Declamation #2

Cooking is worship. The modern church has lost a fundamental factor in worshipping God, and enjoying him. God is not merely the God of our heart and head; He is also the God of our stomachs. A survey of the Bible demonstrates that God is interested in what we ingest. When it came to sacrificing bulls and goats, the ancient Levitic priests were commanded to cook and eat a portion of the sacrifice. The altar was not a stage for pyromania, but a divinely ordained barbecue. Moreover, the Jewish celebrations weren’t merely weeklong church services; they were feasts. Surely in the newer and better covenant this glorious aspect of worship ought not be lost, but made more glorious. Christians are called upon to prepare their hearts for corporate worship throughout the week, by the study of the scriptures in individual devotion. How much more fitting is it to prepare for the great Feast, by preparing and eating good meals? The Westminster Divines considered worship the proper response to God’s lordship, sovereignty, and goodness. There are few greater ways of celebrating God’s lordship and goodness than partaking of the vegetation and beasts that God has to men. Cooking is worship most fundamentally in that by cooking Christians are mirroring Christ who prepared food for the twelve, and for five thousand. If Christians are expected to make joyful sounds, and earnest prayers, and they certainly are, then they are also expected to make rich sauce, bake fresh bread and roast red meat.

Declamation

Everyone here has a home. And for a great number of us, our home is not Moscow. Its California, or Michigan, or Maryland. To those of us who were not born and raised here in Moscow, I have this to say: Go home. And to the locals: Get us out. If you love the school and its vision, take it back home with you. The school has a vision of cultural reformation, and quite frankly, Moscow is reformed enough already. To whom much is given much is required. We’ve been given much. What will be required of us is bigger than Moscow. As far as the people who have grown up here in Moscow are concerned: stay! Perpetuate the work that your parents have invested in, and do a good job so that nobody from out of town feels compelled to stay. We are being trained as rhetors, and I have no doubt that your hometown could use more Godly men speaking in accordance with biblical wisdom. We are being taught to love God’s Lordship over creation, and it is a rather feeble accomplishment to merely conquer a town of only 20,000 in the Northwest corner of the country. We are being taught math from a Christian worldview and the whole country is overrun by secular science. You’re being armed to deal with this problem, let Dr. Stokes handle it here in Moscow. Finally, I am sure somebody’s hometown needs a little Latin. After graduation, humbly gather what you have been given, and go home.

I Love My Adopted Family

By the way, you can view these photos individually in my slideshow at the bottom!

A Near Death experience

Hi everyone. Its 1:00 and I need a break from Augustine. I heard that one of the declamations will be describing a near Death experience so this is what i came up with. Also this story is now nearly three years old so I'm comfortable telling it.

My life has never been near death. My self inflicted bb gun wounds and automobile destructions have not brought me an inch closer to six feet under. That does not mean however that my life has not been threatened. As a matter of fact I have had a death threat leveled against me. In my fifteenth year, my 6’5” 290 lb frame was threatened by a little fruit in a scarf. Two friends of mine, for our purposes we shall call them Dumb and Dumber, arranged a wager. As the aforementioned fruit walked past, Dumb said to Dumber, “I’ll give you a dollar if you ask that guy if he’s gay”. Dumber obliged. That’s why he gets to be Dumber. The relatively calm fruit said “no he was not” and Dumber returned to the table. I felt called to go and apologize. I answered the call. Bad call. Something in my apology must have legitimized my friends question, for that aforementioned fruit exploded in a torrent of scarf laden metrosexual anger. His 5’6” feathered haired head was reaching past me yelling that he had an f…..g gun, and that he was going to f…..g kill us. (Dumb, dumber and I later decided that his gun was most likely pink and fuzzy.) Fortunately his girlfriend arrived, which as I’m sure you can all guess made things much better. Now Ryan Scarfcrest and his girlfriend who at least had the IQ of celery, are yelling through my chest at the guys and girls behind me. And as quickly as it began it was over. They suddenly walked out the door and the bescarfed harbinger of f…..g death and his blond harpy were never seen again.

I thought they said chapters not sections!

