Wednesday, April 29, 2009

the flyover...

i am not sure you all heard about this, but air force one did a little fly over in lower manhattan the other day to get pictures of the plane next to parts of the city, like the statue of liberty.  not only did it cause panic and chaos (hum, i wonder why people were panicking about a low flying boeing 747 in nyc???), but it also cost us (the taxpayers) $328,835.  it is good to know the geniuses running this country are making wise decisions and using our hard-earned money well. 

apparently, the new tech-savvy white house has never heard of photoshop!?!? here is a little hint: you don't have to have two objects in the same vicinity to get a picture of them together.

speaking of good decisions, get ready to be voted out of office arlen specter.

cheers,
jw <><

Monday, April 27, 2009

raccoon creek


what a great surprise!  raccoon creek state park is only 35 miles from city life!  is it a really pretty park with lots of hiking and biking trails,  a little beach and a nice sized lake.

a great get-away for the weekend or a day trip too!  

i learned how to make mountain pies thanks to carolyn!  she has a mountain pie maker which perfectly holds two slices of bread with whatever you want in the middle.  we used pizza sauce, pepperoni and cheese. YUM!!!   then you shove it in the fire for a few minutes and out comes a delicious mountain pie!!

after dinner, we did the same thing with cherries to make a dessert mountian pie.  i'm telling you, the options for these mountain pies are limitless!  a mountian pie maker is a must have!

hydrobikes are one awesome invention!  what a great way to explore the lake and just be out on the water.   i had SO much fun.  jon managed to conquer the hydrobike wheelie and got everyone wet.  it did make for a thrilling adventure!

i led us on some "not so easy" trails that some of the group was a little upset about...  oops!   i just like to go nuts outside.  i do not care where it is... haha!  we never got to the end of the lake trail to find the stone mansion from 1846... maybe next time?  once we actually found the lake (after traveling on forrest trail uphill for over an hour), we made our own trail back to the boat ramp where we started.  leave no trace would be very upset with us.  it was my favorite part of the hike though!  we just blazed a path next to the lake all the way home.  we had some sweet adventures along the way!

the other remarkable event from the weekend, was the fire!  we are totally obsessed with fire.  well, vanessa and i are totally obsessed with fire.  we basically played with it all night.  we were not that crazy.  we kept it in the designated fire pit area.  we just made everyone else nervous i guess...  hey, no one got hurt, and we were no where close to it.  homemade sparklers can be safe, and we proved it... haha!

so that recaps the first camping trip of the season... 

here a couple pics to accent the post.





















e l i z a b e t h

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

bye bye school days!

we're all dressed up!  last day of PT leadership and professionalism class.  we're supposedly ready to own our own business... hmmm....


this is jon's way of having fun while i am busy studying!  i literally rolled out of bed and took my study spot on the couch.  i think i was growing roots into the couch... good thing studying is over!


this is most of my pediatrics elective class on our last day


well... i am officially finished with class!!!

we were all going crazy today before our last test.  we had the whole class doing cartwheels and various other tricks.  it was amazing; i think we should take it on the road! :)  we should gather more often for such events!!!  the tricks, not the tests.  we've had quite enough tests! 

i must say when i walked out of my last test today, i was not feeling the full effects of being totally finished.  i think it will take some time for it to sink in.  we hung around the beloved forbes tower and raided the famous exam snack buffet.  i was not exactly ready to leave, but i am SOOOO glad that i will not take tests anymore!!!  (especially practicals!)   they make my tumbly rumbly!

i think i love school.  i guess that is ovbious since i have been going to school since i was 3!  my mom only had me in pre-school 2 days a week when i was 3, and i asked to go more... haha!

before i start working, there are many fun things on the horizon...

camping this weekend with friends from school at raccoon creek state park.  the weather is supposed to be wonderful!  i am pumped!  good chace to chill out after exams and celebrate earth day too! 

next weekend, our friends katie and shea are coming to visit!  we always love company.  we cannot wait to enjoy the city with y'all!  also, my friend karen and i are hosting a field day at the seminary on saturday.  there is no telling how crazy this could be... haha!  

