...
In the United States, the practice of architecture has come to rely on the computer. In offices the word efficiency is always mentioned, and in design schools the capability to create and rotate complex forms in space is lauded. So, with surprising speed, the tools of the hand are becoming extinct.
* clutch pencil, lead and lead pointer
*bunny bag
*pounce
* erasing shield
* lettering template
*soon to disappear
This is a lamentation for lost tools and a quiet manifesto describing our desire for slowness. We write not in opposition to computers- in fact we are in the midst of bringing them into our studio- but rather it is a discussion about the importance of slowness. We write in support of slowness.
“There is a secret bond between slowness and memory, between speed and forgetting. Consider this utterly commonplace situation: a man is walking down the street. At a certain moment, he tries to recall something, but the recollection escapes him. Automatically, he slows down. Meanwhile, a person who wants to forget a disagreeable incident he has just lived through starts unconsciously to speed up his pace, as if he were trying to distance himself from a thing still too close to him in time.
In existential mathematics, that experience takes the form of two basic equations: the degree of slowness is directly proportional to the intensity of memory; the degree of speed is directly proportional to the intensity of forgetting.”
Slowness Milan Kundera
Slowness of method
Our desire to continue to use the tools of the hand, even as we may begin to use the computer, has to do with their connection to our bodies. Buildings are still constructed with hands, and it seems that the hand still knows best what the hand is capable of doing. As our hands move, we have the time to think and to observe our actions. We draw using pencil and ink, on mylar and on vellum. When we make changes, they occur with effort and a fair amount of tedious scrubbing with erasers, erasing shields, and spit. We have to sift back through previous drawings and bring them to agreement. So, decisions are made slowly, after thoughtful investigation, because they are a commitment that has consequence. It is better to be slow.
We like to keep the stack of finished and unfinished drawings nearby so that the whole project can be reviewed easily. Their physical presence is evidence of work done, and a reminder of what there is to do. The grime that builds up from being worked over is poignant and satisfying. We see the history of the presence of our hand. To have the actual drawings in reach allows us to understand the project in a more complete and comprehensive way. In the buildings we design, we struggle to achieve a unity and sense of wholeness that can come from a balance of individual gestures within a larger and more singular container. The focus of a computer screen feels too compartmentalized and tight to see and understand the whole. And if every time a change is made, a new printout is made, there is the problem that the printouts are too clean. They don’t show the scrubbed and messy sections of erasure, so there is no evidence to indicate the history of the development of an idea. Crucial to creating wholeness is the understanding of the development of the idea.
Documentation is an aspect of architecture particularly interesting to me, especially after several of the freshman seminar speakers(namely Nonya, Eva, Prof. Jimenez, Casbo...I want my fresh sem sketchbook back!) presented a lot of preliminary hand-drawn sketches in their lectures. We definitely lose something valuable (and beautiful) when we abandon trace for CAD, although you can't ignore the million advantages to designing on the computer. I don't know what things are going to look like by the time I'm working in a firm, but I fully take to heart what Danny meant when he said not to forget about the pencil.
p.s. what the heck is a bunny bag?
In the United States, the practice of architecture has come to rely on the computer. In offices the word efficiency is always mentioned, and in design schools the capability to create and rotate complex forms in space is lauded. So, with surprising speed, the tools of the hand are becoming extinct.
* clutch pencil, lead and lead pointer
*bunny bag
*pounce
* erasing shield
* lettering template
*soon to disappear
This is a lamentation for lost tools and a quiet manifesto describing our desire for slowness. We write not in opposition to computers- in fact we are in the midst of bringing them into our studio- but rather it is a discussion about the importance of slowness. We write in support of slowness.
“There is a secret bond between slowness and memory, between speed and forgetting. Consider this utterly commonplace situation: a man is walking down the street. At a certain moment, he tries to recall something, but the recollection escapes him. Automatically, he slows down. Meanwhile, a person who wants to forget a disagreeable incident he has just lived through starts unconsciously to speed up his pace, as if he were trying to distance himself from a thing still too close to him in time.
In existential mathematics, that experience takes the form of two basic equations: the degree of slowness is directly proportional to the intensity of memory; the degree of speed is directly proportional to the intensity of forgetting.”
Slowness Milan Kundera
Slowness of method
Our desire to continue to use the tools of the hand, even as we may begin to use the computer, has to do with their connection to our bodies. Buildings are still constructed with hands, and it seems that the hand still knows best what the hand is capable of doing. As our hands move, we have the time to think and to observe our actions. We draw using pencil and ink, on mylar and on vellum. When we make changes, they occur with effort and a fair amount of tedious scrubbing with erasers, erasing shields, and spit. We have to sift back through previous drawings and bring them to agreement. So, decisions are made slowly, after thoughtful investigation, because they are a commitment that has consequence. It is better to be slow.
We like to keep the stack of finished and unfinished drawings nearby so that the whole project can be reviewed easily. Their physical presence is evidence of work done, and a reminder of what there is to do. The grime that builds up from being worked over is poignant and satisfying. We see the history of the presence of our hand. To have the actual drawings in reach allows us to understand the project in a more complete and comprehensive way. In the buildings we design, we struggle to achieve a unity and sense of wholeness that can come from a balance of individual gestures within a larger and more singular container. The focus of a computer screen feels too compartmentalized and tight to see and understand the whole. And if every time a change is made, a new printout is made, there is the problem that the printouts are too clean. They don’t show the scrubbed and messy sections of erasure, so there is no evidence to indicate the history of the development of an idea. Crucial to creating wholeness is the understanding of the development of the idea.
Documentation is an aspect of architecture particularly interesting to me, especially after several of the freshman seminar speakers(namely Nonya, Eva, Prof. Jimenez, Casbo...I want my fresh sem sketchbook back!) presented a lot of preliminary hand-drawn sketches in their lectures. We definitely lose something valuable (and beautiful) when we abandon trace for CAD, although you can't ignore the million advantages to designing on the computer. I don't know what things are going to look like by the time I'm working in a firm, but I fully take to heart what Danny meant when he said not to forget about the pencil.
p.s. what the heck is a bunny bag?
Sunday, May 23, 2010
The Spirit of Offense
http://www.solomonsporchhk.com/sermons/100523_Pastor_Samuel_Song_-_Spirit_of_Offense.mp3
Offenses will come inevitably. It's our reaction to offense that matters.
Good, relevant message I got from Jonathan's Google Buzz. PTL.
1. Rejoice in the Lord always
"when we lift Jesus up, the atmosphere changes. we may not change, but the atmosphere changes"
2. Bear and Pray
"Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."
3. Focus on the good
"Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things."
4. Practice
Offenses will come inevitably. It's our reaction to offense that matters.
Good, relevant message I got from Jonathan's Google Buzz. PTL.
1. Rejoice in the Lord always
"when we lift Jesus up, the atmosphere changes. we may not change, but the atmosphere changes"
2. Bear and Pray
"Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."
3. Focus on the good
"Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things."
4. Practice
Friday, May 21, 2010
Surprise in Texas
Watched this with Umma at the Angelika in Plano today. Amazing.
Watching Nobuyuki Tsujii (blind and doesn't speak English; shared first place with Haochen Zhang who was the youngest competitor and is, needless to say, brilliant as well) plays the Chopin Concerto no. 2...it's impossible not to cry. One of my favs - 2nd place winner Yeol Eum Son. Okay, I'm probably biased because she's Korean, but she has remarkable maturity, self-discipline, and personal warmth that I admire and hope to learn from.
Crossing my fingers that I'll be able to watch one of the competition concerts in Fort Worth someday...maybe the Chopin concerto with my mom?
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