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Categories Book Reviews

Book Review: “Lost in Rooville” by Ray Blackston

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What do you get when you cross two couples, a trip to the Australian outback, and a quest for the perfect place to propose?

A perfectly hilarious novel.

Ray Blackston’s Lost in Rooville had me laughing from start to finish. Main character Jay Jarvis and his girlfriend Allie venture out into the outback alone–ostensibly racing their best friends for most animal sightings, but really looking for a great spot for Jay to make a sunset proposal. They eventually do find some animals–but get hopelessly lost while doing so.

What follows is a wickedly amusing account of Jay’s actions and thoughts as he and his new fiancee sit by their broken-down Land Rover waiting for rescue–if rescue is forthcoming.

Blackston is one of those authors that I picked up willy-nilly from the library shelves one day–and discovered that I really enjoyed. Most Christian “romance” fiction is written by women–and while that’s just fine, it does mean that a lot of Christian “romance” fiction is, well, pretty feminine. Blackston’s romances are definitely not feminine. This isn’t a feel-good, gushy story–it’s a feel-good, almost-wet-your-pants-laughing story. And that’s nice for a change.

Something in the last few chapters tipped me off to the idea that this wasn’t the first Blackston had written of these characters. I investigated a bit–and it turns out that this was a sequel to Blackston’s first novel Flabbergasted. Obviously, since I made it all the way through the book before realizing that this was a sequel–it works fine as a stand alone novel.

This was a fun book, a great turn-off-your-brain read–and I recommend Blackston for anytime you need a nice light laugh.

Rating: 3 stars
Category: Fiction
Synopsis: In the quest for a perfect place to pop the question, Jay finds himself and his girlfriend stranded in the middle of the Australian outback, with nothing to do but wait for rescue.
Recommendation: Amusing but not necessarily profound, the storyline is engaging but not spectacular. Nevertheless, this is a great read for anyone who likes a laugh.

Categories Family & Friends, Following Christ, Reflections, Thankfulness

My GREAT Aunts

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The Cook Clan, to which I belong, is a clan that is blessed with women.

Of my mother’s eleven siblings, nine of them are sisters.

So I grew up in a world dominated by aunts (although they managed to bring not a few men into the fold as in-laws.)

Some of my earliest childhood memories are of taking romps with a whole passel of aunts, attending the wedding of one aunt or the other, picking up an aunt from her university classes.

My aunts are all smart, brilliant even. The Cook girls were almost universally valedictorians of their class. Most of them went to the University on academic scholarships.

The Cook family, Christmas 1984

The Cook Clan, Christmas 1984

But it isn’t their brains or even the fond memories of childhood play that make me declare that I have the greatest aunts in the world.

It’s Facebook that has convinced me that my aunts are the best.

My aunts read my Facebook stati, the links I post, the blog posts that get automatically transferred as notes. And they comment with wisdom and humor.

I linked to an article about an amusing medical condition. An aunt commented her LOL–and then later privately messaged me. “I’ve been thinking about that article a little more and realized that your younger cousins can see it as well. It’s pretty graphic, and I’m not sure their parents want to have to explain those things.” She was absolutely right–and I never would have thought of it. I removed the link and, thanks to her wisdom, spared my younger cousins from seeing something inappropriate.

I spill my heart, share some of the difficulties I’ve been experiencing–and an aunt comments just to say “I feel you.” When I demonstrate inappropriate thinking, an aunt steps in to lovingly rebuke me, encouraging me to be compassionate towards myself. When I comment on her stati, an aunt responds with an affirmation “Bekah, maybe you should stay in school and get that PhD. I can see you being a professor.”

I mention the “fertility charm” I received as a gift, stating that I won’t be wearing it as I’m lacking certain prerequisites. An aunt comments to say that there are more ways to be fertile than just having babies. “And I would say Rebekah you are very full of fruit, in the Godly way!”

What a blessing to have aunts who are full of wisdom and encouragement–and who are willing to share it so freely.

Cook girls, Thanksgiving 2009

Some of my aunts in their traditional kitchen cabal,
discussing some important issue of the day
Thanksgiving 2009

“…the older women likewise, that they be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things–that they admonish the young women to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be blasphemed.”
Titus 2:3-5

I am so grateful to have such wonderful aunts, who fear God and seek to follow His ways–and who encourage me to do the same.

