John Denver’s song title makes an apt title for this Journal entry too, probably my last one until mid-August when I return, also on a jet plane - an Emirates Airbus, the giant A380. But unlike the song lyrics, my bags are not yet packed, nor am I ready to go, and with a return ticket I actually do know when I’ll be back again… er, trusting all goes according to plan.

I know I have flown on many flights, and over great distances, but flying is really not something I look forward to overly much. However, when you live down the very bottom of the planet (”bottom” according to my Northern Hemisphere friends, that is!) then, if you want to go anywhere much, there are not too many options.

I’m told that the odds of myself coming to grief are far more likely on the roads, in a car accident back home, than in any aircraft incident. Statistics are supposed to be comforting here, but two airbuses have recently crashed and nobody on board survived the experience. Oh-oh, I really should not be thinking of that, should I? And they were not the giant A380.

One of the things about flying is that you give up control concerning your life, as you do when having a general anaesthetic, to others plus technology. Sitting in an aircraft 35,000 ft above the Pacific Ocean, I have relinquished control over my life to the people and computers that make sure the sophisticated winged metal tube enclosing me is doing what it is supposed to be doing, and the materials and workmanship relating to that metal tube and all its necessary parts likewise. I have to trust that all will be well, or I’d just not go.

When it comes to trust, I am aware that trust is not just a simple blanket operation that applies to everything for everything - or it should not be in a prudent intelligent being. For instance, I trust my dentist to repair my tooth, but not necessarily to lay a spanner on my car. Likewise, I don’t trust a mechanic to fix my tooth. I do trust both to cause some pain in my wallet, though!

For a Christian there is more to the story than just trusting people and technology. If you believe that God is the creator of all, and that He is Sovereign over His creation as well, then there is sure comfort in knowing that there are no “maverick molecules” - nothing that happens outside His Will for each of us. Everything to do with each of us remains in His hands, so to speak. That does not necessarily mean that any flight I take wont end in disaster, or that He has decreed it to happen if it does (as He has decreed His moral law) except in the sense that He has determined gravity exists, a pull exerted towards Earth’s centre, and that all kinds of unpalatable consequences do occur due to the fallen nature of this world. However, it does mean that He has it all under His control even though people and technology will fail and natural harm will come of that. The only grief that I come to will be what He has allowed to happen, He whose wisdom and love is far greater than I can ever humanly estimate. I cannot even begin to fathom what good things He has in store for me eternally. If I judge His wisdom and love by my own limited human wisdom, I am simply going to come unstuck. So will you too if you say “because this awful thing happened, God did not care” or “God is not in control after all”. You will be stuck in your own limited human perspective, seeing the horizon from the beach and saying there are no ships out there, rather than standing on top of the cliff behind you and seeing the shipping way out to sea.

Because I am human, I naturally want to have a safe trip. I have a son whom I’m leaving behind for the duration, and other family and friends. I pray for a safe journey, and for their safety back home. But I am aware that the unexpected can happen, that plans don’t always work out, that things can change in less than a blink of the eye. I pray and trust that God will keep us all safe from harm, but should harm happen anyway (because that is the nature of this fallen world) then I do know that it did not happen without God being there, but within His wise and loving purpose for us all. Disbelief will give you more pain than necessary, all that is not of faith being sin, and our tiny finite minds are simply not up to the task of judging the wisdom, love and mercy of God.

Dubai and London, here we come! God bless you all, readers of Judah’s Journal, and I plan to be back posting again later in August.

After 4 years of the same, it was surely time for Judah’s Journal to suffer a little redecorating. Those who have visited before, and remembered anything about what they saw, may notice a new header photo, new clickable buttons, and a new appearance to many of the other pages of Judah’s Site.

The Seaward Kaikouras are the eastern aspect of the Southern Alps where they extend down to the rocky coast line in the vicinity of a little fishing village known as Kaikoura. It is very much on the tourist route, a place where folk love to dine on freshly caught crayfish and go out in boats, or up in light aircraft, for a spot of whale watching. It is a very scenic part of the country, and a favourite place of mine. I love the Southern Alps, the mountainous backbone of the South Island of New Zealand. As a South Islander, I like to claim those majestic Alps as my own. Of course they are not… but I do feel as though both they and I belong to each other in some fundamental way. The photo which forms the header for Judah’s Journal, and also for Judah’s Site and each of the website pages, is one that I took recently of those same mountains. I am no climber, but they certainly are great to admire from where I stood with my camera.

Check out the other pages here, especially Judah’s Crafts, by using the clickable buttons at the very bottom of this Judah’s Journal page. Some redecorating has already taken place, but there is still more to come yet.

Well, I would never have thought it! I’ve been keeping this up for four years now and the ink in my pen has not run dry… or not quite, not yet. Since this time last year, there have been added a further 40 posts and 72 comments. Not great in numbers by any means, but it has been estimated that there are more than 200 million former bloggers (and probably a great many more by the minute) who have ceased posting to their online diaries after the initial novelty had worn off. I’m not one of them yet.

