I worry, I weigh 3 times my body

I was studying Romans 8 in Crema this morning, and I just thought I'd share some of my reflections here.

Psalm 44 - By the Sons of Korah.

1 We have heard with our ears, O God;
our fathers have told us
what you did in their days,
in days long ago.

2 With your hand you drove out the nations
and planted our fathers;
you crushed the peoples
and made our fathers flourish.

3 It was not by their sword that they won the land,
nor did their arm bring them victory;
it was your right hand, your arm,
and the light of your face, for you loved them.

4 You are my King and my God,
who decrees victories for Jacob.

5 Through you we push back our enemies;
through your name we trample our foes.

6 I do not trust in my bow,
my sword does not bring me victory;

7 but you give us victory over our enemies,
you put our adversaries to shame.

8 In God we make our boast all day long,
and we will praise your name forever.
Selah

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Sound familiar? It pretty much sums up what we've been working on in Expedition, going through the Abraham to Joseph to Joshua and Caleb story.

But the psalm doesn't end here.
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9 But now you have rejected and humbled us;
you no longer go out with our armies.

10 You made us retreat before the enemy,
and our adversaries have plundered us.

11 You gave us up to be devoured like sheep
and have scattered us among the nations.

12 You sold your people for a pittance,
gaining nothing from their sale.

13 You have made us a reproach to our neighbors,
the scorn and derision of those around us.

14 You have made us a byword among the nations;
the peoples shake their heads at us.

15 My disgrace is before me all day long,
and my face is covered with shame

16 at the taunts of those who reproach and revile me,
because of the enemy, who is bent on revenge.

17 All this happened to us,
though we had not forgotten you
or been false to your covenant.

18 Our hearts had not turned back;
our feet had not strayed from your path.

19 But you crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals
and covered us over with deep darkness.

20 If we had forgotten the name of our God
or spread out our hands to a foreign god,

21 would not God have discovered it,
since he knows the secrets of the heart?

22 Yet for your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.

23 Awake, O Lord! Why do you sleep?
Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever.

24 Why do you hide your face
and forget our misery and oppression?

25 We are brought down to the dust;
our bodies cling to the ground.

26 Rise up and help us;
redeem us because of your unfailing love.

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Key things to look out for here are verses 22 and 26. Paul writes about this in Romans 8.
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Romans 8:

17 And since we are his children, we are his heirs.
In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory.

But if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering.


35 Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love?

Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death?

36 As the Scriptures say,

“For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”

37 No,despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.

38 And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love.

• Neither death nor life,
  
• neither angels nor demons,
  
• neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—
  

not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.

39 No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.

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Christ was the one faithful human being, who was able to finish the work he had been given. His faithfulness demonstrated the faithfulness of God. Looking back at verse 35, was there anything Paul mentioned that did Christ not face?

I've run out of time, so I'll leave it here. But let me know your thoughts! There's a lot more to Romans 8, ad I'd love to chat about it over a cup of coffee :)

Love,
Chris.

Epic FAIL

As Greg and I are just about to walk out of Arrow to look for a place to study, we spot Aun with Leanne in his office and stop by for a chat, and he pretty much offered to lock us up in the back office and force us to get work done. After a bit of taunting, we yielded and set out to prove our awesome studying prowess.

The first hour or so went alright; Aun dropped in every time he heard something and yelled "Stop speaking!"

Eventually he starts playing Warhammer Online with his headphones on. Hilarity ensues.



Greg gets the bright idea to scare Aun. Sure it'd be funny, but Aun might beatdestroy us by accident if we tried to sneak up on him.

So he blew up a balloon as quietly as possible (just imagine trying really hard not to laugh at this point), and it ended up being too big. He put a cap on it, but on the bottom end cause it wouldn't fit on top, and left it on a chair behind Aun, without him noticing. Seeing as I hadn't done anything sufficiently courageous, Greg made me draw a smiley face on the balloon behind Aun without alerting him.

Then Greg sets his iPhone on the flashlight app and turns on the strobelight effects and places it under the balloon.

Eventually we just started talking really loud to get Aun's attention.

All we heard was a sigh. And Aun comes in with Greg's iPhone like... "What's wrong with you boys? And wouldn't popping the balloon have been more effective?"

