World cuisine/世界美食

Last time when i had Jamaican food at Carolyn's house,the food tastes wonderful!She asked me, this time,the food should be very spicy for you huh? emmm,i thought"the spice level was commci commca" She might not noticed,after i have consumed a bottle of congo spice called"pili pili du congo" which i bought from an open market, chilli processing level has raised at another rate for me--When i try tabasco,it tastes like orange juice. I have to say this congo pili spice is by far the most spicy thing i ever encountered,so i will nominate it the king of spice family if no one objects. Plus, i also fond of other cuisines my dear friends cooked before,miss Japanese sushi, Thai noodles, Romania rolls,Georgia soup,Korean kimchi etc.It would be great to have another world cuisine day at Carolyn's house some day:).
上次在卡罗琳家品尝了美味的牙买加菜。她问我这次的菜应该够辣了吧？其实我心里想，“马马虎虎”。她可能不知道如今我的吃辣功力已经内力大增，因为我吃完了一瓶菜市场买的新鲜刚果霹雳辣椒。再吃TABASCO这种美国辣椒都感觉像橙汁了。刚果霹雳椒真是迄今为止我吃过最辣的辣椒。如果没人反对我决定提名刚果霹雳椒为辣椒之王。当然，我也很喜欢世界其他地方的美食，因为有来自各地的朋友互相献技登厨，做过日本寿司，泰国面，罗马尼亚卷，格鲁吉亚汤，韩国泡菜，等等等等，我们应该再在卡罗琳家举行一个世界美食日。：）

万事的奥秘/Great mystery behind all

孔子的学生季路有一次向学问渊博的老师请教问“死是怎么回事”。孔子说：“未知生，焉知死？”，于是这成了孔夫子学生或后代们久久不能解开的迷。传道书中有写“凡事都有定期，天下万物都有定时。生有时，死有时。栽种有时，拔出所栽种的，也有时。杀戮有时，医治有时。拆毁有时，建造有时。哭有时，笑有时。哀恸有时，跳舞有时。抛掷石头有时，堆聚石头有时。怀抱有时，不怀抱有时。寻找有时，失落有时。保守有时，舍弃有时。撕裂有时，缝补有时。静默有时，言语有时。喜爱有时，恨恶有时。争战有时，和好有时。”托住万有的主坐在高天至大者的右边，祂的生命书中有我们的生之日死之时，如此的奥秘，读后令人掩卷叹息。
Confucius' student Ji Lu once asked him "teacher, what is death?" Confucius answered:" I don't evan know life,not to mention death." thus,this became a mystery which puzzled many generations after Confucius.In Ecclesiastes was written:"There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven:a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build,a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance,a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain,a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away,a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak,a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace."The Lord who's siting at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven, is sustaining all these things by His powerful Word.In His book was written our birth and death,at the exact time and place, such mystery makes me wonder!

