Author: James Hogan

All we, like sheep

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Lunch time here at work! Actually, it’s about over but thought I’d post a quick update, seeing as this last week has been most full of awesomeness! Hopefully I’ll get around to a longer post later detailling my adventures with Deanna throughout Scotland(and yes, it was an amazing few days!!) but for now, suffice it to say that…yeah, Scotland’s a pretty beautiful country. It’s true.

And last night, went with Rosemary to see Handel’s Messiah at the Music Hall here in Aberdeen – my first time ever seeing this performed! Listening to it on my laptop is most definitely not the same thing. So amazingly lovely and gorgeous and our-Lord-glorifying and beautiful and powerful and majestic. And He shall reign forever and ever! My only regret…that I couldn’t sing with them! Ahh, one day. One day.

And now it’s time to get back to work, but know this: tonight will be my first night to myself in quite some time, so I will most definitely enjoy the time to relax and read and SLEEP. Oh the sleep will be welcome! I may or may not have a satisfying dinner of delicious hamburgers, baked potatoes and crispy green beans too. Mmmm. If I don’t fall asleep first.

Have a simply lovely day, y’all! Love you guys!!

Across the ocean

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Alright, I was going to post a long, EPIC entry, but alas, I took too long eating lunch and now lunch is about over and I need to work. But I still must at least write something! Hopefully the quality makes up for the quantity. Actually, it probably won’t, but shh. And now that I’m done talking about why I’m not writing more(and thus wasting precious time that I could have written a longer entry!), I shall just say a few words…

Firstly, Deanna is in town! What!!! Yes, you heard that right – Deanna’s in Aberdeen as of last night and that is just so much awesome, y’all. She’s staying with a family here in the church(Eleanor’s parents) currently and today she’s recovering from her flight adventure yesterday(which included a 4 hour “visit” with immigration officials. Ugh) and exploring around Aberdeen while I work. But tonight, going to go downtown and celebrate Rosemary’s birthday(hurrah!!) and then tomorrow, we go up to Inverness! As long as we don’t get blizzard-ed in the face, that is. We’ll spend a night in Inverness(of course exploring Loch Ness while we’re at it) and then taking the train down to Edinburgh on Friday(again, God willing) and spending a couple days there! It shall be sweet and epic and awesome and fantastically fabulous and perfectly lovely, I so declare.

Of course, I’m also a little exhuasted right now, because while I told myself ahead of time I’d get lots of sleep over the weekend in preparation for impending Deanna-visit, did I? Of course not. Instead I had a gorgeous weekend hanging out with people and enjoying amazingly encouraging and refreshing times at church and shopping(the worst part of the weekend!) and seeing random movies and staying up FAR too late every night and not getting any sleep at all(most of this is your fault, Aiysha!). But…what do I always say? Sleep is unnecessary.

And now it’s work time(for the last time until next Monday!) and then it’s epic Scotland with Deanna Adventure time! Peace out, y’all!!

Snowglobe

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I don’t quite know why I’m posting twice in one day, but it is lunchtime and I’m enjoying a nice lunch of cheese sandwiches and chips(that’s fries to you people back home!). Nice hot chips with salt and vinegar, mmm…

Ok, maybe that’s the purpose of my post, to make you all hungry. Because I don’t really have anything else to say…other than that it is STILL SNOWING. It looks like a violently shaken snowglobe outside. At this rate, we’ll be buried by Christmas. Of course, I’ll in Florida for Christmas(hurrah!!) where it’s nice and warm and sunny. Yes. The only good thing about the snow is that I’ve not yet gotten stuck again like my adventure on Saturday night…and that it’s not really that cold yet. Only about 5 below(23 degrees or so, for all you back home).

And now, I think I will enjoy the rest of my lunch before my chips go cold. To everyone now waking up in the States, g’morning! Have an absolutely lovely day!!

Royal blue

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Well, at work early on a Thursday morning – I’m the first one in, and so before work begins, enjoying a bit of coffee and warming up after being out in the snowy cold!

And as I drove in this morning, rolling behind the cautiously glowing red lights of the cars before me that beckoned me on in a slow dance with the icy roads, I looked up and saw the piercing sickle of the moon shine bright against the inky blue sky and above the silent witness stood the proud morning star, a jewel in the heavens and knowing well that it stood alone of all the stars in majesty this day. And as the sky slowly began to bleed light, the clouds shot through with glory, I sighed with pleasure at the beauty of the skies, the creation of the Almighty that is but a pale reflection of the magnificence I will one day witness in His presence. All glory to the Lord of hosts. All glory to the Lamb that was slain! All glory to our God!!