So obvious... and yet...

Oh man it was so funny we couldn't stop laughing.




*stealth win* snapping a picture of Aun behind his back, Chris and Greg: 1, Aun: 0. Well, actually more like Aun: 4.


So we figured the balloon could represent Aun, and Greg found some ribbon, so we decided to tie him up somewhere. I got on the chair to tie him up to the vent on the ceiling... and couldn't reach. Dude! I swear its funny! Greg tried to sit back down to stop laughing and... well... I had the chair, so he fell down. ROFLing.


Anyway, Greg also found a balloon pump, which was pretty hilarious considering all that effort inflating "Aun". So we figured we'd make "Aun" a "Leanne", again silently so as not to attract Aun's attention.


But she exploded.


We eventually made another "Leanne", and tied her up with "Aun".


So as you can see, our study time was not unproductive.


But of course, its week 12 folks. Buck up and hit the books. But not too hard, they're pretty expensive.

Later!

Depth of field

Some big things were spoken at a meeting with the boys tonight, and there are some thoughts I'd like to capture, and maybe delve a bit further into. I mean, I'd like to capture all of them, but it's a bit too much to share, and I probably can't relay those thoughts intelligibly right now.

But what if 'the world' does not exist? Most of us experience this physical state of existence through 5 senses, and that is our perception of the world; or, in other words, that is our world. But the colour red itself does not do anything, neither does the scent of a rose, the taste of honey, except what you make of it. It's the meaning you give it. It's your perspective.

And so with perspective, you deem your pillow comfortable, you call the sound of waves crashing against the cliff serene.

What if you bought a new TV one day, brought it home, only to receive a message that a good friend of yours had just died in an accident. Suddenly, the TV that you'd been so excited about becomes invisible, and the intangible thoughts, memories, love become so much more real. According to your perspective, certain things have more meaning than others.

Depth of field is a crucial part of optics, especially so in photography. Quite simply, when you look through a lens, only a section of the image a certain distance away (called the focal length) from the lens will be clear, while everything in front of or behind will be blurred. Here's an example of some tangerines:



Anything at the distance where the tangerines are from the camera is sharp, while everything else is blur. The section of the image that is in focus is called the depth of field. A wider depth of field is simply a wider section of focus, e.g.: I can see the whole table instead of just the tangerines.

And so with an SLR, when you adjust the 'focus', or your camera auto-focuses, you are adjusting the focal length. The depth of field itself, however, is adjusted by the aperture. A smaller aperture corresponds to a larger f number, and a larger f number corresponds to a wider depth of field. But the 'focus' will also have an impact on the DOF. When the lens is set to the hyperfocal distance (max focal length setting for the given f number setting), the DOF will range from half the hyperfocal distance to infinity. Meaning, you'll see lots of stuff clearly.

And so if a tried to draw an analogy of perspective as being your current depth of field, what would you see?

What did Christ see?

What does God want us to see?
Check out Hebrews 12:

1Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.

2Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

3Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.

In my life, I guess certain things have been set in motion, and the trajectory of this path I'm currently on will take me through optometry as a vocation. The choice to enter the field of optometry is largely driven by my passion for finding vision. But I guess this is something I'll have to share about another time, when I've found more clarity. Or my depth of field is adjusted.

Love,
Chris.



P/S. I thought I'd leave you with the message translation of Hebrews 12:1-3.

Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we'd better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we're in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he's there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!

Intense huh?

Chlorine Therapy

Gosh, its been a hard week, but rejoice folks, the weekend is here. So we can study more.

Haha. Anatomy test today. Woooo. It's done and that's the end of it. Well, not really, there's the exams.

Today was a pretty awesome day. Winston gave me a free guest pass to melbourne city baths, and I got a free swim, spa, and sauna entry! K, when I have to pay for my swims, I feel like I have to make it worth whatever I paid. So I'll push myself really hard and just go all out, but today I had early dinner plans, so halfway through my swim I decided I had to cut short my training.

Because I wanted to use the FREE JACUZZI TICKET!

Hehe, it was so hard to get out of the jacuzzi, seriously, I really had to struggle. But, I am so chilled out right now, it's just woaaaah. Sigh. It. Was. Awesome.



