• Jul. 10, 2007
I Corinthians. Women wear head coverings?
Lately, I realized that a woman in our church has recently taken up wearing head coverings, and while reading my Bible this morning, I came across Paul's concerns for head coverings in I Corinthians.
Paul wrote to the Corinthian church that women should wear head coverings to show submission. But doesn't God care about what's on the inside, not the outside? Aren't we supposed to not trouble ourselves with what others think, but rather what God thinks? If humility is in your heart, why must you represent it to the world?
Later in the same passage, Paul says men should not wear their hair long, but it is a pride to women. [Does this mean women should not have short hair?] He also says the long hair acts as a woman's covering. Does this mean if a woman has long hair, she doesn't need to wear a covering?
Also- Amish/Mennonite women ALWAYS wear head coverings, even if they aren't worshipping God; how come? In I Corinthians, it just says during public worship.
Another thing I noticed was concerning marriage- basically, Paul said it was better to remain celibate and unmarried, if you can stand to do so, to better devote your life to God. I didn't know this- it makes me think differently about marriage. To me, it felt like everybody had to get married one day or another.
In school today I read Socrates' "Apology". It's about how Socrates made the people around him think about deep subjects they didn't want to think about. For this, he was executed, after an eloquent speech where Socrates tried to explain he hadn't done anything wrong, rather that he was investigating things people were ignorant of at the time. Meletus still persuaded the judges to declare him guilty, and then to execute him to death.
One thing I thought that was unfair about Socrates' trial was how people had warned the jury that Socrates was a well-spoken man, and could speak evil and make it sound good. This must've put the jury on guard, and made it alot harder for Socrates to explain his innocence.
I think Socrates gave a very good speech, and that they shouldn't have killed him.
Today I'm going to start a project on a Greek helmet made of Legos. For our arts project this week, we had a choice to make a helmet, greaves, or a shield. I wanted to do a shield, but I couldn't find anything to make it out of, except cardbord, which wouldn't give me the curve a shield has.
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• Jul. 9, 2007
The Spartans.
Today in our schoolwork I read about the Spartans. I find them a most barbaric bunch of people. Let me list a couple of their practices:
-if a baby wasn't perfect, he was left to starve on the ground
-babies were bathed in wine (which made most babies sick), and if it made them sick, they were killed
-the Spartans were not allowed out of Sparta
-the Spartans didn't use coins, like the rest of ancient Greece did at the time; they used iron bars, for the few who had any. Mostly, Spartan kings didn't allow the use of money so the people would keep their focus on training.
-Sparta wasn't really a city- more like a military training center for the boys. Military training started around the age of 7, and boys 12 and older were officially men, and the training routines became more difficult. The boys wore no clothes during training, like the rest of Greece at the time, but girls wore no clothes during training either, which shocked the rest of Greece. Women were forced to train in discus and distance running, so they would become fit women who could successfully bear children without dying. This was all the kings of Sparta thought of the women; they were child-bearers, and nothing more.
-at the age of 25, Spartan men tried to find a "mess" to live in (similar to a modern day fraternity, from what I understand). To decide who was accepted and who wasn't, the men took a piece of bread and threw it into a pot. If the bread flattened itself, the man who threw it was not accepted, and deemed a social outcast whom no one was to talk to, or even look at. The men actually lived in their messes, and wives were a thing everyone had, but were kept secret. Wives and husbands did not live together, and only met together in the secret of the night. The husbands did not interact with their children, but to train them.
This week, we didn't have any Bible reading assigned [we do Tapestry of Grace unit studies], I picked to read 1st Corinthians, and this verse stuck out at me:
I Corinthians 12-15
Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials-gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgement day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person's work has any value. If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames.
Also, the part in I Corinthians concerning how two Christians shouldn't get into lawsuits with one another- they're setting an example for the rest of the world.
Yesterday my parents went out on a date and my cousins who live with us to visit their father, and we got unlimited computer time [normally we only get time on Fridays and Saturdays after dinner]. I played Age of Empires, and finally reached a title of "Noble". My brother says the next level is the highest, which is "Lord". I didn't play anything else- after that I read "Thorn in My Heart" by Liz Curtis Higgs. It's a biblical history/fiction story based on Jacob+Leah+Rachel's whole thing, and I really enjoyed it. I've read the first three books in the series. The one I just mentioned, "Fair is the Rose", and "Whence Came A Prince". My mom ran up to the library this morning while we were during school, and she got the next book, "Grace in Thine Eyes".
Well, I'm off to read that book now. =]
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• Jul. 4, 2007
About me.
Hello!
My name's Alyssa, and I've returned to Home School Blogger. I used to have an account a year or two ago, but I forgot about it in the rush of things.
My birthday was 2 days ago, I'm now 16 years old. For my birthday, my mother and grandmother took me away for two and a half days at a nearby hotel, where we did a bunch of fun things. I really missed all my brothers and sisters, though. [I'm the oldest of 7! including my two cousins that are living with us right now, though. They're my sisters while they live here, to me.] I find swimming with two elderly women [my grandmother and great-aunt] isn't really that much fun, unless I want to do water aerobics. 
Plus, I'm used to playing "Marco, Polo" and games like that in our pool with my siblings.
I have created a blog here with the interest of discussing and debating "hot topics" with other Christians. I've also done a year of speech and debate and made it to Regionals with my partner Michael. I did team policy, and we debated on the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, better know to the world as NATO.
For my birthday, I got a guitar, and I'm learning with a DVD that came with it. I know the E, D, and A power chords, and I know the E and A major triads so far. I'm already having lots of fun making up my own songs.
It's too bad Texas is all rainy this week and next, our 4th of July won't be very much fun. I wonder if they'll still be able to shoot of fireworks in the rain?
I own my own website that I built with the coding languages PHP, MySQL, HTML, and CSS, and it's called "Dragon Dynasty". It's a simulation website where you can own your own dragons, battle them, show them, feed/play with/take care of/breed alot of dragons, and on my website I've added a "Debate" forum for children over the ages of 13. I find it disappointing the small amount of Christians willing to defend their faith in a public forum, and even more disappointing the amount of Christians who willingly acknowledge their faith, but then say they agree with things of the world.
I've been a Christian for most of my life, but only for the last three years have I truly been living a Christian life and furthering my faith. I attended Calvary church's "Hell House", which frightened me, and opened my eyes to the evils of this world, and how good God is.
That's it for today- I think tomorrow I will discuss evolution.