I don’t know if you remember this meme or not, but I thought I’d bring it back to try and give people something to blog about on Mondays. Please join in!
All you have to do is answer the questions below either in the comment section, or on your blog. And elaborate! Make these questions show your unique and special personalities. This meme entry will post at 12:01 every Monday morning and will be the first postentry listed on WFK all day Monday. (This is an all-day Monday meme, so please, play all day!)
August 2nd Questions:
1. What’s the best fortune you found within a fortune cookie? Did it ever come true?
2. What’s your favorite commercial? What is it about this commercial that you like? (Find it on YouTube and link it on your blog!)
3. What’s a word you always misspell?
4. How would a woman president be different from a man?
5. Bonus: Write a caption, poem or short story inspired by this picture:
This post is to my fellow Missourians, though this certainly applies to the rest of the country as well for I daresay your states may be trying something similar in November.
It’s concerning the debacle that is Obamacare.
The vast majority of us don’t want it. We don’t want to be forced into buying something we do not want. We don’t appreciate how this administration is trying to take our freedom of choice away from us – we are intelligent beings, only WE know what is good for us, we don’t need no stinkin’ government jamming their ideology down our throats and running our lives for us – we are exercising our freedom of DISAGREEING with our federal government.
On August 3rd, (as in THIS TUESDAY!!) Missourians have a chance to take some of our health care control back. At the very least, if passed, Prop C will hinder our federal government from penalizing Missourians if we opt out of purchasing health care insurance.
From the Missourians for Health Care Freedom website:
What does the Health Care Freedom Act do?
The Health Care Freedom Act will preserve and protect the rights of individuals to make their own health care and health insurance choices. Specifically, it would protect the rights of patients to pay directly for medical services, and it would prohibit any individual or employer from being penalized for not purchasing government-defined health insurance.
Why should Missouri protect the right of patients to pay directly for medical care?
Single-payer systems, like in Canada, make it illegal for citizens to go outside of the government’s health care plan and contract for their own medical services. The Health Care Freedom Act would make this fundamental provision of single-payer health care unlawful.
Why does Missouri need the Health Care Freedom Act?
Efforts within the Federal Government threaten to put complete control over individual’s health care in the hands of government bureaucrats, partisan politicians, and appointed “experts.” Government control means you will have less freedom to make the health care choices that are best for you and your family. Patients should have the right to pay directly for medical services with their own money. That’s because when consumers control the dollars, the patient makes the medical treatment decisions. When the government controls the dollars, they make treatment decisions based on what’s best for the government, not what’s best for the patient.
Preserving the rights of patients to pay directly for medical care ensures that patients–not government bureaucrats–decide which doctor to see or what medical treatment to choose.
Does supporting the Health Care Freedom Act mean that I am against health reform?
Absolutely not! The Health Care Freedom Act simply states that the cornerstone of any future health care reform must be the preservation and protection of the right of individuals to make their own health care choices without fear of penalty and/or fines.
Every Sunday I provide videos and valuable links to the Truth or Tradition teachings. We’ve been following the Truth or Tradition teachings for many years now and they have truly blessed our family. We have found peace and happiness through our beliefs and we walk confidently for God. My hope, by passing on this information to you, is that what you find here, or on the Truth or Tradition website, will guide you to a better, more blessed and abundant life.
If you would like to read my views on religion and how we got started with the ministry, you can read this.
Let’s get started:
The ability to communicate with words is one thing that sets mankind apart from all other creatures. God is the Author of language, and no one has ever used language as precisely as God does in the Bible, including His use of figures of speech, of which there are more than 200 varieties in Scripture. [1] When most people say, “a figure of speech,” they are speaking in general terms of something that is not true to fact. However, genuine “figures of speech” are legitimate grammatical and lexical forms that add emphasis and feeling to what we say and write. In the Bible, God uses figures of speech to emphasize things that He wants us to see as important. Many people who read the Bible never think to ask themselves, “How do we know what God wants emphasized in His Word?” God uses figures of speech to put emphasis where He wants emphasis, so it is important that we recognize and properly interpret the figures of speech in the Bible. Knowing the figures of speech God uses in the Bible helps us to understand the true meaning of Scripture and enables us to more fully enjoy its richness.
The figure of speech we are going to study in this article is referred to by E. W. Bullinger as Asterismos (Aster- is-mos), or “indicating.” The Greek word astēr means “star,” and in English today we put an “asterisk,” or “little star” beside something we want to mark in a way that catches the reader’s attention. When we are speaking, we might catch our audience’s attention by saying, “Pay attention,” or “Listen up,” particularly if we think the person is not giving us his full attention. When we write, it is a little more difficult to catch someone’s attention. Some authors use bold, italics, or ALL CAPITAL LETTERS to call the reader’s attention to a word or phrase. However, the original text of the Bible was written in all capital letters (Hebrew and Aramaic do not even have upper and lower case letters). So what does the Bible do to catch our attention?
The figure of speech asterismos is the use of words such as “behold,” “look,” “verily,” or “yes (yea),” in a way that does not add essential meaning to the sentence, but rather just catches the attention of the reader. If the words in the Bible are a direct quotation of what a biblical character said, the words still were originally spoken to catch the attention of the person listening and not to add essential meaning to what he or she said.
