This is my blog post... This is my blog post

So D.Lu bought a Mika Nakashima CD, and I decided I really liked her.

And then I decided to check out some of her music videos on You Tube. Bad idea.

Check out Mika Nakashima's home video. It is ridiculously ridiculous.

Basically, she's showing us around her old house...
"This is the toilet....................this is the toilet. Tooooooilet!"
"This is the entryway..................this is the entryway"

Only she might as well be saying, "This is my big head in the wayof everything"!!!!!!!!!!! It's so ridiculous! It's funny that it's a video about her house, but you can't really see her house.

My keen observations:
Mika is SCARY without make-up.
Why does she repeat everything TWICE?
She has interesting taste in lamps. It's a seashell lamp.
Her BOSS drives her around?!?!?!
Her friend Emi does look like her twin.
I wish she wouldn't just talk in monotone. She can sing...but the speaking....Mika has no personality. Sigh. But she has such a great voice!

Serves me right for checking out ridiculous J-pop home videos. Noooo more.

But I love Mika's rendition of Amazing Grace!

Mini Mono?

I have had chronic fatigue for the last 2 weeks. What in the world is wrong with me? I go to bed and get at least 7 hours of sleep (usually closer to 8hrs), and I wake up tired. I haven't felt completely clear-headed in a while. WHAT is going ON?!?!

(Gasp, the thought just occurred to me that I might just have symptoms of OLD AGE!) Ahahaha. But honestly, I wish I could figure it out. Maybe it's the changing weather? The rain here has been ridiculous lately. The streets were flooded outside our apartment, and on the other side by the door, we couldn't even get out because the sewers decided they would stay clogged during the biggest rainfall here this year! Some of the sewage actually started to seep up slightly! Gah! The rain has also rusted my bike horrendously, but it still works, and I think there's less chance of it getting stolen now. :)

Tomorrow's my rest day, so I'm going to meet my favourite friend with the initials MO! I know, what a coincidence, the SAME initials?! She's so great! We're going shopping, and I'll hopfully buy some fabric to get a couple of shirts copied. They are AMAZING at copying shirts here.

I'll be going to the fabric market to buy the fabric...It's funny because you buy everything here at a market. The antique market. The plant market. The fabric market. Jewellery street. There's no store that carries it all. Ah, how I miss Wal-mart! Actually, we have a Wal-mart here but it's more like a grocery store.

Less than one month till I hit the ground in Canada.

GAH!

(We just discussed today how we'll probably spend the first couple of minutes at Vancouver airport gaping open-mouthed at the multicultural-ness of Canada! "Wow, foreigners!")

Pondering vocation as a service to Christ - John Piper

Things come together in beneficial ways.

I've been reading through John Piper's Taste and See.
I've also been praying about what in the WORLD I'm doing next year.

Then, these two activities intersected in Piper's book. He says,

"I don't want my people to simply drift into a job or coast along in it with little sense of calling or significance for the supremacy of God in what they do."

I think this is what I've been struggling with. It's hard for me to think of a job I can do for next year that I think has significance, that allows God to be supreme in my life. I know I want to do all I can to further God's kingdom, and it's hard for me to think that something like supply teaching is truly strategic in doing that. It's hard for me to avoid the mentality that next year is a limbo year, before I decide what to REALLY do with my life. I know I need to live in the present and go hard in the present...but what does that mean about the job I should apply for for next year?!

So while I ponder what God really wants me to do next year, I have started applying to the Ontario College of Teachers to start the supply-teaching application process. I feel like I haven't submitted this decision enough to Him, so I'm going to keep praying for His will. This decision makes sense...but sometimes He asks us to do things that don't make sense. I'm praying for confirmation of what His will is. All I can say for sure right now is, thank goodness He will never leave nor forsake us!

Meanwhile, Piper gives good guidance to finding a job. Piper asks these questions (and refers to the ultimate authority, the Bible!):

