"the Lord will be a light to me"

Lumineers give the feels

                                          
While I should be studying hard, I'm listening to these songs and feeling feels emerge from the deep parts of those internal wells we all have. Where we keep those emotionally charged memories and some regrets that we don't dredge up in everyday life because they're reserved for poetry and songs and deep words. Man, I love words. 

Better a Dead Dog

I've tried my inexperienced hand at writing many a time, coming out of the attempts a little bruised and scratched after fighting off the badly worded beasts and friends of my imaginings and out of breath from re-reading my many long sentences with minimal punctuation because I must stay true to my writing style.

Just last night I realized the past maybe 10 -- okay that's a bit generous -- 7 years I've been trying to write about people when I have only just begun to comprehend something of the human nature.
What does a young 15 year old know of people? What does she know of herself?

I found it very boring trying to draw up a character because he needs substance to fill his form and substance is the deep things in all of us that, to be honest, are not very exciting to think about, never mind imagine for my imaginary, very exciting protagonist.
But an imaginary story needs a real hero. What makes us 'real' is our baggage that we carry around each day like Christian in Pilgrim's Progress carried his burden of sin. Even those of us who are saved pick up our worries like a globe on our backs, in true Atlas-style.

And the everyday conflict in out hearts and heads is quite boring (mundane) and all anyone wants to do is share our little mundan-ities, connecting with everyone else (who's also mundane by the way). We're all just ordinary. Now I'm not being pessimistic here. We're all the same, with the same needs but just different enough to make life interesting. No one is special because everyone is special and that's alright because life isn't even about us and about being great. It's not that great being great really. Do you think Alexander the Great was better than you?

My point before my fingers started typing was that I've grown a little in understanding and I might try my hand, again, at imagining some characters, stirring them together with a few cups of calamity and baking at 180 degrees. We might just have a delicious book on our hands.

You have no chance -- no chance at all!

I'm listening to the Les Misérables soundtrack while reading the King III code together with it's report. For those of you who don't know what the King III is, don't stress, you're fine--not that it's not helpful. You have to be an accountant or some kind of manager in South Africa to get use out of it. If you're just an investor it's been made easy for you so you don't have to read it, just look up the the SRI index and it'll tell you which companies follow the King III; though it was last updated in 2014 so it's really not very useful at all.

Basically the King III, according to itself, is a code of ethics all entities should apply to their endeavours in South Africa. It's not enforceable by law though like the Americans enforce their code of business ethics (probably because the Americans almost single handedly brought about the GFC in 2008 with the sketchy ethics of their big corporations). If you apply the code, investors like it and trust your company and so invest....that's what they tell me anyway. What IS enforceable by law is that if you don't apply the code, you HAVE to explain why you didn't apply it otherwise auditors will know. We Accountants are quite like detectives, am I right? *cough*

Well my problem with the King III is that it's quite dated (©2009). There's also a lot of man hours involved in terms of managers to ensure they apply the code and a lot of man hours on the part of auditors to ensure there's no pretend application. And well, we have to know the code and it's quite boring and excessively repetitive....

So there we go, now you know something you didn't and I got to sound quite boring but we both got to listen to a bit of the final battle song of the Les Misérables musical so I'd say it's win win. No? Okay just I win.

No one else is even able

Then I saw in the right hand of the One seated on the throne a scroll with writing on the inside and on the back, sealed with seven seals.   I also saw a mighty angel  proclaiming in a loud voice, “Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals? ” But no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able (dynamai) to open the scroll or even to look in it.
And I cried and cried because no one was found worthy to open  the scroll or even to look in it. Then one of the elders said to me, “Stop crying. Look! The Lion from the tribe of Judah,  the Root of David,  has been victorious  so that He may open the scroll and  its seven seals.”
Rev 5:1-5

No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to humanity. God is faithful,  and He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able (dynamai), but with the temptation He will also provide a way of escape  so that you are able to bear it.
1 Cor 10:13

God restricts what we go through to what we are able to endure. Imagine the depths Jesus was tempted, far beyond anything we've experienced. He was extensively tempted in everything and but remained sinless. Because of this, He's worthy and the only One who is.

And He said, “Abba, Father! All things are possible for You. Take this cup  away from Me. Nevertheless, not what I will, but what You will.”
Mark 14:36

We can't even understand the agony Jesus faced because we're protected by the Father who is "faithful" to us by only giving us what we can bear. We could never bear what Christ bore and come through it triumphant as He did.

James 2

Listen, my dear brothers: Didn’t God choose the poor in this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom that He has promised to those who love Him?
James 2:5 HCSB

Be content with little.

For whoever keeps the entire law, yet fails in one point, is guilty of breaking it all. For He who said, Do not commit adultery, also said, Do not murder.  So if you do not commit adultery, but you do murder, you are a lawbreaker. Speak and act as those who will be judged by the law of freedom.  For judgment is without mercy to the one who hasn’t shown mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.
James 2:10‭-‬13 HCSB

Just because you're 'perfect' in one area, it means little; you're sinning in other areas and guilty is guilty. Guilt is absolute and there are no levels of it in this respect. However, remember we've been granted mercy by the blood of Christ and we should act like it.

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can his faith save him?....faith if it doesn't have works is dead by itself....faith without works is useless...You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone.
James 2:14; 17; 21; 24 HCSB

This is what it looks like to be under mercy. 

House of Their Dreams

'House of Their Dreams' - Casting Crowns

So mid-study this song starts on my ipod and, as it does every time it plays, it begins pulling at my heart strings. How many people pursue happiness and find themselves and their families despairing? How many broken homes and broken hearts are there in this world and in the church? We suffer because we all think that what will make us happy is selfishness and selfishness is like a virus. There's no joy in being consumed. Yet God offers us such healing, such comfort and such love. He's the remedy to what ails us.