"Sacrifice and offering You did not desire; My ears You have opened. Burnt offering and sin offering You did not require. Then I said, "Behold, I come; In the scroll of the book, it is written of me. I delight to do Your will, O my God, and Your law is written in my heart." Ps. 40:6-9

At the moment, I am going through this chapter, day by day and memorizing parts of it...well, actually all of it. I am finding my entire graduate experience embodied within this text in particular my relationship with God and life during my time at school and the parallels are uncanny, but so reflective of my walk with Him. This aspect of the text refers to David realizing what God is really saying to him, "that you don't have to work your into my heart, but look...you are already in the Book of Life" and David realizing this changes his interaction with God. He sees a different, even clearer picture of God.

Any daily involvement with God is like imprinting His DNA into my character. In class we talked about memory and how it decays. We also discussed how the reading experience is about one emotion based experience to the next and how in rereadings of a text we try to recapture that emotion. But we can't. When we we come back to the text we've changed; life is progressing through us and it is through that paradigm that we view the text upon our return to it. The text does not change, we do.

Ironically enough this "theory" (or whatever) is readily used in Christian circles. Actually our approach to the Bible is very much in this context, and it really makes me wonder about a whole slew of other heaven related topics. Bu reverting back, the only difference to reading the Bible and secular/spiritual texts is that the Bible always develops, defines and designs us in context to God. Interesting.

Incredible, a year has come and gone and now we stand on the threshold anew.

What can I say? I got that B+. By than I already knew the answer and here I am at the door of a new year, a new term but at the end of my graduate experience. The experience has been tough as hide, excruciating as nails on a board, tormenting as a racketeers delight. What is that quote they say? Oh right...no pain, no gain, and though it sounds weird, I can testify. Left me explain.

First Year Dialogue to Self: Part One

I'm in? Really? Yay!! ...well, that was easy. Okay, wherez the class, ah, there you are you sneaky classroom. He...he...okay, learning knowledge....lots of knowledge....too much knowledge. WARNING, WARNING, WARNING: INFORMATION OVERLOAD (drowning, catches a passing buoy). I know the solution, I won't read as much....ah....relief!

(unbelievably, she passes first term and thinks second term will be of like material, unfortunately our unexpected student is sorely misinformed by trailing-last-term assumptions and second year student's misplaced assurance)

First Year Dialogue to Self: Part Two

Wheee, that was fun, (clapping hands) again! again! ...okay, picking classes....um....(scrunched brow, finger on lip) let's pick that one.....annnnnddd, that one! ooooh, that looks like fun....yes that one! Okay one more...oh, I have to take this one...bummer, oh well. Tra la la la la, off to class I go. Oooh, I want to apply for scholarships! Let's do that, and let's work. Yay,  a fun job of pulling and pushing books. And to balance the growing stack of somethings let's add this, this, this, and of course, that....Hmmm, this is getting difficult. I vaguely remember 'difficult' last term...oh oh...difficult is getting more difficult. OH, Oh, burning, I'm starting to burn! Burning, BURNING, may day, may day, out of the way!!!!

And so my first year came to an end. With the two summer classes I took to make up for the two failed classes, I began to comprehend my stepping out of the horrible pit of burned carnage of my first year failings. Apparently I wasn't getting out fast enough, because I got a talking to from someone in the higher ups. A talking to that I would only appreciate later on.

So I've just yammered about my entire graduate experience, and I guess some people would be pretty peeved about their crashing and burning class experience, and say, why rehash the whole episode. Hey, I have my point. Let me get to it. Everybody has a reason for why they make choices, take on a job, move to a new area, apply for a program. There are reasons for everything. My reason for this entire program is God and as I've come to learn my reason for every movement, word and breath I take as well.

As I was saying, it's the beginning of the term...