Honey in the tea

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Ok, well remember my last entry how I said how I loved the snow, but was sure I’d get sick of it someday? Well, that may not have been yesterday. But it IS THIS DAY. I want it to GO AWAY right now. And actually it is quite lovely outside, now that I’m inside my nice warm cozy flat! Had a lovely Thanksgiving dinner(YES) at Rosemary’s tonight – me and Uche picked up Aiysha on the way…after being quite lost, finally made it to Rosemary’s – mmm, delicious roast turkey and potatoes and vegetables and yorkshire puddings and stuffing(made by yours truly)….oh yes. But, as always, the best part was just chilling with good friends and talking and talking and talking…

Of course eventually we had to go home. But upon walking out of Rosemary’s flat, we found out that it was snowing. A LOT. Our car already had about 3-4 inches piled on it. Yeah. After warming up the car, we made our way slowly down the road…successfully dropping off Aiysha before we got to very treacherous grounds. Cars were stopped and we were stuck and it was not nice at all. Some awesome guys helped Uche push our car a ways and another cool guy shoveled out the snow that was accumulating in front of my tires. My nice little Peugeot is most definitely *not* made for snow. Eventually we got mostly unstuck…and then made it home following in the tracks of a big car(I may or may not have gone through a couple reds to stay on his tail and not get permanently frozen in the middle of Anderson Drive). And eventually, after much much prayer and Uche’s encouragement, we made it home and swung into Headland Ct and pulled straight into an open parking space in front of our flat. Oh, all praise to the Lord!!!!!!! And so now, dear snow, I would really like it if you stayed away while I need to drive. Please?

Also, walking to church tomorrow will be fun. Truly! Walking in snow, I do not mind(I do sort of need better boots though..) It’s the driving and being totally stuck that is not so much fun. Grr.

But now, nice hot tea and book…mmm, yes.

And it comes down

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Driving home today in lovely snowfall, I couldn’t help but marvel at the beauty of the white blankets of snow gently draping roads, grass and buildings alike. Oh I’m sure that someday(probably soon) I’ll be tired of the snow and ready for it to go away. But it is not this day!! So beautiful and clean and fine, powdered sugar on the grass, and the crunch of my boots in the unspoiled snow, and now the trees gracefully hold up the snow to frame the cloudy sky, that sky both tempestuous and amazingly gorgeous, snow pouring forth from the storehouses of heaven. Beauty.

Oh and for some reason, catching a snowflake on my tongue never seems to lose its wonder.

Tonight(after I finish my yummy shepherd’s pie and take a nap because I am exhausted, yo), I’ll be walking downtown to Aiysha’s birthday party – it will be a sweet snow walking adventure, I so declare!

Now to finish dinner(hmm, why has writing distracted me from food? That seems wrong somehow). Peace!

A glimmer, nay, a star

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And you were dead in your trespasses
and sins, in which you
formerly walked according to the
course of this world, according to the
prince of the power of the air, of the
spirit that is now working in the sons
of disobedience. Among them we too
all formerly lived in the lusts of our
flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh
and of the mind, and were by nature
children of wrath, even as the rest.
But God, being rich in mercy, because
of His great love with which He
loved us, even when we were dead
in our transgressions, made us alive
together with Christ(by grace you have
been saved), and raised us up with
Him, and seated us with Him in the
heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so
that in the ages to come He might show
the surpassing riches of His grace in
kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
-Ephesians 2:1-7

I was going to end that sooner, but two things prevented me. Firstly, it’s just so beautiful I couldn’t find a good stopping place…and secondly, because the sentence itself didn’t stop. Oh Pauline sentences, how I love thee.

