matthew henry john bartlett

The Reverend Kavanaugh led the services at church today, so we sang from the old blue hymnal. #68 (by Isaac Watts, from Psalm 39), which we’ve not often sung, I found particularly worthwhile:

Teach me the measure of my days,
Thou Maker of my frame;
I would survey life’s narrow space,
And learn how frail I am.

A span is all that we can boast,
An inch or two of time;
Man is but vanity and dust
In all his flower and prime.

See the vain race of mortals move
Like shadows o’er the plain;
They rage and strive, desire and love,
But all the noise is vain.

Some walk in honor’s gaudy show,
Some dig for golden ore;
They toil for heirs, they know not who,
And straight are seen no more.

What should I wish or wait for, then,
From creatures earth and dust?
They make our expectations vain,
And disappoint our trust.

Now I forbid my carnal hope,
My fond desires recall;
I give my mortal interest up,
And make my God my all.

Whis puts me in mind of the following (#205, by Charles H Gabriel, from Psalm 103), which is my forever favourite:

The tender love a father has
For all his children dear,
Such love the Lord bestows on them
Who worship Him in fear.

The Lord remembers we are dust,
And all our frailty knows;
Man’s days are like the tender grass,
And as the flower he grows.

The flower is withered by the wind
That smites with blighting breath;
So man is quickly swept away
Before the blast of death.

Unchanging is the love of God,
From age to age the same,
Displayed to all who do His will
And reverence His Name.

Those who His gracious cov’nant keep
The Lord will ever bless;
Their children’s children shall rejoice
To see His righteousness.

A friend told me recently that although he doesn’t claim to understand it, he finds the Gospel of John rather beautiful. This morning Mr Oosterbaan read the first chapter or so of it, and I knew what my friend was talking about. It seemed to me John probably rushed home and wrote it the second he got back from the mountain of Transfiguration. Checking it out now, it’s interesting to see that Jesus instructed his disciples not to tell anyone the vision until after his resurrection.

wedding story

Richard came over yesterday afternoon after uni. We made dinner and it was rather tasty. This is what we had:

1. White and red new potatoes, boiled.
2. Peas, steamed.
3. Lamb steaks and lamb sausages with red onion, pineapple, rosemary, cummin, olive oil, salt and pepper, fried in a wok.

After dinner we watched Cube²: Hypercube, which was great if you enjoy being pissed off by movies (we do).

Soren Kierkegaard said:

Silence is the measure of the power to act; that is, a person never has more power to act than he has silence. Anyone can understand that to do something is far greater than to talk about doing it. If, therefore, a person has a plan or idea and is fully resolved to carry it out, he does not need to talk about it. What he talks about in connection with the proposed action is what he is most unsure of and most unwilling to do.

[via Bruderhof]

Growing replacment teeth [/.]
Background reading for Saturday’s eco-justice seminar
Calculate your personal ecological footprint

IT”S A SMALL WORLD BUT
THE EARTH HAS NEVER BEEN BIGGER

How to lie like Jesus [via Deb]

Thursday Breakfast #2 at Leuven this morning was nice. The waitresses were really friendly and prepared for us ditherers this week.

NT Wright (if I remember correctly) says that doctrinal statements are always shorthand for narratives. This is a rather helpful notion. Without it, doctrinal statements have a tendency to get loose from their moorings and float out to sea. It takes the whole Bible and all our lives to give content to ‘Jesus is God’.

I listen to Doves/The Last Broadcast and feel strong feelings I can’t name.

The diary of Stuart of B&S

Martin Buber said:

I knew nothing of books when I came forth from the womb of my mother, and I shall die without books, with another human hand in my own. I do, indeed, close my door at times and surrender myself to a book, but only because I can open the door again and see a human being looking at me.

Theological forum on the Foreshore issue, Monday 10 May

Richard B on Americans and Maoris
Deep sanity for the GE debate
Welcome to blogdom, Lynton

ONLINE PEOPLE ARE QUASARS

A key difference between flatting and living with family is that unlike flatmates, family members have a vested interest in one’s success or failure in most every endeavour.

