Thursday night we had our first Artist Series of the semester. Valentina Lisitsa and Alexei Kuznetsoff (don't let the names throw you. they're married) played pieces specifically written for duo piano.
They were good. Very good. Even I could tell they were good. They got a standing ovation. And two encores. (but that's another story altogether) One of the things I liked was that they actually explained stuff about the piece and the composer before they performed it--for the less-than-perfectly-classicaly cultured such as myself, it made all the difference in the world once I understood a few things.
At any rate, they included the poems Rachmaninoff claimed as his inspiration to his Fantasie-tableaux (Suite No. 1), Op 5. They immediately caught and held my attention and interest, and when the piece was finally played after intermission I was properly moved and impressed and even visualized the reality the notes were to represent. The poems are magnificent.
Bravo!
Click "more" for Lermontov's Barcarolle (the classic song of the gondolier), Byron's Night of Love, Tyutchev's Tears, and Khomyakov's Russian Easter.
One moment gone
is gone eternally.
The opportunity to honor God
or benefit fellow mortals,
irrecoverably past.
William Carey
Curiously, while projection technology has been improving and maturing at an uprecedented pace, there has been a conspicuous lack of progress in the area of presentation graphics.
Today's projectors may be able to paint the walls of our cave with the most mesmerizing imagery in history, borne of the most dramatic engineering wizardry ever conceived, but today's presentation graphics look pretty much the same as they did five or 10 years ago. In that sense, nothing has changed; the mediocrity has just gotten easier to see.
So on we drift, getting better and better projectors, but shaming the technology by putting the same tired slides on the wall year after year. Call me a skeptic, but I do not believe that the apotheosis of 2,000 years of technical evolution is an electronic slide with five bullet points and a logo in the lower right-hand corner. There has to be something better--or at least there ought to be.
from Tad Simons, editor-in-chief of Presentations magazine
The prosecution is looking for moralists--someone that sees things in black and white. They're looking for someone that will stop at a red light at 3 a.m. in the middle of nowhere, and even when there's no traffic for 50 miles will wait until it turns green.
a legal expert on the evening news
Providence Baptist Ministries has a site with archives of works by A.W. Pink, John Gill, Edward Payson, Dabney, and William Cunningham. They also have sections on being Baptist, Eschatology, Heretical teachings (including Promise Keepers, Harry Potter, and Dispensationalism), a slew of articles from some past greats on a plethora of subjects, and some resource links.
WARNING: It's not exactly the prettiest site ever (read clip art and scrolling text boxes), and the books are a bit unwieldy and the format rather blocky; however, if you're looking for something specifically from one of those guys, it's a good site. The site strikes me as Baptist with a big B and Reformed with a big R.
We've had this discussion about transparency and self-disclosure before, and I suppose I tend a little toward the more transparent side.
(which makes some people a little uncomfortable. maybe i should develop a rating system for my personal blogs--G for won't make anyone uncomfortable, ST for starts to reveal a little about me, but mostly only good stuff, and VT for I'm going to be extremely open, including things about me as a sinner you won't like so don't read it unless that won't bother you. anyway...)
While some of you may read the extended entry and say, "Of course, David, that's obvious," I am posting it because it's also possible some of you are just like me and need another reminder, regardless of how well or poorly it's done, that we live by grace.
(in fact, it touches on issues I have thought a lot about lately, particularly this question: Does God judge repentant believers for post-salvation sin?
Along that same vein, does He only chasten or punish in order to bring us to repentance? Does He allow the consequences of sin to be our sole punishment, or does He bring some kind of direct judgment? If the punishment for all my sins was taken by Christ, what is that saying about the threat of ongoing punishment? Am I failing to apply basic principles about grace or, on the other hand, am I ignoring valid principles of warning about sin and its repercussions?
I mean, I remember when God suddenly dawned it on me that I can't make Him love me any more than He does, nor can I make myself righteous. Seriously. That may sound a bit absurd, but I honestly thought that in the work of sanctification, mine was the lion's share. I also thought God was waiting to club me for my sin; however, I don't want to lose a valid fear and respect of Him and recognition of the gravity of sin in favor of a mamby-pamby lightness in the face of evil. I don't want to repeat some of those same mistakes in regard to this specifically.
Some of the answers seem clear, while others allude me. And I'm not sure where some of the answers will lead logically, and how that applies to the preaching and teaching I get normally. So basically, I'm saying I'm confused about something theologically (not a position I like to be in) and am in the midst of working through it. In light of that, on to the extended entry of some current musings that I wrote the other day.)
MORE...Visit the site of Grace Bible, where my friend Will Lee is the Pastor of Teen and Worship Ministries. It's a great church web site (in my unprofessional opinion). Besides the other resources available there, I also appreciated their music page.
Read Dave Doran's review of Dave Hunt's What Love is This? Calvanism's Misrepresentation of God
This is:
2. A small stand of sparsely foliated trees
3. Just me. Yesterday
(not to worry. i'm all better (hah!) now
E.B. Pusey (1800-1882) suggested rules for those who wish to gain contentment that surely reflect Jesus' own attitude:
1. Allow theyself to complain of nothing, not even the weather.
2. Never picture thyself to thyself under any circumstances in which thou art not.
3. Never compare thine own lot with that of another.
4. Never allow thyself to dwell on the wish that this or that had been or were, otherwise than it was, or is. God Almighty loves thee better and more wisely than thou doest thyself.
5. Never dwell on the morrow. Remember that it is God's, not thine. The heaviest part of sorrow often is to look forward to it. 'The Lord will provide.'"
"Lay not more upon us, O heavenly Father, than Thou wilt enable us to bear; and since the fretfulness of our spirits is more hurtful than the heaviness of our burden, grant us that heavenly calmness which comes of owning Thy hand in all things, and patience in the trust that Thou doest all things well. Amen." (Rowland Williams, 1818-1870)
thanks, Natalie, with secondhand thanks to Angie