What happens to “dead” blogs? I hear they become “dotsam” and “netsam” - that is, unwanted objects bobbing around out there in cyberspace, the cyber equivalent of flotsam and jetsam.

I recently received one of those spam comments that had glowing praise for my posts, then asked the reason for the existence of Judah’s Journal. The person (or robot?) claimed to live in Latvia (that might have been so) but his IP address was based in Amsterdam and using a network widely known in association with spamming problems. However, the reason for the existence of Judah’s Journal is clearly set out right here. Four years on and that is still the purpose to which I write.

This beautiful scene was the view from the home of friends we visited recently. I was just so sorry that I didn’t have my camera ready to take a series of shots as the sun went down behind my beloved snow-capped Southern Alps, the reflections off the snow and off the water so perfectly mirroring the amazing colours of this glorious setting of the sun the other evening. It became dark very quickly, almost like a Tropical sunset, but the show was even more amazing for the swiftness of the changing light. We are told that God reveals Himself to us generally through His creation, and this revelation of His glory was suitably spectacular!

But where did August go? In two more days it will be September, officially NZ’s first day of Spring. It has been an icy cold winter, some of the coldest temperatures recorded here for a long time. We were fortunate to have six weeks of heat wave in the USA during some of those coldest days, but it was a shock to the system to return to the winter we have been having.

One good thing about the cold has been the necessity to keep moving in order to keep warm. Back in January I launched my new lifestyle of walking for miles and miles every day. It has not been hard to do. I have some e-friends (Internet friends) who have been doing it too. One of them is walking the length of her home state, Michigan. No, you wont find her out there trudging along somewhere beside the I 75, but she is tallying up the steps she takes each day and figures it will likely take her a whole year to do the required number, walking around her local neighbourhood. Just now she has been grounded by a blister and her doctor’s stern words, but some of us are about to roll her over to get her upright and on her way again. Go for it, Donna!

I was walking about 6 miles a day along the beach until the winter weather set in. Not being great at doing it in the bucketing rain, I bought myself a treadmill. It has all kinds of bells and whistles but was small enough to fit through a door and so resides in the corner of a spare bedroom, properly installed and fully operational. Far from rusting under a bed, as so many of these things eventually do, this one is pressed into service every day. The motivation for me is my iPod. I think I would give up from sheer boredom if it wasn’t for the delights of today’s amazing technologies. This keeps me walking… and walking, and walking.

Over here on this page I have made mention of the podcasts that are available for those who wish to further their Christian education and spiritual growth. I have found two Theological Seminary Colleges that provide free podcasts of their course lectures, a treasure trove of gold for Christians with a desire to learn. I have all their available courses now on my iPod, plus many of the lectures of Dr R.C. Sproul, theologian and teacher, of Ligonier Ministries, and Dr John Robbins of The Trinity Foundation. My iPod is positively bulging!

There are lots of benefits to walking. As a diabetic required to take hypoglycaemics to stay well, I have been able to reduce the dosage considerably these past few months. Needing to be very careful with what I eat anyway, I am enjoying a generally more healthy situation through these safe daily work-outs. The beach with the screeching gulls, scuttering clouds, salty sea breezes and crunching shells underfoot still attracts me on fine days. It can feel so good to be alive, to be part of this incredible world, and to be learning from the Big Picture of it at the same time.

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
~ Psalm 19:1

Judah’s Journal is three years old today! I had not given a thought three years ago to that I would still be writing stuff for an online diary in three year’s time, but neither did it occur to me that I might have stopped by then too. There were no great plans or ambitions. It was just a fun thing to do. Time passes, and here we are… still going strong.

A year ago there had been 157 entries, 382 comments, and visits from over 70 different countries representing over 40 different languages. A new statistics program was installed but has not been working properly. However, I can claim there to be an additional 44 entries and 100 comments. My output has slowed a little, and it does come in waves, like little energy surges. Determined by appearances alone, Wikipedia calls these episodes of “blogstipation”, assuming a state of inability to think of any topic to blog about, and leading to irregular, strained blog entries. Such a condition may be followed by a sudden unblockage caused by a “blenema”, or interesting event, and occasionally a rush of subsequent entries known as “blogorrhea”.

But to say that of Judah’s Journal is perhaps being a little hypochondriacal and rather extravagent. I have never really been stuck for things to write about, but more often than not, overwhelmed by the amount of what there is to be said instead. As a primarily Christian blog, there is much to report in this post-Christian era which is fast becoming what was predicted by the late Dr Francis Schaeffer, an anti-Christian era. Thus there is much to say, and none of it likely to be popular at that. But popularity is not that important to me. What is far more important is Truth, and understanding that it is indeed objectively knowable inspite of what fashionable postmodern thought would have us believe. The truth is that which corresponds to reality, and although we may all have a perspective on reality, perspectives do not change the facts and substance of reality itself. In the end it is how we respond to reality that will determine what becomes of us, now and way beyond now. Most of us live in states of varying degrees of denial. Reality is not changed by any degree of denial. It takes courage to face the truth, and this Age is largely a cowardly one. I don’t expect to be popular for saying such a thing, but neither do I consider myself answerable to anyone other than He who claimed to be the Truth Himself.

