見えざる神に甘えてみる（３） | Heavenly Father's Words (3) October 31, 2007
It's only three days since I started reading the Bible aloud.
But some things are alreay changning inside of me.
I'm not sure what they are, but the one thing is very clear, that there is no thankless job in the world.
Another one is still vague so I can't resolve or swear it here, but it's a thing like this; I should listen to kinds of people I dislike, much more carefully than those who I can say "I like you" or "I respect you".
I never hate my parents, but I can't be honest in front of them.
Maybe I'm not confident that they ALWAYS love and accept me anytime as God loves us human beings.
I've tried too hard to act nicely and diligently especially to my mother.
She has once told me that she always gave me so many strict and cruel words TO MAKE ME GREATER; she understood I'd been struggled to please her, but for her BIGGER relief and happiness she's been watching me carefully as if she examined me with a magnificent glass.
She NEVER overlooks even a smallest defect in my character, and sometimes mumbles,
"How miserable I am!! Everyone but my grandson rebels to me..."
Each time I hear her say that, I silently cry out in my heart,
"Sorry for always being bad to you. But I swear you do the right thing, and will never forgive anybody who despise you. You' ve got the ticket to the kingdom of heaven."
Don't suppose / 考えてはいけない
that I came to do away with the Law / 私がモーゼの法を排除しに来たと
and the Prophets. / そして預言者たちを
I did not come / 私は来たのではない
to do away with them, / それらを排除するために
but to give them their full meaning. / 代わりにそれらに真の意味を与えに来たのだ
Heaven and earth may dissappear. / 天と地は消えてなくなるかもしれない
But I promise you / しかし、私は約束する
that not even a period or comma will ever dissappear / ピリオドやコンマ１つたりともなくならないと
from the Law. / モーゼの法からは
Everything written in it / それに書かれていることはすべて
must happen./ 必ず起こる
If you reject / もしも拒絶するなら
even the least important command in the Law / モーゼの法の中の最も取るに足らない命令さえも
and teach others to do the same, / そして他の人に同じことをしろと教えるなら
you will be the least important person / あなたは最も取るに足らない人になるだろう
in the kingdom of heaven. / 神の国の中で
But if you obey / しかし、もしあなたが従うなら
and teach others its commands, / そしてモーゼの命令を他の人たちに教えるなら
you will have an important place / あなたは重要な地位を手にするだろう
in the kingdom./ 神の国で
You must obey God's commands / 神の命令に従うのだ
better than the Pharisees / ファリサイ派よりも
and the teachers of the Law obey them. / ファリサイ派に従う説法者よりも
If you don't, / もし神に従わないなら
I promise you / 私は断言する
that you will never get into the kingdom of heaven. / あなたは決して神の国に入ることはないと。
見えざる神に甘えてみる（２） | Heavenly Father's Words (2) October 30, 2007
The first time I read the Bible was when I was 20.
My professor gave us the Bible-reading class AFTER regular classes, which was not obligatory for the seminar students at that time, but was very important not only for better understanding of the lessons but also for unity of the seminar.
In my early 20s, I was not so diligent a Bible reader.
But the times have changed me, I'm now searching for the light to shine me in the Bible in English.
I'll read it aloud, not only to listen to God but to encourage myself.
It's only me who're suffer from children's cruelty.
You are like salt / あなたは塩のようなものだ
for everyone on earth / 地上のすべての者にとって
But if salt no longer tasts like salt, / しかし塩が塩の味でなくあってしまうとしたら
how can it make food salty? / どうやって食べ物を塩辛くするのか？
All it is good for / すべてのものにとって良いものは
is to be thrown out / 投げ捨てられるものだ
and walked on. / あるいは踏みつけられるのだ。
You are like light / あなたは光のようなものだ
for the whole world. / 全世界にとって
A city built on top of a hill / 丘の上に建てられた街は
cannot be hidden, / 隠しようがない
and no more would light a lamp / そして何者もランプに灯りをともすことはない
and put it under a clay pot./ そしてランプを粘土のつぼの下に置くこともしない
A lamp is placed on a lampstand, / ランプは食台の上に置くものだ
where it can give light / そこでやっと灯りをともせる
to everyone in the house. / 家の中の皆に向けて
Make your light shine, / あなたの光を輝かせなさい
so that others will see / そうすれば、他の人たちもわかるだろう
the good that you do / あなたのするよい行いが
and will praise your Father in heaven. / そして、天の父なる神をほめたたえるだろう
It's been six months since I started podcasting my diary entries.
I basically podcast them to enlarge my vocabulary, especially for learning pronunciation of words I use in my diary entries in English.
I conpose my podcast episodes based on English language entries I write here in eigoTown blog.
But I often add some ad-libs in Japanese, or I read out my entries in Japanese too when creating them, because I have online friends and readers who're poor in English, and I don't want my podcast and blogs only for English learners.
These days, I tend to forget IDs and passwords of my blogs or online gadgets, and sometimes feel if only I ran only this eigoTown blog and could provide my audio diary here.
Actually I e-mailed to the editors' office and asked how large a space I can use for my attachment files.
Through this e-mail correspondence, I found it almost impossible to podcast my diary entries on my eigoTown blog, and also realized that not all web pages have to be interactive.