A good example of a Hebrew word used as an asterismos is hinneh (Strong’s #2009, pronounced, hin-nay’), which means, “behold, lo, look, see.” A person who takes the time to look up the Hebrew word hinneh in a concordance will see that it is used hundreds of times in the Old Testament, and thus will have many examples of the figure asterismos in the Hebrew text. Here is one example:
Genesis 17:4 (ESV)
“Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations.”
God said this to Abraham, and caught his attention with “Behold” (as if talking with God would not tend to catch one’s attention anyway!). By including the “Behold” in the Bible, God catches our attention just as He caught Abraham’s.
The only real way to experience the force of the “Behold,” is to read the Bible and note how many times God speaks without using “Behold” or any other asterismos. Once we have a feel for how seldom it is used, we can see that when God does use it, we should sit up and pay attention. In the example above, the Abrahamic covenant is one of the most important covenants and promises that God makes in the entire Bible, and deserves our full attention. Since the asterismos is not essential to the meaning of the sentence, some versions of the Bible almost always leave it out. The NIV is a good example of a version that usually ignores the asterismos, which is too bad, because then God’s emphasis on that verse is lost.
A good example of a Greek word used as an asterismos is idou (Strong’s #2400, pronounced id-oo’). It means “behold, see, look, lo.”
Luke 1:31 (ESV)
And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.
The angel Gabriel emphasized his point to young Mary concerning the birth of the Messiah with “behold.”
Matthew 10:16 (ESV)
“Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.
Jesus emphasized his point to the apostles with “Behold.”
Luke 24:4 (ESV)
And it came to pass, as they were much perplexed thereabout, behold, two men stood by them in shining garments:
Here God draws our attention to the angels that appeared to the women at the tomb of Jesus by the use of asterismos, “behold.”
One last thing we need to know about asterismos is that the presence of “behold,” “look,” or “see,” in the sentence does not automatically mean it is the figure asterismos. Those words can be an essential part of the sentence. A good example is when Pilate displayed Jesus to the crowd and said, “Behold your King!” At that point Jesus had already been slapped around all night long by the Jews, who had arrested him the previous night in the Garden of Gethsemane; then he had been taken before Pilate; then mocked by Herod and his men; and now was back with Pilate. He would have been bloody and swollen by that time, and Pilate’s shout to the crowd, “Behold your King,” was equivalent to “Look at your King!” It was meant to elicit their pity, but instead it just incited them to shout for Jesus’ crucifixion. Thus, just because a sentence contains “behold,” for example, does not make it the figure of speech asterismos. We must pay careful attention to the sentence and the context to be sure a “behold,” “look,” “verily,” “truly,” or “yes” is an asterismos.
You can study many more biblical figures of speech here and here.
My mother is so crafty – and I mean that in the actual arts and craft sense.
She can take an ordinary object and create something beautiful out of it. Take this rock for example:
Seriously. How cute is that?!?
She entered it in a special contest at our county fair and won 3rd place!
In fact, she entered 20 items total and won 18 ribbons! She astounds me because my mom does this every year and every year, she virtually OWNS the fair with her talent.
(Yes. I’m bragging. She’s awesome, okay?)
And even though she walks away from the fair every year with a pocket full of ribbons, she’s never won the big, purple Champion ribbon. (The Champion ribbons are the “Best-of-the-Best”).
Until this year.
Congratulations on your Champion ribbon, mom!!
Here’s what my mom said about her Champion-winning shawl:
But my proudest moment was when I saw the purple shawl I knitted. It not only had a first place blue ribbon on it, but it also had a Champion ribbon AND a Sponsors Choice Award attached to it. In all the years that I’ve entered my projects in the Fair, this is the first Champion ribbon I’ve ever gotten! And it’s the first Sponsors Choice Award too. Wow!
A lady that works at the Fair said that she was there when it was being judged, and the judge said that it was “perfect”! I won the Champion ribbon over all the knitted items in the whole section. That made me feel really proud.
{this moment} – A Friday ritual hosted by SouleMama. A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you’re inspired to do the same, leave a link to your ‘moment’ in the comments for all to find and see.
Here’s the thing about cruising – it’s like five vacations rolled into one package. Or in our case, three vacations rolled into one package. (Unless you want to lump New York in there and then it’s four, but you get what I mean).
You have the cruise itself, then each port of call. And where else can you have so much fun while getting there??
I’m telling you, if you have never taken a cruise, I HIGHLY recommend it. And it’s not as expensive as you think it is. When you take in the cost of a hotel room (cabin), WITH food, WITH entertainment, WITH babysitting (the cruise camps are awesome programs for children keeping them busy while you go do your own thing – and this includes programs for pre-teens and teenagers), THEN the cost of traveling TO the ports of call, well … you have one heck of a deal.
It makes traveling places FUN. (Not to sound like an infomercial or anything).
The boys had their own cabin.