Nope, no hypochondiasis here. No blogstipation with rebounding blogorrhea. Just whatever bubbles up and froths forth, digital tappings upon my keyboard, on whichever of those days that distractions don’t detain me. So launching into a fourth year of cruising cyberspace, off goes I in Judah’s Journal.

If you listen to quilters chatting among themselves you will often hear them talking about their UFOs and sometimes also calling them WIPs. No, these are not those weird sightings in the sky that have the scoffers irritating the convinced observers, and vice versa. These are those projects that were started and then stopped, put away, sometimes forgotten, but often causing little twinges of conscience when their numbers begin to mount up - as they invariably tend to do. They are the Un Finished Objects, the Works In Progress.

Like most quilters, I also have some UFOs and WIPs. Just lately I have got up the courage to face them again, and to work through each one to completion. I managed three last month, all full-size bed quilts. Today I hauled out another one - the one in the photo here - and discovered why it was I had put it down in the first place. The top and bottom borders were cut just a little too short, one whole inch short either end. It is an appliqué quilt, which means those flowerpots of flowers, those vines and leaves, are all cut from different fabrics and sewn to the fabric underneath. The vines are sewn with the very finest of silk thread such that the tiny stitches can barely be seen, and the leaves, flowers and the pot are sewn more boldly with a buttonhole stitch and thick variegated coloured cottons to make them more obvious. A lot of work has gone into it already, and I can remember now how dismayed I was to find I had cut those end borders too short. But these things happen occasionally, and there is usually a way to recover if one doesn’t give up. I had put it away because “out of sight, out of mind” and I didn’t want to be reminded of my heartbreaking mistake. How much easier it is to walk away from things, rather than to face them and work through them. Making quilts can be pretty much like “real life” in that way.

Seeing it again today, a remedy jumped out at me! It will involve going back and unpicking just a few inches of the vine on either end, shortening the piece further, and stitching a new square of background fabric into each corner such that it will look as though it was really meant to be that way all along. Now why hadn’t I seen that “fix” in the first place? I was too disappointed, I guess. But now it seems all so obvious.

There is a little more appliqué work to do to the top border, then the “fix”, then something more to each corner - the vine carried around to join full circle, more leaves and flowers. I know how I will finish it off - with a wool batting, straight machine “in the ditch” quilting, hand quilting around the appliqué parts, and tied by tiny contrasting coloured buttons sewn through all layers in the centre of each flower. It promises to look really good when all done. And now I am off with new energy and purpose. This WIP is soon to be a UFO no longer.

A Quilt Gallery has recently been added to Judah’s Site on this page here. As my number of UFOs reduce, you may expect this gallery to grow. There is not a great pile of them, but I am not saying anything about those other secret things every quilter knows about… the fabric stash. That has to be for another day.

Meanwhile, the quilter’s motto: If life gives you scraps, make a quilt from them.

Over the Easter weekend I spent some time doing what I have needed to do for quite a while… that is, refresh the pages of Judah’s Site, the five pages of this website outside of Judah’s Journal. You can get to those pages by either clicking on the little buttons found at the very bottom of this page, or on the words Judah’s Site on the left-hand navigational side-bar under the heading “Some Favourite Links”.

I have brought up to date all of the content on those five pages, added some more text and more photos too. On the Crafts page there is now a Quilt Gallery with a few of the quilts I have made. I may add more as I finish and photograph them. The Faith page has been edited, and there are now links to free mp3 lectures by Christian theologians and apologists Dr William Lane Craig, Dr Ravi Zacharias, and Dr R. C. Sproul. All are solidly orthodox Biblical Christians who are very good teachers, well known and well respected. The Poetry page has a few more original poems and pictures. And the Judah page… well, there was not much of note to change there.

I hope everyone had as much fun over the weekend with the Easter Bunny as these babies below. They certainly knew what was the right and proper thing to do with the cultural mythology of the season!

It has been some time since my last entry although I may go back and add a few retrospectively to February - ones that were started back then but not finished. Now it is Easter weekend, already March, and Autumn as well. What happened? I simply ran out of steam. Family “stuff” has siphoned off much of my energy, and catching up with “the chores” taken much of my time. Friends have been hinting, encouraging, and some wondering where I have got to. Nope, I’ve not fallen off the face of the earth… or let go from clinging by my little bat-feet to the underbelly of the planet, as one Northern Hemisphere friend likes to think of me doing!

This morning an email “from a Judah’s Journal visitor” popped into my Inbox. It was sent by Tom and was short and sweet, but great encouragement. He wrote “Your site is wonderful, keep it going.” Thank you Tom. I will keep it going, and it is messages like yours that certainly helps when going through one of those times that are tough.

Judah’s Journal is part of my greater website, Judah’s Site. In case you have not already done so, check out where those clickable little buttons right at the very bottom of this page will take you. As well as adding more entries to my Journal, my intention over the next few weeks is to update and refresh all those other pages as well. There is much to be added to all of them.