there will be a couple days of nursery working and hopefully some down time... then i will be a working girl!  children's hospital here i come!  from may 4th until november i will be at the outpatient clinic.  from november to the end of april 2010 i will be at the brand new hospital (or campus rather!).  it is quite an establishment!  i am thrilled :)

hopefully i will be back on the blogging radar now that class is OVER!  there should be some great pics to come!

happy earth day!  get out and play!

e l i z a b e t h 

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

good for you, miss california!

i am sure all of you have heard about this by now... the infamous question that miss california fielded and her response in last weekend's miss usa pageant.

i have a few comments about this whole situation:

1.  everyone has the right to their own opinion. don't ask someone a question about what they think and get mad when they respond with their opinion.  the fact is, the homosexual gossip columnist who asked the question seemed to be digging for an affirmation to back his beliefs.  sorry, buddy, but you didn't get it because some people in this world find that there is a worldview that trumps the fads of culture.

plus, this is america. if you tell someone they are wrong, it is discrimination, which, ironically, is the very thing you are fighting against. it is ridiculous that we have over-defined freedom to the point that there is no freedom.

2.  it is amazing to me that people who are fighting for something, which they identify as 'love', can be so hateful.  the class of one individual in this situation prevailed, while others went to their blogs, called names, and threw temper-tantrum cheap shots. that is just inappropriate, tacky, and childish.

further, shame on those of you who abandoned someone you called a friend because you discovered this person didn't believe the same things that you do, especially when this person called you a friend even though she already knew you held different beliefs than her. but this is how things seem to work, isn't it?  let me suggest that true love and friendship go beyond even the deepest beliefs.  i think some individuals have revealed their true color in all of this and should take time to reflect on it.

3.  i am just flabbergasted that people who want to argue that people are intolerant are themselves so intolerant.  if you want to live in a relativist world where everyone is entitled to their belief, then you must honor everyone's belief.  i have just one thing to say - welcome to your self-created catch-22.  by the way, honoring someone's beliefs means that you shouldn't expect the rest of us to tell you that we agree with you.  we don't.

4.  by the way, just in case you were wondering (since one news report stated otherwise) - miss california does not hold views which are in the minority among her age group, nor even for her liberal state.  i am pretty sure that california voted to uphold true marriage.  this statement was a media-created myth to try to trick people into being like-minded by making the majority feel like outcasts.  we will not be marginalized by your lies.

5.  thank you, miss california, for reminding us of something.  we should never read culture onto scripture.  instead, scripture should inform our understandings of culture.  and based on scripture's nature of Truth, it has some hard teachings. this inherently means that scripture will rub us the wrong way sometimes. if it doesn't, then we aren't reading it correctly.  how many times did people walk away from Jesus because they couldn't adhere to His teachings because it challenged them to live their lives differently... it forced them out of their strongly held incorrect beliefs?

6.  i have realized two things from all of this...

a.  this is all a power struggle.  a minority wants to do something that a majority thinks is wrong, so the minority does anything possible to flip the situation on its head.  as much as our post-modern world hates power (which is interesting because this is exactly what the minority wants), power properly used is not necessarily a bad thing.  power is not meant to dominant and oppress, but it creates boundaries that protect (which in this case are called oppressive in order to look like it is awful... pretty soon inmates will be suing the government for imprisoning them).

at some point we must all face it, we were created finite beings, which necessarily means we are limited.  why?  because God loves limits.  He loves limits because He loves us, and He uses limits to keep us safe.  this is the same way a parent places limits on children to protect them from a world that they do not fully understand.  in doing this, they are not being oppressive but loving. there were limits from the beginning in the garden (think the tree of good and evil). God created things good, but anything good used improperly can be dangerous (just look at electricity!). He knows our tendency to pervert His good creation for evil.  thus the reason God ushered adam and eve out of the garden after the fall - because otherwise they would have been able to eat from the tree of life, allowing them to live indefinitely and keeping them in their sin. once again, God created limits (death in this case by cutting them off from the fountain of youth... which provided God a way to ultimately redeem them from sin).