Categories Thankful Thursday

Thankful Thursday: The Morning

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Thankful Thursday banner

“Sing praise to the LORD, you saints of His,
And give thanks at the remembrance of His holy name.
For His anger is but for a moment,
His favor is for life;
Weeping may endure for a night,
But joy comes in the morning. ”
Psalm 30:4-5

Today I’m thankful…

  • That I was able to send in another paper this morning
  • That I had a chance to quilt a bit with my dear friend Joanna (it’s been too long, far too long!)
  • That I found a nice little MP3 player for uber-cheap. Now I can listen to sermons and audio lectures and audio books whenever and wherever I want. (I am my father’s daughter.)
  • That I had a nice chat with my mom and my brother when we dropped by to see mom’s “mother of the groom” dress
  • That I sent in the last grades and am done teaching for the semester.
  • That I had such wonderful instructors to work with this semester.
  • That I have a gardening and dinner date with my dad this evening.
  • That dawn breaks, signaling an end, perhaps, to this dark night

Sun breaking out of the clouds

I am so very thankful for the great faithfulness of my Savior. As the hymn says “Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow, Blessings all mine with ten thousand besides.” I have been so blessed with His presence and guidance through the land of shadow–and in Him I have hope for the haze of a thousand tomorrows.

Thank You, my Lord, for the morning.

Categories Reading My Library

This book’s a blast!

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Romeo and Lou, a penguin and a polar bear, play together in the snow, molding themselves a space ship for imaginary travels.

When their spaceship takes off, they unexpectedly find themselves in the midst of an alarmingly unusual forest.

Romeo and Lou Blast Off

They’re stymied by unfamiliar sites until they finally see something that looks right–another polar bear (actually a small white dog) and penguin (actually a rather large man in a suit.) They ask for directions–and well, things don’t really go so well.

They meet some walruses (workmen) busy “ice fishing” (actually using a jackhammer on a road). They find another space ship (mini-van) and get inside–only to be chased out by a school of angry fish (children coming out of the swimming pool.) A shark (policeman) chases them all the way over a bridge and onto a ship, where Romeo and Lou build themselves a new spaceship and sail home.

Reading My Library

Derek Anderson’s Romeo and Lou Blast Off absolutely enthralled me with its funny juxtaposition of everyday life and polar animals. The story itself is imaginative, even fantastical–but the real treat is seeing the walruses, the shark, the penguin, etc. all just everyday men that you never would have really noticed…well, they really do look rather like walruses, sharks, and the like. It’s uncanny!

If you happen to be able to find a copy of Romeo and Lou Blast Off, I encourage you to pick it up. You won’t be sorry.


Categories Education

Painful Pity

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I needed to talk to my professor about some papers–but I knew I couldn’t do it while other students were in the room. So I waited patiently until the last student left.

And then came the moment I’d been afraid of.

“Rebekah, how are you?” he said in that tone that says he actually cares, that he’d be willing to hear the whole story if I wanted to share it.

Just as I suspected, my eyes filled with tears and I could only take a deep breath and shrug, silently cursing myself for letting him see my weakness.

It’s been a hard semester. Probably the hardest of my life.

I’ve worked hard to not let it show–to not let my personal life infringe on my work and school life. If that meant spending long hours at home working on something that previously took me minutes, that’s what I’d do. If it meant crying out all of my tears in the evening so none could be left for work hours, that’s what I did. If it meant avoiding people in “normal life” so that I could be “on” for the hours that I had to be teaching or in meetings, so be it.

I think I was pretty successful. If any of my classmates (except Chante, the classmate who’s also a friend) or my supervisors or my teachers noticed, they didn’t let on. Except for Dr. Newman.

Dr. Newman saw through my disguise and had compassion.

And I hate it. I hate it that he has compassion on the weakness I cannot have compassion on.

“Don’t be nice to me!” I want to shout. “Don’t allow me this weakness! I shouldn’t be weak. I can’t be weak. Despise me, hate me, be harsh with me–anything but kindness is welcome.”

I don’t want to accept my weakness–and it galls me that he accepts it when I will not.

Why is being shown compassion so painful?

Categories Everyday Life

Grand Plans

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I had grand plans to post about my dad’s garden today.

My parent's garden, circa 1995

My parent’s garden, circa 1995

I also had grand plans of finishing up the editing on a group paper and presentation that’s due tomorrow–and then of getting to work on some personal papers.

Alas, the editing took QUITE a while longer than I expected.

So instead, I’m going to sleep.

Tomorrow I have papers to write, a presentation to give, and grades to drop off. So I can’t guarantee that I’ll have that garden post for you then either.

Sorry about that.

For now, I’ll leave you with a quote that perfectly exemplifies my father’s what my mother wishes was my father’s strategy for gardening:

“A man should never plant a garden larger than his wife can take care of.”
~T.H. Everett

At some point, I’ll explain.

Categories Book Notes, Faith

Our incomplete theology

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Notes on Francis Chan’s
Forgotten God
Chapter 3: Theology of the Holy Spirit 101

“I’m reading this book by Francis Chan called Forgotten God–”

“Forgotten God?” my dad quizzed.

I described the thesis of the book as I understand it now: Chan believes that Christians have “forgotten” the third person of the Trinity and need to remember Him again.