Seriously, such a gorgeous passage, is it not? And two of the most amazing and heart-stopping and enlivening and lovely and starkly beautiful words of all time…”But God.” And hope bursts into glorious bloom, life eternal. This passage is one of my favorites, so I don’t know why I’m trying to unnecessarily validate these verses with my pitiful words, but I just can’t help marveling at the amazingness of God’s most gracious love and compassion towards such desperately wicked men and women…oh what a joy that springs from my heart, abounding towards the God whose love abounds still more! And I think this passage may (subconsciously) be the pattern towards which all my gasps of poetry tend to slip into –

darkness, expanding and vicious and cold blackness and
the depths of deepest despair and when all is lost and
man is
lost in a storm of whirling shadows and
torn in pieces by the knife that was his own and
rotting in the grave so eagerly dug and
drinking the depths of the debt that is owed and
wavering in glazed reality and
on his knees in hopeless emptiness and
on his face in stark weariness and
letting go of the last that could be done and then
light.
Light forever.
Glorious Almighty God.
Light and love and God Himself,
the pinnacle of infinity that the universe strains to grasp.
Oh glorious Lord!
And overwhelmed in joy and overcome by love
and soaking in the blood of the Lamb that was slain,
she is
dancing in the spotless grace,
singing in the newborn praise,
seeing with adoring gaze,
feeling the more perfect rays,
and now she quivers and says,
Oh I love how can I not?
When by His blood I am bought?
He loved me first,
oh those glorious words,
He loves me!

…and that’s what happens when I let my mind stray and wander and ponder the incomprehensible fact that…the Almighty God of the Universe loved me. How else can I respond but by saying…’Oh I love how can I not?’ I love my Father so. Oh I love Him!!!! If my tears could but grace His feet, I would weep for being so close to Him…my Lord and my God, I love Him so!!!!

Peppermint sprig

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It’s a lovely Aberdeen morning! I so much love being able to sit inside by the window with my coffee, staying toasty warm…and looking outside to see the clouds gently float by in the cornflower blue sky…

And I suppose you all wouldn’t mind a minor update, right? Right?? Honestly, not too much to report, except that all is well and I’m learning that a scarf and gloves are very nice to have. Oh yeah, and it sort of snowed this past weekend. In October!! When we were getting ready to leave for work this past Wednesday, Uche looked out the window and said, “It’s snowing.” I didn’t really believe him at first…until I looked outside. And yes, it was definitely snowing. Warm enough that it was a pretty wet snow, but snow nonetheless. The snow only stayed on the ground until noon, when the sun melted it all away…but now we’ll see if this early snow is a sign of a crazy winter to come.

Oh and had a couple sweet nights this past week at church – Wednesday night was Bible study/prayer time, which was of course sweet(talking about Hannah’s prayer in 1 Samuel 1), but the best part was the praying at the end and then talking with some new friends until we figured out we were the last people left(standing outside in the not-quite-bitter cold). Good times!! And Thursday night was game night at the church, which involved much crazy quiz games and running around and human Pictionary…and generally all-around smashing times.

Now it’s the weekend and I’m so far having a relaxing Saturday morning(soon to be noon!) and getting ready to walk down Union Street in a few minutes. Probably going to check the used book shops and see if they have any good books in! And I am displeased – the sky’s starting to cloud up a bit…looking like it may become overcast. Oh well, I won’t complain…because it’s not raining. Yet.

And because it’s been a little while since I’ve posted a top songs list…here we go! Except this time, you get two for the price of one!! I’ve decided that, since I’ve always talked about which hymns/worship songs are in my top five, but never actually defined that list, I probably have seven top five hymns. And that’s just bad math. So…hymns top five – count ’em down! (And before you start castigating me for the order I have these in, the order is very fluid and subject to change…so no whingeing allowed):

5. Amazing Grace – This is an all time classic and deservedly so. Every time I sing it, I feel overwhelmed with joy. How can I not?? Sidenote: the inclusion of this music in Star Trek II made the movie all the better. True story. And I feel I have another hymn that may actually be number five in place of this one…but I can’t think of it, so Amazing Grace gets this spot.

Amazing grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me…
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind but now I see.

4. Be Thou My Vision – A beautiful prayer to the King of Kings, rightly focusing on our Lord. Oh how I love singing this…I sadly realized I did not have a copy of this on my iTunes, so I just found a Jars of Clay version recently, a cause for great rejoicing!

Be Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.
Thou my best thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

3. And Can it Be(Amazing Love) – Whenever I see we’re going to sing this song at church, my heart skips a beat. One of the most lovely songs depicting salvation. EVER. When I sing it, my mind joyfully remembers and rejoices in what Jesus our Lord has done for me!!

And can it be that I should gain
an interest in the Savior’s blood!
Died he for me? who caused his pain!
For me? who him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be
that thou, my God, shouldst die for me?
Amazing love! How can it be
that thou, my God, shouldst die for me?