sexual matters definitely fall into this category. i watched as a young couple, both of whom were fourteen-years-old, sit on the oprah show last week and announce to the world that they were ready to have sex with each other. it is interesting that we don't think these children are mature enough to operate a motor vehicle, but we do think that they are old enough to have sex, which always comes with the potential to create life (when asked, the girl admitted that she didn't want to think about this consequence because it "scared her to death"). wrong!  sex is something God placed boundaries on, not because it is sinful or evil (although, as all else, it is when used wrongly), but because it is so wonderful that when improperly used it can be extremely destructive.  it is not meant to be an outlet for lust but an opportunity for a special intimacy reserved for married couples to bring them together as one flesh. used otherwise, it becomes people using other people as objects to fulfill their desire. it is literally dehumanizing! this is the antithesis of love.

i enjoy candy.  it brings joy to my life, but there has to be limits. otherwise, i end up with diabetes or overweight.  something that could have been enjoyable ends up destroying me. you see, this is what sin is.  it is the crossing of boundaries created for our good.  it is using things that God created good in capacities that they were not created for. the problem is, secular culture, which worships a god it created, thinks it can now define how creation should be used, which obviously suits its own sinful desires.  we are just not having any of it.

b.  from this, i have concluded... 

one side has dominated this whole argument for a long time. it has been controlled with language about rights and love.  this is not an issue of rights and love, though - mainly because this has nothing to do with rights or love. marriage is a privilege and an institution that was created by God, which is defined in Genesis 3. culture, you have no right to define this because God has taken that liberty, as it is His creation. while i am not ignorant and recognize that marriage is also a social institution, it is a social institution explicitly for purposes of procreation.  as homosexual relationships are incapable of this, marriage is an absurd demand (other than trying to claim something that is not your own for "romantic" reasons). further, since God is love and has created marriage (the place for eros, intimate, love) solely between a man and a woman, i think it is a safe bet that eros love has been perverted in any other capacity.

so i would like to suggest this: people who oppose homosexual relationships have been said to be unloving, uncompassionate, out of touch, biased, and a list of other things. these are incorrect assessments, though. i admit that some people are homophobic and hateful, but the rest of us recognize that we love people too much to give in to someone's beliefs (and thus falsely confirm them) when we know these beliefs to be destructive.  we struggle against culture... not to maintain or get power, but to uphold the divinely created boundaries... not out of hate, but out of love.

cheers,
jw <><

Sunday, April 19, 2009

hey! jon's on the news!

jon and the pts praise band led music for a healing service for the stanton heights community, where the three pittsburgh police officers were killed on April 4th.  any way, all the news crews were at the service.

here are the links for the 3 news channels that covered the service...

http://www.wpxi.com/video/19224655/index.html

http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/video/19224353/index.html

there is no audio for this shot...
http://kdka.com/local/fallenheroes/Stanton.Heights.service.2.988811.html

how cool is that!

please continue to keep the community and the families affected by this senseless violence in your prayers.  also, tell the police officers in your community how much you appreciate what they do each day, putting their lives at risk to keep our communities safe.

e l i z a b e t h 




Sunday, April 12, 2009

HAPPY EASTER!!!

this was part of our maunday thursday service at glenshaw.....

Quiet Meditation

How shallow former shadows seem beside this great reverse, as darkness swallows up the light of all the universe.  Creation shivers at the shock, the temple rends its veil.  A pallid stillness stifles time and nature's motions fail.  This is no fantasy, no flight of fervered brain.  With vengence grim, and real, chaos is come again.  The hands that formed us from the soil are nailed upon the cross.  The word that gave us life and breath expires in utter loss.  Yet deep within this darkness lives a LOVE so fierce and free, that arcs all voids and risk supreme! embraces agony.  Its perfect testament is etched in iron, blood and wood.  With awe we glimpse its true import and dare to call it good.
- arranged by Lee Dengler


Christ has died,
Christ is risen,
Christ will come again!

e l i z a b e t h