I have a number of friends who share my interests in crafts, and just recently a few of them have taken up blogging as well. There is a new group of links added over to the left of here - “Crafty Blogs and Websites”. Do check them out if you have an interest in craft things as well. These are very talented people who have been online friends of mine for several years now.

Right, that is my “what’s up in here” update for now. With Tom’s encouragement, and that of other friends as well, I will be back soon with more entries to Judah’s Journal… and more on those other pages as well.

Judah’s Journal was born two years ago today. It began rather tentatively as something of an experiment. Secretly I didn’t think I would keep it going for long. I hadn’t a clue what I might write about, nor where the adventure would take me. Over the two years since, it has evolved into something I never imagined - a witness for Christ, a resource for Christian apologia, and a further resource for information on the reality of Islam’s threat to the western world, all sprinkled with a little music, quilting, other odd topics and numerous images.

To date there are 157 entries, 382 comments, and while I don’t have a working stats program at present, it has in the past received visits from over 70 different countries representing over 40 different languages. It continues to generate interesting correspondence from people who prefer to communicate by email rather than post comments, and it receives much good press which has been really encouraging. One of the most common remarks is that it is a very pretty site. It has also been described as well organized, and that it contains a wealth of helpful information. I have had the odd suggestion for improvement, and one was the addition of Bible software - thus the clickable links to Bible Gateway, e-Sword and InstaVerse which can be found in the left-hand side bar.

So where to next?

I don’t have any great plans for Judah’s Journal. I write things when I can, and when something begs to be written. For the time being it just exists, and hopefully provides an interesting resting place for cyber travellers who happen upon it. It hasn’t always been easy to keep going as I do contemplate the seeming arrogance in thinking that others might ever want to read anything I write, but when I slacken off, the messages start coming - where are you Judah? And as someone born with ink in her veins, who thinks with her keyboard, it does get hard to stay away for too long.

So the first two years have come and gone. I wonder if it will still be around in another two years? Can you wait that long with me to see? If you are reading this now, I hope you drop in again many times thereafter, and perhaps be here with me again should Judah’s Journal have further birthdays and turn three, and four, and five…

For some, writing a Journal or a diary becomes a bind, a burden, even a monster which has insatiable demands for one’s attention. Fortunately this has not been the case here. In fact, it reminds me of the words that Jesus reportedly said:

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
(Matthew 11:28-30)

It has been a pleasure and a blessing to present this witness for He who would simplify our lives and lighten our burdens if we would only heed His counsel. And before I blow out my two candles, I wish to mention my gratitude to a certain friend who lead me to his Lord and Master, and who has graciously shared his bandwidth with me, providing technical support and setting me off on this fun adventure. Thank you DKC, Mr Visiblesoul, my Christian brother and friend.

Yesterday I received a very nice surprise from my friend and fellow blogger, Mark Alexander, who announced that he has nominated Judah’s Journal for the “Thinking Blogger Award”. Criterion for nomination is that the blog concerned had made one think. It isn’t specified exactly what the blog concerned made one think, but just that it did. I suspect in Mark’s case it was probably good things that it made him think, but regardless of what they were, I am very pleased that it caused such a response in him anyway.

The way the Award works is like a game of Tag. Now that I have been tagged, I am “it” and allowed to nominate 5 blogs that made me think. Again, nothing is required to be said about what they made me think - just that they surely did so. However, I am not a great blog-reader and I don’t think I even read 5 blogs, or not on any regular basis, so I intend to nominate a couple less than five but instead say a little more about what they made me think in order to make up for the deficiency. Those whom I nominate are then “tagged” and if they accept nomination, should go ahead and nominate their own choice of five, linking back to Judah’s Journal as the previous tagger. This form of tagging does not involve spray-cans of paint, nor the Police, nor upset citizens - it is relatively safe, moral and legal to go ahead. If one accepts nomination, one is expected to post the little Award logo/banner as well (which I did just now - later - when Mark kindly pointed that out to me).

Mark’s own blog, A New Dark Age Is Dawning, causes me to think about the worrisome encroachment of Islam into western civilization and the very real dangers that this presents all of us who do not want Sharia law forced upon us. It is scary stuff, thinking about that, but cannot be avoided if you are to take a realistic look at what is happening out there in our world.

Anyway, now I am nominating for this prestigious Award the following blogs (in alphabetical order):

Covenant Theology - Puritan Lad (Scott) expounds and elucidates a traditional exegesis of Scripture in a very clear and sensible manner. He debunks a lot of the cultural infestations that cause a corruption of true Christian belief and offers much tasty and nutritious food for thought.

Omnipotentgrace - August (John) does something quite similar to Puritan Lad’s blog (indeed, they post and/or comment to each other’s blogs at times) and when it comes to sustaining food for thought, offers further menu items for the discerning diner. Jesus told Peter “Feed my sheep” (John 21:18) and these two blogs most certainly do that.