DW’s parables get better
Lyrics: Catatonia/Why I Can’t Stand One Night Stands
Engineering textbook online, free

Today I say a culture is nothing more or less than a set of shared traditions. A church that wishes to challenge the predominant culture needs to develop or harness better traditions. Eucharist is one that springs to mind. Eucharist can be central and deep because it involves elevates and grounds a tradition that all cultures everywhere share, because our bodies require it of us: eating and drinking.

Today I begin an epic journey into the world of vermicompost.

Today’s Bruderhof enail:

A rabbi asked his students, When is it at dawn that one can tell the light from the darkness?

One student replied, When I can tell a goat from a donkey. No, answered the rabbi. Another said, When I can tell a palm tree from a fig. No, answered the rabbi again. Well, then what is the answer? his students pressed him.

Only when you look into the face of every man and every woman and see your brother and your sister, said the rabbi. Only then have you seen the light. All else is still darkness.

Calloo callay! Yesterday evening at Part I of the foreshore issue forum I met a dutchman whose hero is Wendell Berry.

ChristianPolygamy.com [via Hans]

A cartoon about going to Mars [feat. naughty words]
1993 Kim Stanley Robinson interview

Here is a theory which needs work and involves a sort of liberal view of the Old Testament:

Various people and peoples through history have volunteered themselves as God’s representative(s) on earth. God lets them have a go at that for a while. From time to time there are crisis points, when there is a face-off between the volunteers and their enemies. At these points God steps in and either vindicates the volunteers as his true representatives, or visibly rejects them and ‘promotes’ the enemies.

This notion came to me when I came across Ezekiel 31, where Assyria and Egypt almost seem like proto-Israels, that is, proto-True-Adams.

I learned this morning that President Bush once declared that his favourite political philosopher was Jesus Christ, and I wonder if I can use this theory to predict future calamity for the United States.

[Update in response to a comment from John]
It’s possible this whole idea won’t prove helpful, it’s very sketchy at this point. Here is where the liberalness comes in: The theory is that Isaiah & Ezekiel are speaking from Israel’s POV as The Chosen One, but from say Babylon’s POV perhaps there was a time when they thought the same thing about themselves. This occured to me when I noticed Babylon (Ez 17) and Egypt (Ez 31) are described using the language of big tree with lots of birds nesting in it’s branches. Langauge which is later used by Jesus to describe the kingdom of God. So that makes me think perhaps those countries were in a way failed attempts at being the kingdom of God. And then I think, well did God fail? No, it was people grasping towards Him but failing in the end, after a promising start. Like with Israel – they were rejected in the end, did God fail? No, Israel did.

The imaging stuff comes from my idea that the most basic fact of people’s and peoples’ existance is that they are “made in the image of God”, which I understand to mean “made to image God”, that is “made to represent God”.

Novel sans verbs [via antipixel]

I recommend Unity Pacific‘s album From Street to Sky for quality New Zealand reggae. The lead singer Tigalu Ness is Che Fu’s Dad.

All of you who don’t care about sport, read no further. Unless of course, you want to admire my writing skills.
It’s semi-finals time in the Super 12. Tonight (Saturday) Crusaders v Stormers, Brumbies v Chiefs.
The Crusaders Stormers game will be tight. While the Crusaders have not been playing like a team who has won the Super 12 four times, I really can’t see them losing to a South African team playing away from home and under pressure. No South African team has ever won the competition and tonight will see their only finals contender bite the dust of Jade Stadium.
The Chiefs Brumbies game will be the match all of NZ (apart from most of the people who read Matt’s blog) will be watching. If Waikato wins they will be one step closer to a fairy tale finish to the season. I doubt this will happen. They lost last week to the Brumbies on their home turf, and it is unlikely that result will be reversed. The Chiefs don’t have finals experience or the game breakers to beat an on-fire Brumbies side.
The final next week will be Crusaders v Brumbies in Canberra. The way that game goes will be influenced strongly by who can stay injury free tonight.