I think I'm going for a run tomorrow morning, anybody keen?

Between Here and There

I just want to say that things cannot possibly get any tougher than this. At least on some level, there's a bit of comfort in that.

But I'm scared I'll be proven wrong, almost know I'll be proven wrong.

To say things could be worse is, as well, somewhat comforting; until it appears that things will get worse.



A rock. A hard place.



I'm just not strong enough to pull through.



Good.

Brothers

I was really touched by Julian's last post about being Kel's brother, and as an older sibling, I know my little brother has been going through some, if not all of what Juls mentioned. Please check out his blog under my links.

Be warned, there will be a fair amount of bragging in this post, but I'm not going to lie about how proud I am of my brother.

Ok? My brother can't really be bothered to read yet, so I'm not worried about inflating his ego right now. So let's go.

Nicholas Law is a special kid. Perpetually happy, hyper, potentially insane, and good looking. I honestly feel he's got all the good genes. He got the tall genes, the handsome genes. Me? Jealous? NAH. I'M NOT JEALOUS. *sulk*

But all the same, and I'm not sure how he feels about it, but simply because I popped out 8 years before him, there's a pretty big shadow cast over him. It's as if he's got 8 years of my achievements to outshine. When he goes to school, everyone first recognises him as "Chris' brother". All the teachers ask him "how's Chris doing?", or "when's Chris coming back?", or at least that's what my mom tells me. And when people find out that he swims, they ask "oh, just like your brother?". Our family friends, even my parents tell him, or us, "oh, your brother was much quieter and well behaved than you at your age..." and I always get a bit irritated, just leave the little dude alone right? They'll tell us, "oh, Chris was very smart in school, but you keep getting x% for maths?"

So my brother's a bit dyslexic. This one time, he wrote a short story in school about Dragonforce and being epic. It was EPIC! Dragonforce as in that epic power metal band (Yes, I share my music with him)! It's like something I could only dream about. Ok, so everyone struggled through the spelling and grammar... it was funny, but I think no one really saw the genius of it.

One person I really admire though, is my good friend Albert, who's teaching my little bro the drums. He gives my bro the right mix of discipline and praise. The kid is 10, ok, how many 10 year olds can get a grip on Latin beats? In the short span of time my bro has learnt drums, I reckon he's advanced much more in technique than I have in guitar playing. Only his rhythm wavers now and then, but those skinny chicken arms are pretty powerful. I'm not trying to brag, really, but my bro is probably the best 10 year old drummer I've seen. Outside of youtube. If you're interested though, search Igor Falecki.

And swimming. Oh man, the kid used to be such a wuss. But when he came over during easter I was pretty shocked. Just to test him, I went, "ok, 20 laps warm up, go." and he was like ok, and left and finished 20 laps no problem. We later went on to train in sprints and other stuff, doing at least 1km a day. And you know what, coaching my brother that week inspired me so much. If it weren't for him, I wouldn't be swimming as regularly as I do now.

I was training him that week for a competition in Bangkok last weekend. And when I called mum on mother's day, she told me about the competition. Listen to this:

His teacher accidentally sends him up for 50m butterfly against an older age group because he heard the PA wrong. Against these big boys, in that crazy ass event, he came second. And just as he came out of the pool, his name was called for his next event, the 100m freestyle. At this point everyone was just going crap! Shouldn't have sent him for the butterfly! But the little champ went for it anyway, and at the start of the race he was just kind of lagging behind last, and everyone thought aww what a waste. But towards the end of the first lap, he catches up with the person in front of him, and now he's second last. By the end of the second lap, he catches up again with the next guy, and now he's third from the back. And then as he kicks off the wall for the final lap, he begins to overtake heaps of people, until he's finally neck and neck with the race leader, and in the last few metres he overtakes the guy and wins the race!

Is that freaking amazing or what?

His overall spoils from the comp are 2 golds, 5 silvers, and a bronze in swimming, 2 silvers in athletics, and gold in soccer.

I think my bro is well his way to making his own mark.


Of course, he forgot about mother's day, and I am therefore still mummy's favourite.

Just kidding.


I'm Chris, and I'm Nicholas Law's brother.