Toward the Goal - John (a different one) shares his Christian journey with experiences and discoveries from Bible studies, his delightful little family (check out the photos of the very recent new addition!) and events in wider Baptist Church circles. John, you’re tagged too, haha!

OK you three, CONGRATULATIONS! on being nominated for this most prestigious Thinking Blogger Award.

The lovely picture below is again the Southern Alps of New Zealand, taken from across the foreshore of the east coast South Island fishing village of Kaikoura.

Every so often I go through phases of thinking “what on earth am I doing this for?” and feel like walking away from my website, full of doubts about it’s usefulness to anyone. This is not a crisis of personal faith (doubting the truth claims of Christianity) since that remains strong throughout such times, but more about the worthiness of myself to have anything to say to anyone else, and how much it matters… that kind of thing. So I don’t post for a little while, going off to play at other things, and before I know it my Inbox is receiving emails from all over the place - people who don’t necessarily make comments on-line but who want to tell me what my site has meant to them, or to ask a faith-type question, or to give encouragement and blessings. How can I walk away from that? And so it seems I get turned right around and told to get back to the job.

Up until such time that a Christian friend pointed me to the writings of some great Christian apologists I had no idea that our Faith was so substantial. And that’s just it… our Christian Faith does not substitute for something real, rational, intelligent. True Faith actually is all of those things - real, rational, intelligent - and often more so than worldly knowledge, since it goes well beyond this present earthly existence of ours and addresses the eternal reality. Truth is that which corresponds to reality, and the truth of the Christian Faith corresponds to eternal reality embedded in our Creator Father God. Believe on that and you are leaning on a rock and cannot fall over. Believe on man-made cultural constructs and a crisis can knock you flat.

I have heard the Bible disregarded as a collection of old books written by man and for use as a guideline only. That description saddens me as I know the Bible to be far more than that. There is objective truth about God in Scripture. It is revealed truth. It is proving very difficult to discover God by scientific means, unless you realize that science reveals knowledge of Him through the vehicle of His creation. But when it comes to the Bible, if you let it do so, you will notice that what you read can “ring true” spiritually - not all of it all the time since it is a journey of discovery rather than a time machine to some immediate destination. A healthy scepticism is useful as it stops one from being gullible, but to toss the whole thing out as “just some old guidelines” is to throw away the greatest written account that we have of God and the Christian Faith. Just because something is not immediately understood does not mean that it can never be understood, is not understandable, or is nonsense, or false - nor even self contradictory. More often than not it means one’s own knowledge is lacking instead.

The content of Judah’s Journal is copyright. If you are NOT reading this on Judah’s Journal, then it has been copied from there and is re-published illegally - in other words, stolen. Those who would do that are common thieves and lack moral integrity. Judah’s Journal

Christian Apologetics may be defined simply as the defence of the Christian Faith. In fact, it is more than just a defence. Different apologists have emphasized different functions of apologetics, but generally these include the presentation of a rational basis for faith, the answering of objections of unbelief, the challenge and refutation of non-Christian beliefs, and the persuasion that goes beyond intellectual assent such that the other tests the credibility of Christian truth claims for himself. One of the first Christian apologists was the Apostle Paul, and another was Luke, writer of his Gospel and also the Acts of the Apostles, and another John. Paul words his message to appeal to the ears of his listeners, to speak in terms by which they will best understand, although in doing so he does not dilute or distort the message itself. Paul comments on this himself where he says…

1 Corinthians 9:19 Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.
20 To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law.
21 To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law.
22 To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some.
23 I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

And of course Peter gives the classic biblical statement for the Christian mandate to engage in apologetics with his words that I have written on the image at the top of this post. We are always to be prepared to give an answer.

Since the writings of the Christian apologists persuaded my own belief and strengthened my own faith considerably, I have used my website to build a resource where others may also find the answers they seek, encouragement, and support in their own Christian witness. I take no credit for the work of others, but simply offer a list of links to a number of excellent sites where this apologia is found. Look on the left-hand side bar of this page to find the heading “Christian Apologia and Theology” and a list of no less than 18 sites loaded with gold. You most certainly wont be short of some fascinating reading that should bless you greatly on your journey in faith.

On my page Just what is it about Islam? I recently posted a disclaimer concerning a misrepresentation of me made on a forum to which I am not a member nor had previously visited. I discovered it by tracking back on a link that appeared in my Journal statistics. It was probably the result of an unfortunate misunderstanding on the part of an otherwise well-meaning person who posted there and I am sure it was not intended to cause any mischief. However, some false claims were made of me that I have never made of myself. It is not particularly pleasant to find oneself criticized for things one has never said nor done, and I wanted to set the record straight on Judah’s Journal so that readers know what is the truth and what is not. It does highlight the need to take care when making statements about others, and being sure that one has understood and can substantiate any claims that are made.