The Black Caps are touring that place where the queen lives at the moment. Anybody slightly interested in cricket will be thrilled to know that the king , Shane Bond, is back in action and in scintillating form leading in to the first test. How can you not be filled with awe and wonder when you see that man in action? His perfect bowling technique leading to breath taking pace and accuracy sends a chill down the spine of any onlooker (apart from most of the people who read Matt’s blog). Shane Bond provided me with one of my most beautiful memories when he ripped the Australians apart in 2002, I look forward to seeing him in all his magnificence as he destroys the Poms next week.

May edition of Comment

Last night I dreamt that I had a day or three left before my death. I was worried that when I’d tell people “I don’t think I’m going to make it through the night” I’d still be embarrassingly alive in the morning. I wanted to write everyone letters to tidy up all the loose ends, but I didn’t. I didn’t know who was going to get my money. I smoked a lot in my dream, inside.

On Saturday (a very good day) I bought Zero 7′s album When it falls from Slow Boat Records. I’ve listened to it three times so far. It is very pretty. Lush strings and horns. Nice vocalists. Similar vibe to Beck’s magisterial Sea Change. It’ll be interesting to see how it wears.

Bodega has some swell gigs coming up this month: Tuesday People (my flatmate’s band) on Wednesday the 19th, Goldenhorse on Wednesday the 27th ($20 from Real Groovy) and Stylus 77 on Thursday the 28th. Woot.

TUNNEL VISION, TINY DRAMAS IN A HOMEMADE CANDLE

THE ANSWER CANNOT BE WRITTEN IN
WORDS WORDS WORDS; MAYA x MAYA

Said Francis Thompson:

Nothing begins, and nothing ends,
That is not paid with moan;
For we are born in others’ pain,
And perish in our own.

‘Knowledge’ in the Knowledge Economy is gnostic. It’s facts and statistics and marketing nous and sharemarket savvy and scientific manipulation, not sacrifice or service or faith or hope or love.

fine Finnish photos [via consumptive]
April edition of First Things [via John Patrick]

The Canterbury Crusaders will win the Super 12 final on Saturday night. Stirling Mortlock is out for ACT and there are two other injury clouds hovering over their training camp, while Canterbury has a full contigent. Crucial.

Mozilla Calendar, free alternative to MS Outlook Calendar
Shirky: the future of p2p filesharing
Kim Stanley Robinson’s utopian fiction
Rituals and culture in Christian history
Homosexuality and totalitarianism in Canada
The Ecology Psalm
Alzheimer’s & Grace

Someone once said:

Talking about music is like dancing about architecture.

Interview with my hero

Lyrics: Belle & Sebastian/Roy Walker
BMcL: The Passion, America, Lent, Ps 73 [RA]
Current Welly waterfront Artbox

AN ELLIPSIS IS THE TRUEST THING YOU CAN EVER WRITE

This afternoon my sister Kathy and I watched Lost in Translation (Roger Ebert review). When the lights came on afterwards Kathy turned to me and I thought she said “That was crap” so I said “Well I really liked it”, but I’d misheard and she’d really said “That was great”, in fact “That was great”. It is nice that we agreed. It is a beautiful movie. Tokyo is so strange.

Paul Simon said ‘“Kathy I’m lost” I said though I knew she was sleeping. “I’m empty and aching and I don’t know why.”’ You know that line written down needs some special kind of punctuation mark at the end, but English doesn’t have one that will fit. I don’t suppose any language does.

My flatmate Shannon is moving out shortly. If you would like to be considered for the room which has been freed up, do contact me. We each pay $120 per week which includes rent, power, gas and a few other bits and pieces.

Deb on Troy, women & homosexuality
Blogging software compared [via /.]
Sustainable living in Wellington [via James K]

Online
I wrote a comment on someone’s blog saying that I didn’t know where to start to try and get into Bach. Someone saw it and emailed me suggesting I try out choral recordings made by the Bach Collegium in Japan, which I shall at some convenient juncture.