Web sites with music and videos are a lot of fun though, but simple printer-friendly pages are as important as interactive pages.
Taking for English learners for example, interactive web pages are convenient for those who're good at PC, but there are so many diligent learners who use PC less often for their study.
I do want to make my entries more and more useful not only for online friends but also for my "offline" friends and traditionally motivated English learners.
I must strive for it.
英語学習近況を、英語で語ってみる | My English-learning Records of This Month October 17, 2007
According to TOEIC Test DS Training study records, I did TOEIC-style exercises hard enough in this year's terribly hot September.
Maybe I won't experience September as hot as this year's.
I failed to do them on this software on 9/22, when was my children's sports festival at their elementary school.
From next year, my children's elementary school will be under renewal. So this year's sports festival was so special, since during the school building construction it may be suspended or held in a smaller way.
We call 10/1 or the first Monday in October "koromo-gae", the day to change cloths, and Kanto plane became cool suddenly.
I see some people around me having a cold, even I hear some of my online friends caught cold.
Actually, my son had a severe cough with a high fever two weeks ago, and my younger daughter got cold and has been absent from school since this Monday.
On 10/6 and 10/7, I missed my English exercises with TOEIC Test DS Training two consecutive days...what a shame!!!
To tell the truth, I did them on 10/6 even at his hospital lobby in our waiting time, but I forgot saving my study record of that day...when his turn came, I left my Nintendo DS on with my unsaved study records, and turned it off without saving them after I got home.
This month, I haven't taken a practice test on my Nintendo DS software.
How will I do on it?
It seems to me that web sites and blogs are getting simpler and simpler.
I started my web site in May of 2003, when web diaries were more popular than blogs.
I wrote so many things with my Homepage Builder, that took much time to make one web page.
Changing backgrounds of web pages were really tough, but I couldn't help doing it.
I used to change my web site backgrounds at least four times a year. I rather enjoyed that tough work, since I could feel the seasons.
Now I change backgrounds of my blogs, but I feel I've come to care less about my web page backgrounds.
I sometimes think I would close some of my web sites, but I can't close them.
The web site above is my very first step for my life with English, which I started with a different name though.
The tune called "Hare-te Hallelujah(晴れてハレルヤ）" has been ringing in my mind since this Wednesday.
It's in an album my elder daughter bought online via ITMS, which contains songs quite new to me.
I could recognize two songs in it at first, and "Hare-te Hallelujah" was one of them.
I recalled that I had a cheap cassette tape containing cute songs from various animes released about ten years ago.
Either my father or I used to play it when we took my children to somewhere by car when thery were very little.
Not only its rhythm but also its lyrics of that song brightened me enough, even though I hardly watched the anime series "Mahoujin Guruguru （魔法陣グルグル）" which featured this song.
Now, this tune has got my elder daughter's heart.
Just check it out, it will make you real encouraging!!
I have a harbot and a livly on my blogs.
I firstly knew them in 2003 and had my first one in 2004 on my web site.
It was not easy to keep digital pets in good shape at that time, we had to "feed" them by updating web pages where they inhabited.
Since 2005, if my memory is correct, Harbot (as a digital creature program) became available on
blogs, and Livly followed after it.
Keeping harbots has become easier by setting it on blogs, but we still must log onto Livly Island to take care of our loved ones. That's a little inconvenient for me...
My daughters are really into Livly now, especially my elder daughter struggles to enjoy herself with her buddy.
The day before yesterday, I suspended the use of the internet in the evening time saying "Pleasure after work!! You do your homework first."
On that day she persistently refused to study, but she admitted her negligence, and began her study little by little, .for the sake of her livly...
These days, I feel "the digital world" growing so rapidly, which is described in "Digimon Adventure" series.
The first animation was broadcast from April 1999 to March 2000, and I firstly watched it with my children in about December of 1999, and gradually got into it.
It was from 2000 to 2002 when we eagerly watched "Digimon" series on TV.
My elder daughter at that time fascinated the digimons, but I felt in each story something so grave, even philosophical, containing a warning to Japan in the near future.
I remember hearing the words
"The gate of the digital world opens where there's a PC",
in Digimon Adventure 02 (Season 2), and now that PCs and the internet became so popular amoung us, I'm afraid that my elder daughter has felt more eased in the digital world (=while she is on the net) than in her real daily life.
Actually, there are a lot of absured adults and society in our real life, for example, sexual perverts and annonymous frauds.
Some popular TV programs are so vulgar that I loathe them and don't want to watch them to my children.
We adults can't always blame children if they have no dreams, aims, or ambitions in this harsh and cruel world.
I've found some online entertainments less vulgar to youths than absured talk shows on TV, so I was less nervous to my elder daughter surfing the net until last month.
But...this month...I thought she has dropped into the digital world, since she refuses to do her assignments, prefers sitting up late to getting up early, and what I concern the most is that promises with online friends have become important than those with her parents and grandparents to my elder daughter.
So, I decided that I disconnect the TV cable and the internet modem every day before my children come home.
I must show my children how slowly and gently time goes in the world without mass media.
Oh, I'd better be going!! Here they come, I should log out quickly and turn off my laptop...
見えざる神に甘えてみる（３） | Heavenly Father's Words (3) October 31, 2007