2. Holy Holy Holy – This has long been one of my favorites, probably longer than any other song on this list. And for good reason. It oh so majestically reminds me of the Lord God Almighty to whom all glory and majesty and dominion and power belongs. I can’t describe it…except that I love it. If you want to hear it, youtube the Keith Green version of it. I love hearing the passion in his voice(another recent iTunes addition). Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty!!

Holy, holy, holy! Lord God Almighty!
Early in the morning our song shall rise to Thee;
Holy, holy, holy, merciful and mighty!
God in three Persons, blessed Trinity!

1. Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing – And here we come to number one. This song became my number one favorite song of all time one Sunday morning at Creekside Community Church, freshman year at UF. Singing it and being reminded of Jesus who saved me by his glorious grace, and his grace alone!! And that despite my sins and slips and failures…He holds me still. I love it so.

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.

Honorable mention: Hallelujah Chorus – really, I LOVE singing this, especially in a MASSIVE group of people…alas, it is not often done, so I’m not including it. But one of my favorite experiences of all time was singing this purely God-praising/glorifying/worshiping song in a group of ~300 people. Amazing. A very picture and faint image of heaven.

And there we go. To summarize:
5. Amazing Grace
4. Be Thou My vision
3. And Can it Be?
2. Holy, Holy, Holy
1. Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing

YES.

And don’t worry, since I decided that an epic two-cookie post has been far too long in coming, that’s not all the music we have for today. But before I finish the musical program for today, just wanted to muse a bit over…life, the universe and everything? No, not quite. Well, at least not today. But wanted to talk a bit(really, I will try to be brief!) on the subject of marriage. And yes, I know, I am most definitely not married, so take all my words with several grains of salt. But I’ve been for some reason bombarded lately by discussions and messages on marriage(whether it be the recent sermon series at church or the blog topic at several blogs I read or talking to my good friends), and so that’s been on my mind more often than not lately. Whether that’s a good thing or not, I leave to you. Well actually, it’s not bad as long as I don’t overly focus on it to the detriment of my walk with the Lord and seeking after His face. And I talk about it little enough on here, I felt I’d share these thoughts. And now that my long-winded(really, did you expect anything else?) introduction is coming to a middle, just consider these words and feel very free to correct or rebuke me! And encouraging words are always nice too!

Anyways, I was talking to my flatmate Uche this morning, and were(for some reason!) talking about the extravagances of weddings. Apparently, some things never change, from America to Scotland to Nigeria. But as we were discussing this, it struck both of us that the strong emphasis on the wedding is sometimes to the detriment of the actual marriage! Some people will go deeply in debt to put on an impressive wedding and then a year later, the divorce papers are filed. Truly, truly tragic. But why are the weddings so important? We do want to celebrate the two becoming one flesh, yes. And there’s nothing wrong with joyful celebrations! But I feel that sometimes a wedding is seen as an event, something that is an epic event in and of itself. Oftentimes(I will not admit to this!), we dream of “the wedding” and all the pageantry that is so involved. Why do we do this, when the wedding day is gone in the blink of an eye.

Rather, as a man and a woman come together, their focus and goal should be a marriage and life together. That is forever(well, sort of). Instead of spending all our pre-marriage time pondering and looking towards a celebration, let us look towards a life of oneness and unity! A life of serving each other! I wrote down a good quote from a sermon at my church a few weeks past…I’m sure it won’t be foreign to any of you: “Love is a willful decision of giving one self to another”. I love that. I won’t be spending a multitude of words talking about the nature of love(I think I’ve done that before anyways), but is that not beautiful?? We shouldn’t be looking towards marriage as something that will satisfy our needs or make us happier or fill an emptiness in our souls. Should I be thinking that a woman will answer my heart’s deepest longings? Absolutely not! (And neither should a woman think that of a man. Um, yeah, we men are definitely not all that) We should be looking to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ first and foremost. As we pursue Christ, we will see that we can serve as He served. And that marriage is one of the best opportunities to serve that will ever come along. Or so I’m told. In marriage, love is serving and loving and encouraging and correcting and feeding and sacrificing. And the foundation of that is our love in and of Christ. True that? Yes.