Offline
I met a workmate’s neighbour while I was in Masterton yesterday. He dropped me off at the train station. On the way, we talked about his work – he’s a philosopher working on the mind-body problem, is fond of Wittgenstein and has written a few books published by MIT. My workmate told me he gave him a book to send down to me, which is on the courier now.

Most movies piss me off because they forget they’re movies and try and encapsulate pin down trap reality (ugly word) all-that-is onto that flat screen. They’re closed circles, imposed categories and forget the mystery and crazy-go-nuts-ness of it all. They have to point away from themselves or it’s claustrophobia city, like taking tea with someone who won’t shut up. The real stuff is in the gaps and cracks silences between sentences. Lost in Translation doesn’t piss me off at all.

DUALIST CHURCH ATROPHY* CULTURE AND COMMUNITY BY CELEBRATING ONLY SMALL SLICE OF LIFE

*COLD SILENCE TENDENCY

Augustine said:

…when there is a question as to whether a man is good, one does not ask what he believes, or what he hopes, but what he loves.

[from Gideon's site]

The aforementioned book has arrived. It is Wittgenstein & Modern Philosophy by Justus Hartnack. I have started it, and it looks quite exciting and will likely compete well for my attention with the eleven other books currently in progress.

Inspired by an article Richard pointed me at, I counsel companies with vehicle fleets to consider purchasing or leasing hybrid cars. Toyota’s Prius apparently gets 55 mpg (23.5 km/l). Of course they’ll still crash into things and kill people quite a lot, but one step at a time, yo.

I tried to tell DOC but couldn’t find any useful email contacts on their very nice looking website.

Pirsig vs. Wittgenstein

From Adbusters #45 (ALL READ ADBUSTERS):

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean –
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down –
who is gazing around with her enourmous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

There are little and bigger fish in the shallows of Chaffers Marina, round near Te Papa. There are lots of starfish and some of them glide very slowly over the sea floor if you watch long enough. Evidentally they don’t mind the taste of diesel.

Goldenhorse played well. Some of their new songs are hot to trot. I bumped into Robert from Christchurch, and that was nice. It was an unusual crowd; none of the regulars.

In Psalm 104, sin is an afterthought, a glitch, a pimple, an abberation in the overwhelmingly good world that God made and makes.

In a rather worthwhile talk on theology and the arts [RealAudio: Part 1, Part 2] Jeremy Begbie said:

I was deprived. I never had the unhappy childhood necessary for greatness. The worst things that happened to me were shopping at weekends, unfinished homework and the ghost beneath the bed. My one regret in life is that I was not born on the bad side of town. At 14 I wanted to be the heavyweight champion of the world, but I was 70 pounds to light, and had no criminal record. I could have been the next John Lennon, but my parents couldn’t misunderstand me. My first novel dried up through lack of trauma. No skeletons in my cupboards, no ghosts to exorcise. Now I’m going to be a poet, I’m looking for the net that could be the key, the chip that could be the spur. If only things had been different. If only I could have been like the rest. All I ask of life is some poverty to flee from and a pit to climb out of.

my role is KONNECTOR
i know a little about ALL TOPIX
so that i can KONNECT people TOGEHTOR
to ACHEEVE big THINGS

TO SAY “THERE ARE MANY TRUTHS”
DOES NOT SAY “THERE ARE NO LIES”

Make the IE status bar stay put in Windows XP
Interview with Sofia Coppola & Ross Katz
Map of Springfield [via Richard]
Creating the play Meeting Karpovsky [650K PDF]

Adbusters #51
Dad (happy b/d fo’ yesserday)
Happy hollow and very tired
Jono, Rebecca, Ingrid
Mr & Mrs Heeringa
My scarf
My teapot
Staying up all night
Reconditioned shoes
Ride/Rolling Thunder
Tonga’s discman
Tranz Metro
Whisky

scared of God

LOVE IS ONLY PROXIMITY
CHIMERA DEADLY COMPLACENCY

Aaron’s weekend (feat. me)

Massively multiplayer thumb-wrestling [via /.]
Mechano Difference Engine [via /.]
All about Death Stars

LiT has a scene with 4:20 shown on a clock ahehe.

I recommend Dr Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.