11 Questions

Hey

I recently read about these on Captain Andrew Clarks blog (http://armyrenewal.blogspot.com) and found them very useful.

What "they" are is a set of 11 questions given in The Salvation Army's "Orders and Regulations for Soldiers" (1950). They're not intended to become rules for living, just probing questions to aid us in our self examination.

Mentioning about them to Lucy, it became clear that they might be useful to one of her group, but not in the language they are currently in. So I have re-written them in a slightly more modern language.

The questions (both versions) are available here: http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dc6k32v6_2g63cbw

I hope they are of some use to you too

Washing

Do you think it means I've overfilled the washing machine when my clothes come out folded exactly the way I put them back in my bag after the weekend?

Is that bad?

Ho hum.

Take time to be Holy

I found the words to the song my head was searching for in the labyrinth (read the previous post). Song can be found in the Salvation Army Song Book (No. 458)

1.
Take time to be holy, speak oft with thy Lord;
Abide in him always, and feed on his word;
Make friends of God's children; help those who are weak;
Forgetting in nothing his blessing to seek.

2.
Take time to be holy, the world rushes on;
Spend much time in secret with Jesus alone;
By looking to Jesus, like him thou shalt be;
Thy friends in thy conduct his likeness shall see.

3.
Take time to be holy, let him be thy guide,
And run not before him whatever betide;
In joy or in sorrow still follow thy Lord,
And, looking to Jesus, still trust in his word.

4.
Take time to be holy, be calm in thy soul;
Each thought and each motive beneath his control;
Thus led by his Spirit to fountains of love,
Thou soon shalt be fitted for service above.

William Dunn Longstaff (1822-94)

Labyrinth

Well today the Chaplaincy at Uni have put on a Labyrinth. For those of you who don't know, more information is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labyrinth basically it's like a maze, except that there is one path in and out and that it's easy to follow.

Recently, particularly following the Holiness Weekend at Pill, I've been thinking a lot about holiness. Even my daily reading today mentioned holiness as the "punchline".

On my path around the labyrinth my thoughts settled on this particular issue. One song kept trying to come into my head, but sadly I didn't know all the words, all I knew was "Take time to be holy".

As I sat reflecting in the middle of the labyrinth, it suddenly struck me that holiness takes time, and not necessarily my own. Just like salvation itself, holiness comes only from God. It is a gift to me. Holiness will happen in God's time, by his Power and as His will dictates. So I thanked God for His salvation and His holiness.

So on my way out of the labyrinth, another song came to my head (along with the first, still trying to break out) "Thank you for saving me, what can I say?" My response to that (all in my head, since a labyrinth is usually a quiet affair) was "Here's what I can say:
Take my life and let it be
Consecrated Lord to Thee.
Take my moments and my days,
Let them flow in ceaseless praise." (BTW: for those that don't know, this also is a song)

Praise God for what He has done for me. May I be set apart for him and may all my actions be used for His glory.

Two Blogs

You might have noticed that my "About Me" talks a lot about university. That's because I first created an account on Blogger to blog about my third year project (blog at http://aivirtualcharacter.blogspot.com).

I have updated the About Me to reflect a little more about me, but since both blogs share the same information, I still wanted to keep this fairly vague.

Just of those of those reading this over an RSS feed, or on Facebook - just ignore this as you can't see the "About Me" section to which I refer ;)

Anyway, I'm off to walk a labyrinth and then lead a Cell group. Oh, and then I'm going to try and create an emotion engine using Prolog... oh the joys!

Welcome

Well, my blog has once again moved. Hopefully this will be the last time I have to move it.

The Windows Live Spaces interface was becoming to cluttered. My computer struggled to even load the page to add new posts. Incredibly my Linux laptop does a much better job than my Windows PC.

So, a little introduction to my blog: Here is a place for me to talk about random stuff, usually related to my Christianity, but also my life in general.

More interesting entries will follow (I hope)!