One of the authors I have referenced in my comments on Islam is Robert Spencer. He is committed to exposing the facts about Islam and the prophet of Islam. However, in doing so, he receives considerable flak from Muslims who resent what he writes and accuse him of disseminating lies based on hatred and fear. It is important for the reader to regard critically all such protests that set about trying to discount this kind of information. Many who protest are Muslims who want to present a nicer side to Islam. They themselves may truly and wholeheartedly believe their version of Islam to be the truth, but it is a version that is at variance with the facts highlighted by these authors noted here and on websites beyond this one. Some of these Muslims have adopted a “moderate version” of Islam and claim that the “radicalized” Islam of the Middle East is not true Islam. However, there is much to be said about this position as the “moderate” believers do little (if anything) to defy their own Muslim brotherhood whose beliefs and behaviours are such a cause for concern, and much else is also denied in the face of objective reality. The claim that these authors are spreading lies and have an agenda based on hatred and unrealistic fear is unfounded. Objective reality demonstrates very clearly that reasonable fear of Islam is not unrealistic and that the facts are proven truthful, substantiated both by world events and Muslims themselves. One must really question the agenda of those “moderate” Muslims who deny that it is the case and insist upon a benign interpretation of Islam instead.

In Robert Spencer’s latest book, The Truth about Muhammad, he discusses why the truth about the prophet of Islam really matters. Was Muhammad a figure of compassion and peace, or was he a violent and evil murderer, warmonger and paedophile? Spencer discusses this issue by drawing on information from solely Muslim sources, and he says that it matters greatly because…

- for if he was indeed a man of peace, one may reasonably hope that his example would become the linchpin of reform efforts in the Islamic world that would eventually roll back the influence of jihad terrorists. If he really championed democracy and equality of the sexes, one could profitably invoke his example among Muslims, who revere him as the highest example of human behavior, to work for these ideals in the Islamic world. But if the jihad terrorists are correct in invoking his example to justify their deeds, then Islamic reformers will need to initiate a respectful but searching re-evaluation of the place Muhammad occupies within Islam - a vastly more difficult undertaking.

This post is not intended as a complete review of Robert Spencer’s newly published book, but it is possible that I will publish my review of it here very soon. Meanwhile, it needs to be said that the truthful portrayal of Muhammad is the critical measure of Islam and whether it can be regarded as the religion of peace and tolerance as claimed by “moderate” Muslims who constantly criticize and discount the exposure of Islam by writers such as Spencer, or as the religion of violent hatred and intolerance which is evidenced by world events and what we so often read in the Qur’an and the Hadith.

After a little bit of reshuffling, the page for Book Reviews has now disappeared to be replaced by a new Category for Book Reviews instead. See the navigation bar to the left of where you are reading now, or click here.

Three new book reviews, ones I had written and published elsewhere during November 2005, have now been added to this category. They are three books by Lee Strobel, namely his “The Case for a Creator“, “The Case for Faith“, and “The Case for Christ“. Taken together, you might like to think of them as Christian Apologia 101. They are great basic entry level introductions to Christian Apologetics, the field of knowledge involved in producing a rational and intelligent case for the truth claims of Christianity.

Lee Strobel, a former atheist and now devout Christian, has a Master of Studies in Law degree from Yale Law School and was the award winning legal editor of the Chicago Tribune. He has brought his skills as a legal investigative journalist to the examination of evidence in support of the Christian faith, asking wellknown Christian Biblical scholars for their answers to some of the toughest questions asked of Christianity.

These books are well worth reading to sure up one’s own faith and deal with any little niggling doubts, to help you provide answers to the searching questions of others, and to recommend as worthwhile non-technical (and not too heavy) reading material to anyone interested in these subjects. It is definitely the case that one does not need to drop 30+ IQ points in order to become a Christian. It is not at all a matter of faith filling in the gaps where mankind lacks knowledge. A belief in the truth claims of Christianity is a very rational and intelligent decision, and for those with doubts about that, a read of these books may well dispell them. So read them if you dare!

The First of September is the first day of Spring down the bottom end of the planet. NZ’s national tree is the Kowhai which comes into bloom around now with masses of yellow flowers often photographed against an azure sky, a spectacular curtain fall to the last dreary days of winter.

These images are my own, photos I have taken of the tree outside the window of my Happy Room. Those who know me personally know that my Happy Room is also my quilt studio and from where I write to my friends around the world. Judah’s Journal has been a little neglected as of late with the pressure of real life events taking up time and leaving little space for much else. It is still nice to see that visitors have continued to call despite no new postings, and they often come as a result of searches on a wide range of subjects, Professor Google frequently pointing them this way. Of note has been the interest in Mother Teresa and her lovely simple little poem to be found here. Mother Teresa was a very special person, a saint by virtue of her salvation in Christ, a saint in modern secular terms, and a Saint by recognition of the Church. If you have not seen it yet, there is a DVD worth watching that tells the story of her life.

Spring is the season of new beginnings, new life and new hope. There is much in the world that is wrong, a source of gloom and despair for those serious thoughts when it seems nothing will stop “the forces of darkness” from overwhelming and taking over. I’ve noticed a new definition by some regarding whom they think is “the Anti-Christ” and where once many said it was the Pope or the Roman Catholic Church (which I have always privately thought rather silly) now I am hearing that it is Islam instead. I am not clued-up on these matters and prefer to stay out of the debate.