余音绕梁/A Guzheng song with a story from 2000 thousand years' ago

Endocrine disrupters/内分泌干扰物

Before explaining what endocrine disrupters(ED) are, it’s important to know first what endocrine system is. The endocrine system is consists of glands, which secret hormones, these hormones acts as chemical messengers travel through the blood to arrive at a target organ. It binds with the receptor, just like a key would fit into a lock. But there are exogenous substances in the environment (eg. Natural and synthetic hormones, dioxins, furans, DDT, PCBs or chemicals used in detergents or in the plastics industry) that mimic or inhibit the action of hormones and try to disrupt the physiologic function of endogenous hormones. Therefore this disruption might be able to cause harmful effects to human body, such as: breast, prostate, testicular cancer, urogenital malformations and reduced male fertility. With the environmental pollution becomes ever serious, the study on the environmental endocrine disrupters becomes an important task of research.
Although sounds bizarre and faraway, our life is in fact much more invaded by ED than ever as we are more industrialized. We might expose to endocrine disrupters through direct contact with pesticides or chemicals when we ingest fruits, food, or contaminated water. Many ED are persistent in the environment and can accumulate in fat, so we are more exposed to ED if we eat many fatty foods and fish from contaminated water. (Watch out scavengers!)
If it’s still not scary enough, let’s look at some shocking examples.
Diethylstilbestrol (DES), the first synthetic hormone, was massively used in the 1950s~1960s prescribed to prevent spontaneous abortion of women who were experiencing problems during pregnancy in USA, Latin America and elsewhere. Over the decades, doctors not only prescribed DES to prevent miscarriages, they also began to recommend it for untroubled pregnancies as if it were a vitamin. There were advertisements of the DES boasting that it produced bigger and stronger babies. There were also a myth about the placental barrier that this complex body of tissue that attaches to the wall of the womb and to the baby through the umbilical cord, acts as an impenetrable shield protecting the developing baby from any harmful outside influences. Nightmare came as mothers found out their babies were sooner or later detected of birth defects. Some study had also linked a rare vaginal cancer showing up in young women to the DES drug that their mothers had taken during pregnancy. Cruel reality cast down the myth of placental and the fact that some chemicals could cross the placenta and disrupt the development of the baby or have a serious long-term impact without causing any outwardly visible birth defects. In the 1960s DES was also used as a growth hormone in the beef and poultry industry that can cause cancer, however it has been halted now. (Not guarantee some countries are still using it).
Now comes to the more famous DDT. We often use it to control mosquitoes and other insects. DDT can damage the liver and reproductive system. Young roosters can be feminized when treated with DDT. It has also successfully feminized alligators in Florida’s Lake Apopka, the female ones are super female alligators with rations of estrogen to testosterone twice as high as normal. Male alligators had what looked like ovaries and stunted genitalia. Considering this animal reaction, what about the effect on humans? Many countries have a sharp rise of testicular cancer over the years, the sperm count in men has fallen almost 50%. The ubiquitous feminizing hormones in our environment bathe us in a sea of estrogenic compounds, which can also affect sexual behavior. I wonder if it's also contributing to the ever increasing homosexuality numbers.
Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are a group of 209 compounds which also possess a similar feminizing capacity. Effects including demasculinization and feminization of male fish,birds,and mammals and defeminization and masculinization of female fish and birds.Some turtles are sex-reversed by PCBs, male frogs exposed to a common herbicide form multiple ovaries, pseudohermaphroditic offspring are produced by polar bears. PCBs were used in numerous products such as capacitors, flame retardants, sealants, adhesives and plasticizers.
Plus there’re more than 2000 chemicals that come into market every year without being tested to determine toxicity. Knowing more reality indeed makes people more pessimistic, even my smartest professor is a cynical person. However my professor still encouraged us, young, not yet cynical students to find some solution to this man-made disaster. Human solutions are proved to be less effective against our non-stopping industrial activity. The best and most important solution I can think of is really a God solution. The prayer before each meal is never been so necessary than knowing our inability now. So solution one: pray before you eat, that the creator of universe and everything within would make clean the food we eat, it will definitely be cleansed if our faith is big enough.. Second, buy organic food wherever possible; third avoid using pesticides in our home; four, avoid fatty food as cheese and meat. Five, avoid heating food in plastic containers. Last but not the least don’t consume chicken necks which were the sites of injection of estrogens etc.

Who is it?

Someone said we should consider Revelation13:11 together with Genesis3:19 and Genesis3:1-6,then we may identify the beast.Let's see what we can get:
Revelation 13:11[Then I saw another beast, coming out of the earth. He had two horns like a lamb, but he spoke like a dragon.]
Genesis 3:19[By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return." ]
Genesis 3:1-6[1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?"
2 The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.' "
4 "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. 5 "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.]
某人说从启示录十三章十一节对兽的描述要联系到创世纪三章十九节和三章一到六节来一起考虑推断出兽。我们看看这些拼到一起会是什么：
启示录十三章十一节[我又看见另有一个兽从地中上来。有两角如同羊羔，说话好像龙.]
创世纪三章十九节[你必汗流满面才得糊口，直到你归了土，因为你是从土而出的。你本是尘土，仍要归于尘土.]
创世纪三章一至六节[耶和华神所造的，惟有蛇比田野一切的活物更狡猾。蛇对女人说，神岂是真说，不许你们吃园中所有树上的果子吗？女人对蛇说，园中树上的果子，我们可以吃，惟有园当中那棵树上的果子，神曾说，你们不可吃，也不可摸，免得你们死。蛇对女人说，你们不一定死，因为神知道，你们吃的日子眼睛就明亮了，你们便如神能知道善恶。于是女人见那棵树的果子好作食物，也悦人的眼目，且是可喜爱的，能使人有智慧，就摘下果子来吃了。又给她丈夫，她丈夫也吃了。]