Now I’m trying to remember what my point is(that’s the problem when I semi-stream-of-consciousness-write…*scrolls back to top of page* Ah yes) But if I really wanted to talk about marriage and all the intricacies and beauties therein, it would take more words than I have. I might possibly discover the word limit on livejournal. But marriage is a man and woman coming together as one. A man will love his wife above himself. Whoa. And marriage is a picture of Christ and His church and the amazing love that is the very cornerstone of that relationship! Marriage is a man and a woman truly loving each other, every second of every day, and seeking to use their oneness as a vehicle to serve and love others, whether they be in the Church or not. That. Is. Beautiful. And yes, yes, I know it very often doesn’t look like that. But that’s what we(who are married, or may one day) should be striving after. Let’s strive, yo? Sweet.

And now that I’ve either thoroughly bored you(please don’t tell me though) or underwhelmed you(don’t tell me that either) or encouraged and uplifted you(you can tell me that!!)…time for our musical postlude.

Just made a new mix-CD…well actually, a mix-iTunes playlist. Once I get some CDs, I’ll burn it. BUT, this will give you an idea of my current favs. Also, I sort of cheated…I have a rule I made for myself: one song per group. Yeah, couldn’t do that this time. Nightwish and Muse both ended up with two. Oops. Also, if this list doesn’t convince you of my weird crazy eclectic music taste…yeah, nothing will.

Now presenting…Granite Realism

1. Wildfire – Sonata Arctica
2. Slaying the Dreamer – Nightwish
3. Holy Thunderforce – Rhapsody
4. Showbiz – Muse
5. Fireflies – Owl City
6. Far Away – Ingrid Michaelson
7. Ballad of Bilbo Baggins – Leonard Nimoy
8. Please don’t Leave Me – Pink
9. Alejandro – Lady GaGa
10. Fix You – Coldplay
11. Just – Radiohead
12. Unnatural Selection – Muse
13. May It Be – Enya
14. Girl Named Tennessee – Needtobreathe
15. Sleeping Sun – Nightwish
16. Be Thou My Vision – Jars of Clay
17. Savannah – Relient K
18. Holy, Holy, Holy – Keith Green

It’s been real, y’all. It’s been fun. But, it’s time for this party to come to an end. I did say this was a two-cookie post. I lied. Three-cookie post. I made peanut butter cookies recently…if you read this all, you can claim ’em. Rock on, y’all!!

Truly yours

James HoganLeave a comment

Driving back home from work in the rain, grey foreboding clouds omnipresent in the sky,
I crested the hill to look out over the city of Aberdeen. Oddly enough,
a gentle light bathed the city. I looked up to see an opening in the sky,
almost as if someone standing on the clouds above had taken a giant shovel
to the grim layer and scooped a hole. A diamond shaped hole,
wedged through the scowling storm-clouds like a tent peg driven through
the earth, boldly defiant on a canvas of weeping faces drawn
in pain and deep weariness and hopeless abandon of all that is good,
like a stained glass window except without the glass and without the stain,
and through this window in the sky I could see bright blue sky and golden tinted clouds,
bearing witness to the presence of the sun. All around me was rain and gloominess,
but in the sky, I could see hope. Hope in the shape of a diamond, pure and clear and and beautiful.
And as I drove further, I could see the city glow softly in the sun,
the moisture-laden air giving the light an inviting feeling.
And then, I entered the realm of the light.
The rain ceased. The clouds were still all around me, hovering.
But above, blue. And the sun.

Threads of gold, falling silver

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Alright y’all, wasn’t originally planning to write an entry today…but why not? It’s a lovely Sunday afternoon and I am dutifully(and by dutifully I mean JOYFULLY!) resting in Starbucks sipping my peppermint mocha. I want to write something…so yeah. We’ll see what I’m feeling…



For a trumpet’s song,
for a banner’s call
we’d give our fortunes,
we’d forfeit our all.

For a twice-sold birthright,
a third-born son,
we’d shake with laughter
until summer’s done.

For a sweet-tongued lass,
adorned in lace,
we’d divide our portion,
forget our face.

Merry we make, peace we buy
Dregs we drink, life we cry!

Falling upon the swords of our fathers
and born upon the waves of our daughters
we bless the cries of our heart
we curse the tears of our soul
and we fail to realize
we are already dead.

Cloaked in justice,
robed in love
bearing truth and
gifting peace
wielding a rod
of iron
and double edged
sword
in the crown
of a king
in the raiment
of a lord
with eyes of flame
and upon
the face
a tear.

And
we sneer.

Destiny is to be grasped,
and fate is to be sown
our hearts and our souls
our lives, our own!

The goblet full,
the land groans,
the pot a boil,
and we drink.

Don’t have time to tighten it up…enjoy?