I notice that there are visitors to Judah’s Journal from several different Islamic countries ~ I have counted 16 so far, Islamic countries that is, and there may be more. If you are a Muslim reading these pages, then please know that they are not written with any hatred towards you as a person. An objective study of Islam does give much cause for alarm. Any belief system forced on another is a violation of that person’s freedom to choose. If you as a Muslim were forced to abandon your dearly held beliefs and made to confess those of another under pain of torture and death, would that not concern you as well? But the verse of the sword in your Qur’an says “But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the Pagans wherever ye find them, and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war)…..” (Surah 9:5) and “O ye who believe! Fight the Unbelievers who gird you about, and let them find firmness in you: and know that Allah is with those who fear Him” (Surah 9:123). These verses abrogate the gentle verse you prefer us to know, namely “But there is no compulsion in religion” (Surah 2:256). Christianity is never to be forced on another. That goes against everything that it is about. The freedom to choose gives one personal responsibility, and the denial of that is to take it away making one less of a person.

But what of new beginnings? It is hard sometimes to shelve these considerable concerns; they are weighty to bear. But in many ways they are like everything else in that too much of something causes a shift in balance that may not be helpful. We need some respite from the weariness of the journey, the anxieties and fears that would soon have us depressed and unable to go on. Like reading a book all weekend and not looking beyond will have your vision so fuzzy that you can’t see to drive. Or too much candy which will make you as sick as green apples, or too much sun burns and blisters your skin. With all the concerns around us, there is a great need to be able to “take time out” and put it aside for a while. For me there is nothing like being out in the garden early in the morning as the little dewey buds spread their new petals to greet the sun that rises each day. Yay, that’s me, a nature junkie!

And a poetry junkie as well. The following is one of my most loved poems of all time, written by my favourite poet of all time:

A new Category has been added to the left-hand side bar for Book Reviews. At the moment just one book is reviewed there, but I hope to add more in future.

The first book to be reviewed is one that I believe everybody should read. No, it is not the Bible but it does contain some very important information for this day and age. It is about the dawning of a new age, a dark age, one that is threatening to become worryingly real should we not do something to prevent this reversal of our enlightenment. But enough of an introduction. If you are intrigued at all, hop over there to the left, click on “Book Reviews” and all will be revealed.

You are invited to read and if you wish, to register and contribute discussion to as well, the posts made to the most recent subject on the Visiblesoul Forum.

This subject concerns the restriction of free speech when it comes to religions, beginning with Islam and the recent conviction of someone in a German court, and the possible repercussions this may have for the exclusive claims to salvation of Christianity itself.

When you scroll to the bottom of this Journal page, you will come across seven small clickable buttons, each of them with a name on the same little background picture.
The picture is that of the altar and the view through the altar window of the Church of the Good Shepherd, Lake Tekapo, in the south of the South Island of New Zealand.
If you first came to my Journal by a direct route from elsewhere, you may not have realized that it is part of my larger website that includes five other pages. You are invited to visit those other pages as well.

The seventh button takes you to the Visiblesoul Christian Website from which my website and Journal are hosted.

A new feature has just been added to Judah’s Journal. Thank you DKC.
There is now a form available by which you may email me a message should you wish to do so.
You can find it over there on the left-hand sidebar under “Pages”.
A response will be on it’s way as soon as all the interruptions give me half a chance!

Well peoples, I would like to draw everyone’s attention to the comments posted to the previous Journal entry. If those who wish would like to take a peek, that will save me from bringing any of them to the “front page” here.

After the serious stuff that has gone before, it is possibly time for a bit of light-hearted liplabour or my reputation will be getting one-sided… and also distorted since many of my online friends know me quite differently again, finding they need to watch where they put their legs or one will be found longer than the other.

Oh, Nooningscaup? Just an old word referring to the labourer’s resting time after dinner.

Playing with AltaVista’s Babel Fish automated translation service the other day reminded me of all the good laughs you can have playing with words. Babel Fish might know a lot of languages, but it takes a very technical approach that can provide for hilarious reading. If you need cheering up, try writing a little paragraph in the textarea box then choose a language into which you would like your paragraph translated. Don’t worry that the result means nothing to you - unless you already know that language - and then click again to have it translated into yet another language you don’t know. And now for the fun part. Ask Babel Fish to convert what it came up with back into English. Was that really what you said in the beginning? What on earth could you have been thinking?

As a kid we used to play a game with a storybook (Alice in Wonderland was always a good choice) and a box of little cards each with one noun written upon them. One person was the designated reader and would start reading, stopping each time when coming to a noun, and we would take it in turns to supply a substitute noun from the box. The reader would continue as though nothing was amiss, and often the more fluent the process, the more bizarre the story, and it would often become so funny that the “round” ended when we all rolled around on the floor cracked up with laughter. For some reason the vision of a Duchess sitting on a guinea pug and nursing a knitting needle once had me in stitches. I don’t know if kids ever play these games anymore, unless there is a digitalized version of it online somewhere around. No doubt Google knows where they are.