I'm Back

Have you ever been faced with a situation so overwhelming that you simply couldn't handle it? Yeah, I haven't either. I'v spent the last two weeks driving accross country with my dad, and working like mad to get construction finished on my house. I've learned an aweful lot in the past two weeks. You shouldn't drink a lot of coffee if your trying to stay on the road for as long as possible. If you're going to get a flat tire, the best place to do it is in Austin, Minnesota so you can go to the spam museum while your getting it fixed. I learned that sometime you can learn more about your family in an intensely stressful week than you could in nearly eighteen years of normalcy. I learned how to scrape the paint off of hardwood. and vynil. and lynnoleum. and plaster. Mostly i learned that, in a very hyumble way, there is nothing I can't handle. When I am at my tiredest, when my defences are down, when i'm weak, God fills that void, more than my own strength ever could. I can spend all morning hauling pianos and book shelves, and somehow when evening comes and i feel like i have nothing left, God gives me the strength to handle the pipes bursting beneath the sink. With the two weeks I've had school shoulod be easy, and all the trials and triumphs that I've had leave me with one realization. I can do alol things through christ who strengthens me.

T

New Features

Hey there everyone,
A couple of new features on the blog worth checking out, first we have the promote the Dwyers sidebar, with their new releases. The weekly updated poll, and down at the bottom we have a slideshow of some of my favorite pics. a legit post should show up soon.
T

Beauty

It is sometimes the case that certain women are recognized universally as being beautiful. This is a shame. Their beauty is purely plastic and external. The most fundamental type of beauty is the disputed type. Let us say that I find someone very attractive. Hypothetically. It is more of a testimony to my affection that others I know do not find her as attractive. She is attractive to me. She is not so much beautiful on her own. She is beautiful in respect to me. My love makes her beautiful. Lest you think that I’m saying beauty is relative, I’m not. Beauty is not something that is indefinable, but it is personal. Others might not find her laugh infectious. But it infects me. Others might not get lost in her eyes but eye do. The standards do not change. Men do. If others found her as attractive as I do, I would doubt my feelings. I would think that they were superficial. But she has a disputed beauty. Yet she is indisputably beautiful to me. Hypothetically.

-William Bernard Martin
Selected Shorter Writings

Updated

Hey there everyone, sorry if my pre-departure nostalgia was a bit too heavy, I had a lot on my mind and wanted to get it out. Anyway as you might have noticed there are some updates to the site including the beard poll on the side, and as soon as I figure out how it works, a slideshow at the bottom.

About a year ago I wrote this statement of faith for my college application, after smoking a cigar and reading Chesterton, my two primary muses. I hope you enjoy:

I believe in God, the father Almighty maker of heaven and earth. I believe in God the Creator and God the Redeemer. I believe in a God who is transcendent in his greatness yet immanent in love. I believe in God’s Son, begotten not created, and that he used a cursed cross to crush a serpent’s head. I believe that Christ was fully God and fully man, and I believe that I will never fully wrap my head around that. I believe that He was a prophet, priest and warrior king. I believe that the Apostle’s Creed is an accurate human portrayal of the inerrant truths found in the Word of God. I believe in the Holy Ghost, that He proceeds from the Father and the Son, equal in power and glory, and that with the Father and Son, He is to be worshipped and glorified. I believe that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are one God in three persons, as real and as mystical as shamrocks.
I believe that God loves the babes of those who love Him, and that he has welcomed them to be washed and feast in His name. I believe that God gave men wine to make their hearts glad, and cigars to put hair on their chests. I believe that the Westminster Confession of Faith is not the Bible nor is it the sequel, but it is close. I believe in loving the sinner but hating the sin. I believe that Roman Catholics are Christians, even if Pope Benedict does not think that I am. I believe that the government is God’s minister for good, no matter how often they attempt to throw us down wells and shred our multicolored coats. I believe God hath foreordained whatsoever comes to pass. I believe that many of the prophecies uttered in the books of Daniel, the Gospels, and Revelations were fulfilled in 70 AD. I believe that as an image bearer I am chief among creatures and as man I am chief among sinners. I believe that Christ died for all men but not every man. I believe that laughter is war and that not all Rigor is Mortis.

My father

Its 4:30. Time to go to work. Six days shall you labor. 13 hours a day. The seventh day is a day of rest, but much is expected of my father even on that day. My father's build comes from a time when men were men. His thick chest and graying beard are those of a Norse soldier, not of the feminine stock that today passes for men. My father is stalwart. My father is what God requires of man. He is a creator. An artist. An educator. A defender. A laborer. A servant. A husband. A father. He is my best friend. My father is Loves His Lord and his creation. He glorifies God and he will enjoy him forever. He blesses those around him with strong drink, and good cigars. My father's singing reverberates off the roof and dances in our ears. I love my father. I am leaving him. But he has molded me into someone like himself, and I will make him proud.