Taekwondo promotion test/跆拳道升级考试

Saturday I've been tested for green belt in dojang.Next goal is blue. SBN and BOO SBN have taught us a great deal about the HWARANG/WARRIOR spirit:humility, perserverance, courage,commitment, discipline,courtesy,self-control,integrity,indomitable spirit etc. I'm really grateful to learn such classical Taekwondo with wonderful teacher and friends. In the torrent of olympic sports, this ancient art is now losing a lots of its original beauty due to modernisation which reduced the art to only wrestling, kicking and boxing etc. The same is happening to many other disciplines and arts.We either go back to 2000 or so years ago marvel at how people were learnt and faint or ancient people comming to modern day to be suprised and say:I condemn thee.
周六跆拳道升级考试，我拿到了绿带。下一个目标是蓝带。我们的跆拳道老师是一个很注重武侠精神的黑带高人，在当今奥林匹克运动流行的洪流中，武术比赛已经被剔除了很多精华，剩下的竞技多半是摔跤，踢腿，拳击等。而许多很珍贵的武术精神:谦卑，坚忍，勇气，承诺，纪律，自控，正值，不屈不挠的精神已经渐渐流失。若是我们回到两千年前观看古人习武，一定是令人叹为观止。而古人若来到现代一定是气绝而亡。比如一向洁身自好，曲高和寡的黄老邪，不和丑人蠢人过招的东邪，他会劝那些人赶快自杀。北丐七公会用他的打狗棒把今习武的糟泊剃掉手筋脚筋。

Crucified to the Religious World

(Brethren T. Austin-Sparks is a faithful servant of God,his artical further elaborated the things of a natural world and of a spiritual world.We see how dangerous it is to put a natural hand on the things of a spiritual world. Such insight into Galatians is a great blessing to those who receive!)

Crucified to the Religious World
"But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world" (Galatians 6:14).

It is interesting to notice the particular way in which the Apostle speaks of the world here. That term is a very comprehensive term and includes a very great deal. Here Paul gets right down to the spirit of the thing. You notice the context; it is well for us to take account of it:

"For neither they themselves who are circumcised keep the law; but desire to have you circumcised, that they may glory in your flesh" (Galatians 6:13).

What does the Apostle mean? They want to say, "See how many proselytes we are making! See how many followers and disciples we are getting! See how successful our movement is! See what a power we are becoming in the world! See all the marks of Divine blessing resting upon us!" The Apostle says that is worldliness in principle and spirit; that is the world. He sets over against this his own clear spiritual position. Do I seek glory of men? Do I seek to be well-pleasing to men? No! The world is crucified to me, and I to the world.

All that sort of thing does not weigh with me. What weighs with me is not whether my movement is successful, whether I am getting a lot of followers, whether there are all the manifestations outwardly of success; what weighs with me is the measure of Christ in those with whom I have to do: "My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you" (Galatians 4:19). Christ formed in you — that is my concern, he says that is what weighs with me... not extensiveness, not bigness, not popularity, not keeping in with the world, so that it is said that this is a successful ministry and a successful movement. That is worldliness. I am dead to all that; I am crucified with Christ to all that. The thing that matters is Christ — the measure of Christ in you.

You see how the world can creep in... and how worldly we can become almost imperceptibly by taking account of things outwardly — of how men will think and talk, what they will say, the attitude they will take; of the measure of our popularity, the talk of our success. That is all the world, says the Apostle, the spirit of the world; that is how the world talks. Those are the values in the eyes of the world, but not in the eyes of the risen Christ. In the new creation, on the resurrection side of the Cross, one thing alone determines value... and that is the measure of Christ in everything. Nothing else is of value at all, however big the thing may be, however popular it may be, however men talk favorably of it; on the resurrection side that does not count a little bit. What counts is how much of Christ there is.