Cleaning out my computer files I came across a couple of attempts I once made at rewriting Wordsworth. Being rather a fan of his, I can’t think why I was rewriting him, but it was probably a bit of verbal doodling while waiting in between interruptions, my life being full of those and giving rise sometimes to a mindset of distractions.

Sorry Wordsworth
©Judah

I wandered lonely as a shroud
Looking for a ghost to wear
When all at once a shriek so loud
Sounded in my startled ear
My weakened knees and fluttering heart
Had me feeling none too smart

And then an echo echoed long
Followed by an eerie wail
That stretched into a hideous song
Of spooks and wraiths beyond the pale
My stomach heaved and I was sick
And ran away almighty quick

(er, try again…)

Sorry again, Wordsworth
©Judah

I wandered lonely as a shroud
Looking for a ghost to clothe
When suddenly an echo loud
Of shrieks and moans around behove
That I had stumbled on a wake
A party of the dead forsake

These night time wanderings I must stop
They do my wits not one bit good
If sleep would not escape to drop
My mind into this haunted wood
I might have more that’s sense to make
Some rhyming words of worth to spake

Oh Wordsworth I have let you down
This fan of yours in pensive mood
Is vacant when the words don’t crown
Inspiring thoughts in solitude
And all she hears are eerie cries
Of creatures that volatilize

(end)

Yes, well. I don’t think Wordsworth is easily improved upon.
But enough of this nonsense.
Would you prefer some more serious stuff next time? OK, I’ll see what I can do.

Judah’s Journal is part of my website, Judah’s Site.
Judah’s Site is hosted by a Christian website, visiblesoul.org, which has a number of features including a Christian Forum.
There is a clickable link to my parent website at the very bottom right of each page of my site including this Journal.

Since we have a pre-existing Forum for the discussion of Christian and related topics, I would like to make use of this feature when comments to any of my Journal posts appear to be developing into more of a discussion or debate than just comments alone.

This will be experimental at first since I have not combined use of the Forum with my Journal up until now. I think it is fun to try out new things and see how well they might work. Sometimes they are a total flop, in which case they can be abandoned. But I would like to try this idea to see what happens.

Since my previous post, being on a Christian topic, received a reasonably large number of comments and took on more the appearance of a discussion, I have transferred a copy of the main comments to a new topic thread within the Visiblesoul Christian Forums. A clickable link is provided in the last comment to that post.

Everyone is welcome to go take a look over there, and to post a response if you like. You may register there in order to post under your chosen internet name - see here for more information including how to do that.
The board is moderated. Posting privileges for Guests are dependant upon the continued goodwill and good behaviour of those who use this privilege. Again, this is experimental.

[Later edit: Posting privileges are no longer available for Guests due to an influx of spam. Registration is required just as it was to post comments to Judah's Journal.]

There is no “hidden agenda” in doing this other than simply making use of the existing Forum of my parent website, and strengthening the relationship between my site and the parent site.

Mark, I would especially like your comments since it was mainly your comments to my previous post that precipitated this move.
Well folks, what do ya think?

Oopsy!

I think I have it working now…

If you had tried before to register to make a comment, I am sorry you were turned away.
You are very welcome to post a comment now that feature has been enabled.
As much as I am quite happy seemingly talking to myself, it is also nice to hear from others who pop in to visit when they do.

It is Election Day today here in NZ. Some are calling it D Day… as in Desperation Day.
Two major political parties are slugging it out, both neck-a-neck with each other. The incumbent government is off to the left, the opposition party is off to the right. There are other small parties dotted all over the place, but one which is more-or-less centre, or as about centre as you can get here, is a the largest of the smaller ones and will likely be the “kingmaker” with regards the outcome.

So, we are in for a fun evening tonight, watching all the TV hype as the results come trickling in. I must check that I have a good wine chilling in the fridge, and some handy snacks to help us sustain the energy while we laugh and groan as the various runners tumble over each other towards the finish line.

And now I must trot off to the nearest polling booth and do my own little scrap of duty in this matter.

Judah’s Journal is a phoenix from out of the ashes

Last week I finished coding my new website, rather unimaginatively named Judah’s Site, a whole five pages now up and aglow, hosted on visiblesoul.org. You are welcome to visit if you came here direct, and the link buttons are there at the very bottom of this page. My blog originally had another name and was hosted a little further afield. Now it is all here together, artfully skinned by DKC to match the rest of my site. With a new look and new features, it is all set to go once again.

And what is the point of all this? Why have a website, and why publish a journal?

“We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But if that drop was not in the ocean, I think the ocean would be less because of that missing drop. I do not agree with the big way of doing things.” Mother Teresa, 1910-1997

We are what we eat, and we are influenced by what we read. A tiny drop from this small part of the cyber-ocean may not slake a thirst, but it will point to a fountain that can.