Blog Header - September 8, 2010

I took the picture for this blog header just one week ago today. We noticed a lot of black smoke rising behind our house, so we called 911 to report it, we grabbed our cameras, and headed to the fire. It was a large barn fire, so we weren’t able to get very close to the fire, but we did get a lot of photos of the emergency vehicles coming and going and the various emergency services personnel engaged in the firefight.

I added the border and the blog title and then aged the picture in Photoshop. I cut the picture into two sections to increase the effect of the aged photo. I like the final result primarily because the trucks and the people’s outfits make it quite clear that it’s not really an old photo.

Growing Together

Lance snapped this photo a couple of weeks ago when we went to visit Linville Falls, NC. It matched a quote I found about a year ago, and so I thought I'd share the two together with our readers:

Entwined

"Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being "in love" which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Your mother and I had it, we had roots that grew towards each other underground, and when all the pretty blossom had fallen from our branches we found that we were one tree and not two." -Captain Corelli's Mandolin

I'd like to add this youtube video which I posted on my husband's Facebook wall today.

 

September 11 - the proper response

 

Success

To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

Redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die

I love this old hymn. And it just seemed like the right day to post it.

 

There Is a Fountain Filled With Blood

William Cowper

There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel’s veins;
And sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.
Lose all their guilty stains, lose all their guilty stains;
And sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.

The dying thief rejoiced to see that fountain in his day;
And there may I, though vile as he, washed all my sins away.
Washed all my sins away, washed all my sins away;
And there may I, though vile as he, washed all my sins away.

Dear dying Lamb, Thy precious blood shall never lose its power
Till all the ransomed church of God be saved, to sin no more.
Be saved, to sin no more, be saved, to sin no more;
Till all the ransomed church of God be saved, to sin no more.

E’er since, by faith, I saw the stream Thy flowing wounds supply,
Redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die.
And shall be till I die, and shall be till I die;
Redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die.

Then in a nobler, sweeter song, I’ll sing Thy power to save,
When this poor lisping, stammering tongue lies silent in the grave.
Lies silent in the grave, lies silent in the grave;
When this poor lisping, stammering tongue lies silent in the grave.

 

Blog Header - September 5, 2010

I took the photo used in this header a couple weeks ago on Skyline Drive. I got up early on a Saturday morning (about 4:00 am) and was on the Drive well before 5:00. As the sun rose over the mountains I took quite a few pictures. It’s gorgeous up there any time of day (or night), but sunrise is especially inspiring.

The Culture of Death

About 15 years ago I worked for a pro-life organization as editor of their bi-monthly magazine. Although I have been pro-life as long as I have been able to form an opinion on the matter, my association with this organization introduced me to horrors the general public simply never hears.

At times I wondered if some of the stories I heard were overstatements because the depravity and evil nature of those involved in the stories boggled my mind. But I came to realize that the abortion industry’s sanitized image—courtesy of a willingly complicit public media—is far from the truth. Abortion is a great evil against mankind and the closer you get to these purveyors of death, the realization of the moral sewage swirling around it becomes clearer and clearer.

When an abortion clinic in Maryland was ordered to stop their operations pending an investigation into a woman who had been injured at the clinic, the investigators found horrors in the abortion clinic that made them sick. The investigators found, among other evidences of great evil, a collection of jars containing the remains of the aborted babies—apparently kept as some sort of souvenirs.

Matthew Archbold of the National Catholic Register writes:

I used to think that the abortion industry were simply capitalists who allowed their greed to override their humanity. I used to think that maybe it was just feminism run amok and that cooler heads would eventually prevail. I used to think that pro-lifers were simply up against the extreme of secularized logic. Over the past few years though I’ve come to believe that it’s more than that. It’s worse than that. We’re immersed in a culture with a death fetish. Our fascination with death is boundless.

More: Doctor’s four-state abortion business under investigation

Blog Header - September 1, 2010

This is another photo from the Warren County Fair Truck & Tractor Pull. I have always loved taking pictures of the people at events. It seems like a little slice of time that I can revisit in the future. It’s fun to look back at these sorts of photos many years later and to remember how the world was as represented by that photo.

Blog Header - August 29, 2010

I took this photo at the Warren County Fair truck and tractor pull. I thought this couple looked the part. It was fun experiencing something that is a bit out of the norm for our family but is characteristic of the town we love so much.

American by birth – Libertarian by choice

L

ast Saturday I joined the throngs of people who traveled the nation’s highways to gather together in Washington, D.C. We came at Glenn Beck’s call, but we were there to stand up for our nation against the seemingly evil advances of our nation’s government. Glenn had a different idea, which was outstanding. He pointed us to God. And that is truly where we all need to start—with God and focusing on conforming ourselves to the image of Christ.

But even though Glenn’s rally featured non-political speakers, those in attendance represent the folks who are determined to make use of our right to vote this coming November.

Most of the people gathered along the Reflecting Pool would be described as Conservative—possibly even Republican. But I am of a more Libertarian bent. I believe Glenn Beck is a Libertarian. I believe our founding fathers could be described as libertarians. And I also believe the bible proclaims principles that encourage a libertarian point of view.

So when I began to read Henry David Thoreau’s On the Duty of Civil Disobedience, I was pleased to read the opening paragraph of the book:

I heartily accept the motto, “That government is best which governs least”; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe—“That government is best which governs not at all”; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have.

I don’t agree with Thoreau on many things, but I am in full agreement with that paragraph.

May the November 2010 elections stand as the point in time when the United States turned direction and began to roll back government. We are well past due.