You and I in the Cross of the Lord Jesus must come to the place where we are crucified to all those other elements. Ah, you may be unpopular, and the work be very small; there may be no applause, and the world may despise; but in it all there may be something which is of Christ, and that is the thing upon which our hearts must be set. The Lord gives us grace for that crucifixion. There are few things more difficult to bear than being despised; but He was despised and rejected of men. What a thing is in God’s sight must be our standard. That is a resurrection standard. Now that is the victory of the Cross: "But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world".

Joshua 1:The LORD Commands Joshua

Joshua1:5 No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you. So we say with confidence, "The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?"

Sermon on the mount--Heaven on earth--study note from a brethren

Heaven is not a cemetery where we go after we die,instead, heaven is here and right now, as in Matthew 4:17 says: From that time Jesus began to preach and say, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."

We are often taught that Heaven is far away. Is this promise about the future? What good is theoretical gospel?The Sermon on the Mount was delivered to bring hope and joy to a group of poverty stricken peasants who were taxed to death by the Romans and sneered at by their own rulers and scholars: the scribes, Pharisees and church leaders. His primary purpose in teaching was to convey the message that the Kingdom was here and now.

Where and what is Heaven? The Bible teaches that it is all around us?

Genesis 21:17-19[17 God heard the boy crying, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and said to her, "What is the matter, Hagar? Do not be afraid; God has heard the boy crying as he lies there. 18 Lift the boy up and take him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation." 19 Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. So she went and filled the skin with water and gave the boy a drink. ]

Exodus 31:21[ And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night: ]

1 chronicles 21:26[And David built there an altar unto the LORD, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings, and called upon the LORD; and he answered him from heaven by fire upon the altar of burnt offering. ]

John 12: 28-30[28: Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again. 29: The people therefore, that stood by, and heard it, said that it thundered: others said, An angel spake to him. 30: Jesus answered and said, This voice came not because of me, but for your sakes. ]

Jesus rebuked Nicodemus for not understanding the New Birth into His Kingdom which is to be joined with a divine reality into an entirely new pattern of life: the Kingdom Amongst Us.
Is the gate to heaven small? yes, [Go in by the narrow door; for wide is the door and open is the way which goes to destruction, and great numbers go in by it.]However the heaven road is not a deliberately hidden passage that requires special rites and secret procedures to join.Although the gate to heaven is small, it can be found by anyone who wants to look for it.yet, the Lord said[For narrow is the door and hard the road to life, and only a small number make discovery of it.] So why do so few pass through? The answer to that question lies in the definition of the gate. The 'gate' is an admission by each seeker that there is absolutely nothing that he can do to gain admittance. The reason that the way is described as "narrow" is because it is purposeful. A road with one direction and one goal, makes it a narrow way compare with wide roads without directions and going nowhere.
Biblical descriptions of the narrow way's alternative:
Proverbs 13:15[Good understanding produces favour,But the way of the treacherous is hard.]
Proverbs 14:12[There is a way which seems right to a man, But its end is the way of death.]
Isaiah 59:8[They do not know the way of peace, And there is no justice in their tracks; They have made their paths crooked, Whoever treads on them does not know peace.]
Proverbs2:15[Whose paths are crooked, And who are devious in their ways].

滚滚的倩影 ：）

Darby's poem

Low at Thy feet, Lord Jesus,
This is the place for me;
Here I have learned deep lessons:
Truth that has set me free.
Free from myself, Lord Jesus,
Free from the ways of men;
Chains of thought that have bound me
Never can bind again.
None but Thyself, Lord Jesus,
Conquered this wayward will,
But for Thy love constraining,
I had been wayward still.

Lord, Let Me Wait For Thee Alone;My Life Be Only This:To Serve Thee Here On Earth Unknown,Then Share Thy Heavenly Bliss.