1) Can I earnestly do all the parts of this job "to the glory of God," that is, in a way that highlights his superior value over all other things? (1 Corinthians 10:31)
2) Is taking this job part of a strategy to grow in personal holiness? (1 Thessalonians 4:3)
3) Will this job help or hinder my progress in esteeming the value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord? (Philippians 3:8)
4) Will this job result in inappropriate pressures to think or feel or act against my King, Jesus? (1 Corinthians 7:23)
5) Will this job help establish an overall life pattern that will yield a significant involvement in fulfilling God's great purpose of exalting Christ among all the unreached peoples of the world? (Matthew 28:18-20)
6) Will this job be worthy of my best energies? (Ecclesiastes 9:10)
7) Will the activities and environment of this job tend to shape me, or will I be able to shape it for the Christ-magnifying purposes of God? (Romans 12:2)
8) Will this job provide an occasion for me to be radically Christian so as to let my light shine for my Father's sake, or will my participation in the vision of the firm tend to snuff out my wick? (Matthew 5:16)
9) Does the aim of this job cohere with a growing intensity in my life to be radically, publicly, fruitfully devoted to Christ at any cost? (Mark 8:34)
10) Will the job feel like a good investment of my life when this vapour's breath of preparation for eternity is over? (James 4:14)
11) Does this job fit with why I believe I was create and purchased by Christ? (1 Corinthians 6:20)
12) Does this job fit together with the ultimate truth that all things exist for Christ? (Colossians 1:16)

High standards, and so they should be.

Here's back to praying and waiting on Him.

You tube afternoon

So ever since discovering You Tube, I have been watching a ridiculous number of music videos. But not even whole ones. Why? Because I find J-pop ones booooooooooring! Ayumi, Namie and Utada...they can sing (or well, Namie and Utada can), but their videos are soooooooo boring. And D.Lu, you're right, Namie kinda slithers!

Sigh, even Lindsay Lohan has more exciting videos than these j-pop sisters. But maybe it's because there are still undiscovered AMAZING j-pop videos out there!

Thus, the You-Tube-ing continues!

A new take on empowering women...

"Recently I’ve been contemplating what would happen if the women of America united behind a few basic family principles. We shouldn’t underestimate the power of a woman, and especially the power of women united. I challenge the women of America to lock arms, and united, say to men:
“No marriage, no sex.” Imagine the overnight cultural change if every women said, “I will not be intimate with any man unless and until he makes a legal, binding, lifelong commitment to me.” In other words, “Unless you marry me, you won’t sleep with me.” What would happen if women united and refused to have sex with men who had run around in their teen years or had left their first wives? Women, you have the power to civilize men."

Whoa. Strong words, but it makes you think about God's plan. No sex without marriage and there wouldn't be rampant STDs, as many abortions, infidelity...wow. Women Unite!

You are Everything...

It's funny how so many love songs have been written! I remember in my boy-crazy high school days how I would listen to Boyz II Men or some other RnB band crooning about love, attraction, being enamored, mutual love, unrequited love...love love love. I'd sit there listening to the songs and admittedly, dreaming about a future boy in my life. How much energy and time were consumed with listening to these songs!

As I sit listening to another love song, I realize how much these lyrics still capture my feelings. But this time, it's not some human I think about...it's something much bigger, much better...Someone majestic.

Find Me Here
Speak To Me
I want to feel you
I need to hear you
You are the light
That's leading me
To the place where I find peace again.

You are the strength, that keeps me walking.
You are the hope, that keeps me trusting.
You are the light to my soul.
You are my purpose...you're everything.

How can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?

You calm the storms, and you give me rest.
You hold me in your hands, you won't let me fall.
You steal my heart, and you take my breath away.
Would you take me in? Take me deeper now?

How can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?
And how can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?

Cause you're all I want, You're all I need
You're everything,everything
You're all I want your all I need
You're everything, everything.
You're all I want you're all I need.
You're everything, everything
You're all I want you're all I need, you're everything, everything.

And How can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?
How can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?

-Lifehouse

Jesus said, "When he looks at me, he sees the one who sent me. I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness." - John 12:45, 46

How big is He?

"But if you believe in a small God who is no bigger than you are, you are not going to place much faith in Him. Nor will you be motivated to love, trust, and obey Him." - Bill Bright, The Coming Revival

Do I live as if I believe in God? Do I live as if I believe He is the Creator of the Universe, all-knowing, all-powerful and mighty? Do I believe in a God who is infinitely greater than me?

If I was truly living as a child of the living God, shouldn't that be reflected in my life?

Forgive me for lacking passion for You, for You are the only One who truly deserves all my heart, soul, mind and strength.

By the word of the LORD were the heavens made,

their starry host by the breath of his mouth.

He gathers the waters of the sea into jars;

he puts the deep into storehouses.

Let all the earth fear the LORD;

let all the people of the world rever him.

For he spoke, and it came to be;

he commanded, and it stood firm.

The LORD foils the plans of the nations;

he thwarts the purposes of the peoples.

But the plans of the LORD stand firm forever,

the purposes of his heart through all generations.

Psalm 33:6-11