Daily pages of reflection...for knowledge, understanding, to wisdom
Section of The Last Supper, Leonardo Da Vinci Section of The Last Supper, Leonardo Da Vinci

More On Excellence

September 27, 2018
Year 3, Day 270 | No Comments
Section of Adoration of the Magi, artist unknown

We return to problems of complexity.  This relates understanding, a factor of the trinity summary of wisdom.  Wisdom comes from the order of learning (truth), understanding (perceiving the meaning of learning to useful ends), and application (experience that includes mystery related to life, so to manage unknowns, complexities, and necessities).  We are expected to seek wisdom and practice it up to adequacy level.  That requires some energy, and overcoming human weaknesses like laziness.  Students fail, not for intellectual incompetency so much as neglect of duty, of interest, of challenge, of purpose.  Once I determined the purpose of my life, I awoke and moved from unsatisfactory evaluations to glowing ones. Currently most persons seem not to like parenting discipline.  They love… Read more

Proverbially Speaking

September 26, 2018
Year 3, Day 269 | No Comments
Section of Christ and the Woman of Samaria, Benedetto Luti, 1715-20

This list picks up from Volume 2.  101. Blessed are they who see things as they are, and as they ought to be.  102. Blessed are they who have a loving prayer partner.  103. Blessed are they who turn criticism into analysis to be checked for truth.  l04. Blessed are they who have a caring pastor in their lives.  105. Blessed are they who believe it is better to give than to receive.  106. Blessed are they who do not turn concern into worry.  107. Blessed are they who celebrate life.  108. Blessed are they who live in a context of prayer.  109. Blessed are they who do not permit negative attitudes of others to set their own life contexts. 110…. Read more

Value Added

September 25, 2018
Year 3, Day 268 | No Comments
Section of The Taking of Christ, Caravaggio, 1602

Value Added has occupied our theme for this date.  In the Freshman Series we reviewed the five star evaluating designates: poor, fair, good, excellent, and superior with some of the legitimate effort we exert to gain the biblical concept of excellence in Christian life performance.  For the Sophomore Series we reviewed oddities for self-improvement, likely to gain interest without contributing to self-improvement.  For this date we try again to accent specific points rather well known we can try to achieve maturity. Give attention to language – this includes such factors as avoidance of expletives, enlargement of vocabulary which leads to greater objectivity and sensitivity to the context, especially in questions. Give attention to values – the authority for values for… Read more

Ideas and Geeks

September 24, 2018
Year 3, Day 267 | No Comments
Section of The Descent from the Cross, Rogier van der Weyden, c. 1435

On television’s long running and excellent program, 60 Minutes, for November 24, 2013, a section of about fifteen minutes was devoted to an interview with a fellow sometimes called a geek, sometimes a genius, sometimes hippie-like in his life.  Without much publicity he has become a millionaire in meeting the demand for him to speak and interact with professional persons in conferences.  He did not have a normal childhood, but it was lived in an accepting and different combination of factors, including the responses of his parents.  He is appealing in that he does not follow just the standard order of things, arguing for ways to be creative.  The program began with his analogy of difference as demonstrated in the… Read more

Biography

September 23, 2018
Year 3, Day 266 | No Comments
Section of Sistine Chapel ceiling, Michaelangelo, 1508-1512

If we are interested in summarizing Christianity as a lifestyle we look to the biography of Jesus Christ, and attempt to live according to his pattern, motivations, tolerances, concepts, habits, treatment of the human experience, and all that goes into practical living.  We follow to the best of our ability, but assisted by the Holy Spirit.  It is marked by love, truth, righteousness (devotion, values, exemplary) and service within the individual’s life context.  For the sake of discussion we leave here the understanding that Jesus Christ incorporated two natures, human and divine, so to make him unique among all the persons who have ever lived.  He tended to mute his divinity somewhat in the objectivity of his speech and conduct… Read more

Space Mystery

September 22, 2018
Year 3, Day 265 | No Comments
Section of Sistine Chapel ceiling, Michaelangelo, 1508-1512

We return to the theme of space, galaxies, supernova, dark energy, time – and theories.  Theories vary widely in some contexts, until emerging evidence moves them in proper directions.  About the time there is agreement, new evidence replaces old evidence.  The old remains in some way, but newly discovered evidence move circumstances along in another function or meaning.  For some decades it was felt that the expanding universe was slowing down.  Further, the supply of matter thins out.  Like a balloon, the universe can take only so much expansion and the usable air is lost, perhaps by explosion or contamination.  The newer telescopes, developed in my lifetime, are informing the scholars that instead of slowing down, or even holding, the… Read more

Problem Solving

September 21, 2018
Year 3, Day 264 | No Comments
Section of Noli me Tangere by Hans Holbein the Younger

One of the best choices in my college experience was to become a debater.  It was the practice of education not only for life and meaning, but for the factors that achieve persuasion to solve problems, to find better ways, to find improvement for persons and the environment of life.  We always began with a problem.  We were not offended by the problem, but welcomed it as a means for finding the available skills and approaches to get the solutions we believed in to be accepted.  One hour in a tournament we were assigned to debate the affirmative of the proposition and the next hour to take the negative position.  It was always assumed that whatever existed related to the… Read more

Order And Trial

September 20, 2018
Year 3, Day 263 | No Comments
Section of Sistine Chapel ceiling, Michaelangelo, 1508-1512

Some persons tend to practice experimentation for much of what they do.  We may commend the procedure if it is understood in the light of the nature of the person adopting it, and the contexts of the areas in which it is practiced.  It is not usually effective in religion.  One of several reasons it does not serve well in faith matters is that most religions enhance the better sides and dimensions of mankind, rising above common levels of decency and values sufficiently well to attract and hold adherents.  Finding balance and peace in the elevations, accepting logical problems related to the context, and noting emptiness of humanism left to itself – settle on what they find available to ideals… Read more

Values And Perceptions

September 19, 2018
Year 3, Day 262 | No Comments
Section of Sistine Chapel ceiling, Michaelangelo, 1508-1512

It is my purpose to discuss with understanding some of the compound problem identified here as decline in life as it moves more and more into the technological age.  I tend to accent American because that context is best known to me, but the problems exist in other advanced nations, at variant degrees.  With the turn of the new century, often referred to as the beginning of a new millennium, American life has effected some distortion in the conduct of the generations entering professional life during the years after the turn to a new millennium.  According to several analysts the current graduates of higher education are not entering professional life with a professional performance that merits their expectations.  The issues… Read more

Family Order

September 18, 2018
Year 3, Day 261 | No Comments
Section of The Descent from the Cross, Rogier van der Weyden, c. 1435

A presupposition that needs careful attention by Christians relative to marriage and the family (and much else) is the belief that human life is an analogy for earth of the order for life in heaven.  We learn from it – how to live in love, peace, and meaning to fulfillment as individuals and society.  For those giving attention to the matter nearly every turn they make observes another of the context of heaven and earth that provides insight so to give to faith an intellectual perception about spiritual reality, and in the understanding to discover who we are as individuals and society.  For example, every individual is taken by God in a primary relationship that is treated as so personal… Read more

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