“I think he’s right.” Dad replied–and went on to tell me that he’d just been thinking that same thing in relation to the Nicene Creed. He quoted the pertinent passage:

“And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life; who proceeds from the Father and the Son; who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified; who spoke by the prophets.”

And I thought, “Huh, yeah. He’s right.”

When was the last time I heard a sermon on the Holy Spirit–on who He is, not just what He does? I have no idea. When was the last time I heard a hymn of adoration to the Holy Spirit? I can’t remember. My church does not publicly recite the creeds, so I know it has been years since I heard or recited the Nicene creed.

This fundamental confession of our faith declares that the Holy Spirit is the Lord and Giver of life–and that He is worshiped and glorified together with the Father and Son–but I see little evidence that the church accords the Spirit the same adoration that they do the Father and the Son.

I remember one particular year where I found myself in a liturgical church on Pentecost Sunday. My own church is not liturgical and pays no mind to the liturgical calendar except for lighting advent candles (frequently in the wrong order, although I try to refrain from being nit-picky)–so I know better than to expect a Pentecost sermon on Pentecost there. But in a liturgical church, I had high hopes of hearing a true Pentecost sermon–a sermon on the Holy Spirit. Sure enough, the readings were rife with mention of the Holy Spirit. My anticipation mounted for the sermon–and then was quickly dashed when the pastor mentioned the Holy Spirit exactly…never…in his sermon. Forgotten God is right.

Recently, I was visiting the website of some churches in my area–and I found a “statement of faith” that quoted from Mike Yaconelli of Youth Worker Magazine from Nov/Dec 2003:

“We’re about Jesus. We know He’s a part of the Trinity and all the other important stuff we also believe, but if we’re honest, we’re partial to Jesus. Don’t get us wrong. God is like a Father-no, God IS the Father-and the buck stops with Him (if you’re going to have the buck stop somewhere it might as well stop with Someone who is…well…all about love with a capital L. Of course, He’s also about justice with a capital J, but we’ll take out chances that, in the end, justice will also feel like love!) And then there is the Holy Spirit-mysterious, windy, seems to like fire a lot, whispering, and always pointing us to…you guessed it…Jesus. We not only like Jesus a lot, He likes us a lot, enough to die for us. We know that when life gets tough (and it always does) He’ll be there for us.

I was absolutely shocked by the way this “statement of faith” treated the Holy Spirit. Mysterious, windy, pyromaniac whisperer who points at Jesus? Honestly? I understand that within the original context, this likely (hopefully) was never intended to be a distillation of belief about the Trinity. Yet I don’t doubt that this is the essence of many a Christian’s beliefs regarding the Holy Spirit.

Even as I look at my own church’s statement of faith–I see discussion of the Holy Spirit, but more in reference to the “baptism of the Holy Spirit” than in regard to WHO the Holy Spirit truly is.

It’s a hole in our theology. The word theology strictly means theos-God, -logy-study. The study of God. Yet we study the Father, we glorify the Son, and we forget about the Holy Spirit–or at best, turn Him into little more than a cosmic gift-giver. We’ve got an incomplete theology–only two-thirds formed. The Christian God is a triune God. Why then do we not include all three persons of the Trinity in our theology?

Seeing a hole in our theology makes me glad that Chan chooses not to jump right into the “practice” of the Holy Spirit–into charismata or the “baptism of the Holy Spirit” or even the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit that accompanies Christian witness. Instead, Chan takes the time to establish a basic (although non-comprehensive) theology of the Holy Spirit–both who He is and what He does.

Some of Chan’s main points:

  • The Holy Spirit is a person
  • The Holy Spirit is God
  • The Holy Spirit is eternal and holy
  • The Holy Spirit has His own mind, and He prays for us
  • The Holy Spirit has emotions
  • The Holy Spirit has His own desires and will
  • The Holy Spirit is omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient

It seems to me that we can easily fall into a trap of either ignoring the Holy Spirit entirely or considering Him as a means to our own ends. Either way, we tend to deny Him His deity.

My heart, then, is to reverse this trend–starting with myself. I want to know the Holy Spirit so that I might worship and glorify Him together with the Father and the Son.

I love the description Chan gives of why the Christian should be interested in the theology of the Holy Spirit:

“Know that even as you seek to understand the Spirit more, He is so much more and bigger than you will ever be able to grasp. This is not an excuse to stop seeking to know Him, but don’t limit Him to what you can learn about Him. The point is not to completely understand God but to worship Him. Let the very fact that you cannot know Him fully lead you to praise Him for His infiniteness and grandeur.”

Why should I develop my theology of the Holy Spirit? In order that I might worship Him–and the entire Trinity–more fully.

(See more notes on Forgotten God here.)

