Psalm 119 - In Praise of the Law

Notice the title of this post is not Psalms 119.  It is only the one Psalm.

I am not going to type it all out here as it is much too long for that.  I just wanted to explain two interesting details of this Psalm that I did not know about before yesterday.

First, do you see those weird headings throughout the Psalm?  They are the letters of the Hebrew alphabet.  א - Aleph, ב - Beth, ג - Gimel, and so on.  There are 22 of them which is why there are 22 sections of 8 verses each in Psalm 119.  Here is the neat part, if you were to read Psalm 119 in Hebrew, each verse starts with the letter indicated.  Obviously this is lost in translation, but you can see that the author was looking to incorporate alliteration in his work.  He is using the entire alphabet to praise the word of God.

Second, every verse (literally, take a look, every single verse has it) points to the word of God.  Various different words are used throughout the Psalm.  Decrees, Precepts, Law, Word, Commands, Statutes, and so on.  I had never noticed this before although it is quite blatant.

Kind of cool to know these two little tidbits right?  Now read Psalm 119.  It becomes more of a poem or song instead of just a long chapter full of words.  It sure would be neat to be able to read the entire book of Psalms in the original languange.

I Then Shall Live

This song was inspired by Francis Schaeffer's book How Should We Then Live.

"I Then Shall Live" by the Gaither Vocal Band with Signature Sound:

I then shall live as one who's been forgiven,
I'll walk with joy to know my debts are paid,
I know my name is clear before my father,
I am His child and I am not afraid.
So greatly pardoned I'll forgive my brother,
The law of love I gladly will obey.

I then shall live as one who's learned compassion,
I've been so loved that I'll risk loving too,
I know how fear builds walls instead of bridges,
I'll dare to see another's point of view.
And when relationships demand commitment,
Then I'll be there to care and follow through.
Your kingdom come around and through and in me,
Your power and glory, let them shine through me.
Your Hallowed name, O may I bear with honour,
And may Your living Kingdom come in me.
The bread of life, O may I share with honour,
And may You feed a hungry world through me.
Amen.

Free Music Downloads

This is something I struggle with quite a bit.  I love listening to good music so much.  One of my favorite things to do is to put on my new 7.1 circumaural headphones that my excellent wife got me for my birthday and just zone out for an hour or two listening to music at the computer.  There is very little music that I don't listen to.  Recently I've been listening to a lot of Kaskade and Deadmau5.  Check out my profile for a list of music and artists I listen to.

Downloading music for free is like a dream come true.  I can listen to whatever I want whenever I want.  I'm listening to music on the radio while I drive home from work, all of a sudden Deadmau5's Ghosts N Stuff comes on and I crank it.  Inner monologue: "I should download this when I get home.  This song is so wicked"  That's right, I say wicked a lot in my inner monologue.  But wait...there's the alarm...and...WAKE UP - YOU'RE DREAMING!

*I would have put an exclamation point after each sentence for the rest of this post, but I feared the repetition would have caused it to loose some of it's potency.*

The reason downloading music for free seems like a dream come true is that you're dreaming if you think it has come true - ethically anyway - does anyone still bother with ethics?  I am not talking about downloading music from itunes or some other site where you purchase music.  I have had some of my Christian friends argue with me about this!  "Downloading music is ok because the artists are making so much money anyway, they really don't need the extra $X from that one CD."  "It really isn't illegal in Canada if you are just "sharing" files."  "Everyone's doing it, what difference am I going to make?"

I don't care what the law says in this regard.  If you are taking something for free from another person who created it and intended for it to be purchased, you are stealing.  You are stealing their livelihood.  How is this so hard to understand?  It doesn't matter if they are as rich as Bill Gates, if you download a copy of Microsoft Office without paying for it, you stole it - they didn't spend years staying up late writing the software out of the goodness of their hearts.  Do you think that Universal Studios spends billions each year making movies without some intention of making that money back somehow?  If I grab your wallet and start "sharing" your money with everyone, you're going to want to sit down and have a talk with me about that.

Be honest with yourself.  You want to do it, so you justify it.

Everyone knows that unless it is freeware there is some expectation from the author to be reimbursed for your enjoyment of their product.  Do you really think they did it just for you?  If I was to run into someone who would respond to me that they knew they were stealing but that they didn't mind being a thief, I think our conversation would be over.  There would be nothing for me to say.  I wouldn't agree with them, and my opinion of them would be in the dirt, but the conversation would have nowhere to go.  It is people's justification of the whole process that starts to make my temperature rise.  Especially people who call themselves Christians - there is no excuse for that.  None!  If you have come up with an excellent excuse for downloading free music which makes my previous one word, gramatically incorrect, sentence obsolete please leave a comment telling me all about it - I would love to start downloading music for free.