Awe

Matthew 18:18-20 (The Message)

18-20"Take this most seriously: A yes on earth is yes in heaven; a no on earth is no in heaven. What you say to one another is eternal. I mean this. When two of you get together on anything at all on earth and make a prayer of it, my Father in heaven goes into action.

And when two or three of you are together because of me, you can be sure that I'll be there."

Brian, Greg, Winston and I met up for lunch today. It was a good time of eating, sharing, and dodging bird droppings. Brian brought a bottle of juice, rice crackers, and some cups, and we had communion right outside union house (comm-union house?). It was incredibly thoughtful of him, and I do miss having communion as well. Later on, we took some time and prayed, and after we were done, a lady who had been sitting next to us the whole time came up to us and essentially said,

"Are you guys christians? Make sure you keep in contact with each other, even after you finish uni, because the friends that you pray with during your time in uni will be the strongest group you'll ever find. Even if you meet other christian friends after you graduate, life will still be much harder without each other."

It's funny how easy it is to forget that, in the midst of a crazy machine driven world, there are still agents of a different Kingdom placed around you.


Thank you for the encouragement.



Blessings,
Chris.

A Man's Gotta Do

What a man's gotta do.

But what does a man have to do?


Is it to

love the Lord your God:

• with all your heart
• with all your soul
• with all your intellect

and to love your neighbour as yourself?



Wednesday night's worship session was great. I think for me, nothing beats sharing a meal with good friends.

And as for "praise and worship", well, these days it's hard to escape from the whole corporate deal of getting as massive a herd of people as you can to get into it; it's been popularised, reduced to some CCM chart.

I'm not trying to say there's no authenticity. But I probably don't believe it's really authentic either. But Wednesday night really gave me something to think about.

It begins with an invitation, into the presence, the peace, the power of a Creator who is actively working in the people you're surrounded by. In a posture of adoration of the Creator, with trust in the friends surrounding you, well, a song is just a song. But in that moment, I rediscovered joy, and joy is not a word I use very often.

So thanks to all my friends who intentionally took a night out of a busy week to gather together and worship. And for everyone who couldn't make it, so sorry about the timing, but we'll definitely do one again soon.





Love,
Chris.

Seize the Day!

Ann, I dissected a rat with gloves.

It was pretty funny actually. We had to figure out if we were dissecting a male or a female and let everyone know; that way, those who got males can look at female specimens later on. So... mine didn't have the typical male genitalia. In fact, it looked a lot like the female one (we had diagrams in the notes). On this basis, I concluded it was a female. Fair? (OH, I'VE GOT ANOTHER STORY TO TELL ABOUT DECIDING THE GENDER OF A SUBJECT, but it's rather embarrassing and involves arts students, so ask me about it some other time.)

So to cut a long tale short (get the pun? HEHE), I cut it open, made a diagram of its insides, and... discovered fat pads. Now, the demonstrator mentioned that his specimen was a male and had fat pads, and suggested removing the fat pads. So, I pull out the fat pads, and lo and behold; the thing has balls.

Hmm. So it was a male reproductive organ after all. Oh.

Also... I can't think of a worse time to have been hungry. :(

Anyway, I went shopping today. And by shopping I mean I exchanged money for material goods. And by material goods i mean some shiny new batteries for my Nikon and a few prints of film taken with my lomo. Here are the firstfruits of my coloured flash!

Blue and Pink flash, featuring a Winston. I think its a male.

Ditto.

Yellow flash. Yep, my room was intentionally messy. It's a lot neater now. Really.

After "shopping", I took a walk this afternoon, around Carlton, exploring backlanes and whatnot. I figured since it was such a grey day, it'd be good to take some photos with my Nikon, since I had a whole stack of ISO 3200 film.

(high ISO = high film sensitivity = good in low light)

On my walk, I found something rather interesting, though I think its been there a while. Just thought I'd share with you guys.





Somehow, (I couldn't possibly fathom how, its a mystery) I wound up in Music Swop Shop on Elgin street. There are some really cool secondhand guitars there. I tried out an unassuming no-name (possibly homemade) acoustic, and it blew my mind when I first strummed it. But then I couldn't get it to make that sound again so I decided to put it back. I probably just wanted it to sound good and started imagining it. Then I tried a banjo.

I now want a banjo.

See you round folks!