Our favorite part about cruising, and all four of us concur on this, is the food. The guys LOVE being able to eat at anytime. I love that the guys can eat at any time. This means, I don’t have to stress about finding someplace to eat, and then getting grumpy about having to pay an arm and a leg for it. If you’ve ever gone on vacation and struggled with the “where are we going to eat” question, then you can appreciate what I’m saying.
This was our third time on a cruise, the boys’ second time. We sailed on the Valor last year, the Glory this year. The Glory is the Valor’s sister ship so other than the (gaudy) decor, everything was pretty much the same – we didn’t have any trouble getting around. (Though we continue to get mixed up no matter how many times we’ve cruised).
Look at the tables. Now look at the seats. (And yes, they were VELVET!) Tacky!
Kevin and I have a theory about the decor on these cruise ships – we think the company must get the rejects or overstocks on fabrics and other items and use this stuff on their ships to save on cost. I mean otherwise, do they really PAY someone to decorate their boats like this on purpose?! Wow.
Though I love everything about cruising (well, except for the seasickness part, but that can be knocked out with a Draminine or two), I think my favorite part is leaving the port. There is something SO EXCITING about being on the deck of the ship and watching the city you just navigated like crazy in order to make the boat on time get smaller and smaller.
But this departure was my favorite, I think. We had a bird’s eye view of New York’s breathtaking skyline.
I'm seriously thinking of blowing this up and framing it, I love it so much.
The only time we actually SAW the Empire State building while in New York.
(In fact, Kevin edited a few of the New York skyline pictures, you can see one here and here).
There’s a sense of anticipation and your nerve endings start tingling with adrenaline because you know you have DAYS of fun and adventures ahead of you – it’s hard NOT to get excited.
See the people in the hot tubs? It's like "Dude. Could you not wait TEN MINUTES and appreciate the view before jumping into hot water swirling with bacteria?"
Jazz is such a goofball. (And I wouldn't want him any other way). See that large white ball near the tail of the boat in the above picture? We were standing on that same deck, only toward the front of the boat and to say it was a tad windy? Would be pretty accurate. 😀
Another reason I love cruising is because we’re forced to sever all ties with the world. Our cell phone service stops working and there isn’t any Internet. Wait, scratch that, there’s an Internet Cafe that you’re welcome to use on the boat, if you don’t mind paying $25.00 for ONE hour of service.
Seriously. Only, that’s nothing compared to what it was last year – $60.00 for one hour. Oh yes, yes it was.
This means that the boys? Have nothing better to do than actually TALK to us. I love it. It’s so nice to have their full attention and I can’t tell you the number of times they’ve surprised me with things they’ve said or an opinion they had about something that I didn’t know before simply because we were all too distracted to listen to each other.
I honestly think that’s the number one reason why I love cruising so much – it gives us a chance to bond as a family and I hope the boys are taking some pretty awesome childhood memories away from these trips so they can wistfully sigh as they retell the stories to their children.
We relaxed and goofed off our first day at sea. This was exactly what Kevin needed to recuperate from the whirlwind that was New York City. The boys played video games. I mentioned before they have clubs for the kids – they have three, actually. They have Camp Carnival for kids 2 – 11, Circle “C” for tweens (12 – 14) and Club O2 for kids 15 – 17. If you have social kids (I do not), your kids will love these clubs. They have all sorts of activities that the kids can get involved with and it gives them a chance to make friends their own age on the boat instead of hanging out with boring mom and dad.
While the kids played video games or hung out in the cabin, Kevin rested on deck
and I cuddled with my Kindle.
I was wearing a jacket because the closer we got to Canada, the colder it got.
This cruise was different for us. The last two times, we cruised to places down by the Equator so it was hot. So hot, in fact, that I had had to edit the sweat stains out of our vacation pictures. (True story).
But this time, since we were sailing toward Canada, the temps dropped and we actually had to wear jackets at one point. In fact, about four hours out of New York, we ran into some dense fog. So dense, in fact, that we couldn’t even see the water. While standing outside, and leaning over the railing.
It was really strange. To top it off, the ship blew it’s fog horn every five minutes so it was sort of an eerie feeling. Though it was still warm, the air was cool, like outdoor air conditioning. It was quite pleasant (initially, too long though and it was chilly) and quite a different experience for us.
It's like I'm standing next to a green screen, only it's fog!
Kevin took a video. Listen carefully, you can hear the fog horn in the background. And note the people out in bathing suits – it was an odd juxtaposition of warm and cold.
I also made a short video about our first day of cruising:
I mentioned that we were going to go play the slot machines, we did. We allotted $10 and when that $10 ran out? We’d stop. That lasted for five minutes and I’m sad to report, we did not win that BMW. *sniff*
The boys loved relaxing in their very own cabin.
I’m seriously thinking about taking a cruise to no where one of these days. We all really love just hanging around the boat and relaxing. It’s so nice to be waited on, to have food readily available and to have entertainment decks away.
monday morning meme
I honestly think that’s the number one reason why I love cruising so much – it gives us a chance to bond as a family and I hope the boys are taking some pretty awesome childhood memories away from these trips so they can wistfully sigh as they retell the stories to their children. 
Write From Karen 