Categories Recap

Recap (April 25-May 1)

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Busy week –> Not much blog reading –> Short Recap

Sorry, folks–since I know you all look forward to these recaps SO much! :-P

On bekahcubed

Book Reviews:

  • Home by Julie Andrews.

Photo Albums:

On the web

Laugh out loud funnies:

Books for the TBR list:

Thought-provoking posts:

  • Eric does it again, with a beautiful post that brought tears to my eyes. On reading the Bible “in context”:

    “The problem with seminary – and with insular churches, self-righteousness, and every other manifestation of Christian isolationism – is that it never reads Luke 4 in this setting. It never sees the bondage of addiction, the blindness of unbelief, or the poverty of the truly poor on their own terms. Since we live in a world that is very good at pretending its problems are small, Isaiah’s promise ends up feeling pretty small too. Put another way, many Christians fail to see the transformative power of the gospel because the only sick people they know hide their cancer behind closed doors and strained smiles. Here, they wear it on their sleeves (sometimes literally – I’m guessing that rainbow on my favorite waitress’s t-shirt isn’t meant to be a Care Bears reference).”

    Read the whole post.

Categories Education

Dead Week

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At the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, the week before finals is “Dead Week”–the week in which professors are not supposed to give homework or tests unless previously scheduled. Of course, this just means that the professors are careful to schedule homework and tests in advance.

My modus operadi throughout my undergraduate career was to get sick every dead week. I’m moderately (Hah!) Type A and tend to work myself rather hard over the course of the semester. By dead week, my body has had enough of the stress I’ve inflicted upon it and it simply gives in. I stay in bed for a week, wishing I were dead–and then rise again on the seventh day to take finals.

Then came grad school.

I don’t remember whether I got sick in my first few semesters of grad school. It all begins to blur in my mind. But I do know what this semester’s dead week has looked like–and I definitely had no time to get sick.

I TA for a class of 200 students–and we gave them an assignment due last Thursday. So I’ve been frantically grading all week. Then on Thursday, I administered a lab practical to my other (much smaller) class. My supervisor and I sat down right away to get the practicals graded.

I had a job interview on Tuesday (I didn’t get the job–which I’m feeling ambivalent about.) I had a bit of an emotional shock on Wednesday. I had a major physical shock on Thursday. And yesterday, I baked a cake.

Actually, it wasn’t just a cake. It was a cake plus several dozen cupcakes. My sister is throwing a bridal shower for our sister-in-law-to-be today, and she’d asked me to prepare the cake. No problem. But our family…well, we have a rather large family. And even with half of the invitees not being able to show up, we’re still expecting 35 or so at the shower. So LOTS of cake making and decoration was in order.

My sister and our good friend Mary are in town for the shower–so I spent some time with them last night.

And I woke up today with an allergy-stuffed nose, a pressure-related headache, a heaviness in my fingers and toes that indicates dehydration, and a realization that I’d made it through dead week without getting sick.

Let’s hope I can do the same for finals week.

Categories Everyday Life

Revenue Generating

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Yesterday, I got done with my classes and walked to my car, nonchalantly contemplating all that I had to do that evening and thinking about the job interview I’d had that morning–nothing much really.

When I reached my car, I stopped short at the sight of–no it couldn’t be–

Parking ticket

But it was. A parking ticket. How on earth? My mind ran through the options. I’d parked there at 3:45 pm, the area was two hour parking between 8 am and 5 pm with no limit after 5. So I only spent 1 hr and 15 minutes there between the regulated hours.

I was considering my options, thinking through the appeal process, when I opened the envelope and discovered the true issue.

Parking Ticket

“Invalid registration.”

My mind tried processing this new information.

“Let’s see, I bought Lucy last year after the car accident. The car accident was at the end of February. I drove a rental through March. And I bought Lucy in April, right?”

Except that I checked when I dropped off my recycling at the recycling collection place.

No, I must have bought it in March.

Oh, that’s what happened. I’m remembering it now. I bought JACK, my previous car in April–and so I’d paid registration through April on the car that was totalled in the accident. Didn’t they try to arrange something to reimburse me for that extra month or something?

Yeah. That’s right.

Okay, so my car does indeed have invalid registration. My plates expired last month. I’ll accept that.

License plate

The question is–why didn’t I get a postcard reminding me that registration was due and telling me what I owed?

I haven’t changed my address. I’m the one who gets the mail, so I doubt it’s a matter of the postcard getting lost on my end.

Hmmm….

Conspiracy theories arise in my mind–and I’ve suddenly got it figured out.

They’re doing some old-fashioned revenue generating. Save $0.28 on the postcard, get $100 from the ticket, and still end up getting the registration in the end. It’s a fantastic racket.

So do the smart thing and check your registration today. Put the expiration on your calendar and don’t get caught by the racketeering state and local government.