danny boy

im gonna listen to take all of me by hillsongs and pray;; Lord, minister to me! i need help =.=

you raise me up by josh groban

many love this inspirational song but not everyone seems to recognize that it's a Christian song! this is evident in the biblical illustrations used throughout the song. the pronoun YOU is God..

another fact that many may not know - God stoops down to raise us up. he kinda bends down, meets you at your eye level.. kinda like how good dads bend down on their knees to embrace their child and stands up so the child can see new horizons.

Psalm 18:35

³⁵ You give me your shield of victory,
and your right hand sustains me;
you stoop down to make me great.

deeper

i remember in highschool, i had some pride concerning how "deep" of a thinker i was. i did indeed think a lot - probably more than i do now. it led me to develop certain "truths of life" that are wrong and unhealthy for the soul.

one 'truth' i held on to dearly was that the purpose of life was for us to be happy. i believed that everyone has this innate desire to obtain happiness. it's what drives us - it is the reason why we want to protect our loved ones, why we study so hard, why we get up each morning, etc.

in retrospect, i realize that i enjoyed this type of thinking - observing things and concluding with certain 'truths'. but i wouldn't stop there, i would continue thinking deeper and deeper about the subject, observing and analyzing, attempting to reach that more profound truth that would correctly explain the observations i had made.

i took pride in the fact that i thought so deeply about these things - depth had become the object of my thoughts and its very purpose.

and how destructive that was.

here's an analogy i heard that explains why that thought process is so destructive

"no matter how deep you dig, you wont' find the treasure if you're digging at the wrong spot."

zoom tool

i was editing some portrait shots for photography this morning.

we have to photoshop flaws out of the face..such as scars, acne, uneven skin tone, etc.

and my, when you're zoomed into the face, you see flaws that you would never see w/ your bare eyes!

i thought of three things as i continued to photoshop those faces..

1) skin is not as clean as i perceive them to be in real life - everyone has skin flaws

2) photoshop is magical

2) God sees all of our flaws(not just our facial ones) - yet, He welcomes us with open armss, just like the dad in the story of the prodigal's son. How amazing is this love!

essay

i have a bachelor's degree in english from UC Irvine.

however, the longest paper i've ever had to write in my life is a 10 page paper on Art Nouveau at FIDM.

newfound respect for josh mcdowell

i've read his apologetic books before but today was the first time i've heard him speaking.  He was being interviewed by a pastor and his excellent character just exuded through his gracious yet genuine speech.

"The greatest security that children can have is knowing that their parents love each other and will never divorce."

-josh mcdowell

yes, how true that is and how sad it is that 50% of children grow up without this security.

Lord, let there be healing of those children's hearts.