A Love After God’s Own Heart Essay Example for Free

A Love After God’s Own Heart Essay What is the foundation of Christianity? If the question being discussed is whether something is ideally Christian, then the motivation behind Christianity must be understood. The basic outline of Christianity is simple. Man exists in a fallen and depraved state. Christ died on the cross to conquer death and atone for all humanity. Those who acknowledge their need for a Savior and place their faith in this gift, shall have eternal life. That leads to the logical question of why. Why should Christ sacrifice himself for such undeserving people? Therein is found that basis, that motivation behind Christianity. Love. The Bible says, â€Å"For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.† (NASB Jn. 3.16). Love is the heart of Christianity. God sent his Son to pay the ultimate cost for sinners because He loves them so much. Indeed, all truly Christian actions are committed out of out of love. Christ said while he was on the earth, â€Å"By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.† (NASB Jn. 13.35) Christianity starts and ends with love. Love is the root of Christianity and it is also the outward manifestation of Christ in a life. God is love. Therefore, though Silas Marner is at first estranged from both God and man, the Christ-mirroring love he bestows upon Eppie is a clear reflection of God’s own nature and is ideally Christian. George Eliot’s Silas Marner details the life of a solitary linen weaver. Silas Marner lives a life of seclusion in the town of Raveloe for 15 years while dealing with deeply inflicted emotional wounds. He loses his faith in God and his fellow man. Marner’s lone refuge is the coins he earns. He treasures them not for their monetary value, but for their companionship. Meanwhile, there is an alternate storyline of Godfrey and Dunsey Cass; sons of a wealthy landowner. The latter is a slobbering drunk while the other is well thought of. However, the former has a secret wife and child, and the knowledge of this allows the drunk to blackmail his elder brother. One day the drunk chances upon the empty house of the linen weaver. He discovers the coins and steals them. When Silas Marner discovers his loss, he elicits the help of the villagers. They search extensively for the coins, but to no avail. No one knows who has taken the coins, but Godfrey is delighted by Dunsey’s absence. On New Year’s Eve, the Cass family throws a large party and Godfrey attempts to woo the respected Nancy Lammeter. Meanwhile, Godfrey’s wife tries to bring their child to the Cass home and proclaim Godfrey’s secret to the world. However, being under the influence of opium, she falls asleep on the snowy ground. The child wanders into the nearby house of Silas Marner. When Marner finds the child and eventually the mother, he rushes to the Cass house for the doctor. The woman is found to be dead and as no father comes forth for the child, Marner claims it as his own. He names the child Eppie and does his best to raise her. He is often given motherly advice by his friend Mrs. Winthrop. Sixteen years go by and Eppie is now 18. Godfrey is married to Nancy. Godfrey regrets not claiming Eppie and decides it is time for her to come live with them. He tells Silas and Eppie the truth and asks Eppie if she wants to come live with him and his wife. Eppie declines, saying Silas is the only father she has known. Later, while a pit is being drained near Silas’ house, the body of Dunsey is discovered and with it Silas’ money, which is returned to him. Silas uses the money to return to his old home for closure on his past wounds, but the entire place is gone. When Silas returns, Eppie gets married to Mrs. Winthrop’s son and the story concludes with Eppie and her husband living happily with Silas. The child Eppie does not have a father, so Silas Marner adopts her as his own. Eppie quite literally wanders into Silas’ life and though she should not have to be his responsibility, he takes it upon himself to be her father. â€Å"Till anybody shows they’ve a right to take her away from me,† said Marner. â€Å"The mother’s dead and I reckon it’s got no father: it’s a lone thing- and I’m a lone thing† (Eliot 679). Though he shows it in his own peculiar way, Silas takes great compassion on this homeless, parentless girl. This is the first way Silas Marner shows God’s love to Eppie. God is obviously not a â€Å"lone thing,† having existed for eternity past in perfect harmony with the Trinity. However, he does take compassion on poor, lost people. God is the Father to all who place their faith in Jesus Christ. â€Å"For you have not received a Spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a Spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, Abba! Father! The Spirit himself testifies with our Spirit that we are children of God† (NASB Ro. 8. 15-16). Silas Marner adopts Eppie and becomes her father who she can always rely on. God adopts sinners who come to him and becomes their Everlasting Father in whom they can rely. The clear correlation between the two is the first way Silas Marner reflects God’s nature and ultimately Christian ideals. As Silas has this Christ-like love for Eppie, he naturally wants to protect her and help her grow. This gives Silas a completely new outlook on his surroundings and his normal everyday life. â€Å"As some man who has a precious plant to which he would give a nurturing home†¦and asks industriously for all knowledge that will help him to satisfy the wants of the searching roots, or to guard leaf and bud from invading harm† (689). Silas’ new role is to do all he can to keep Eppie safe. Eppie is young and inexperienced and vulnerable. Silas watches out for her and keeps her away from trouble because he knows better. Jesus Christ does the same thing for believers. He protects Christians from the Devil’s schemes as well as from their own folly. The Bible often describes this relationship with the analogy of a shepherd and his flock. â€Å"Like a shepherd He will tend his flock, In his arm he will gather the lambs and carry them in His bosom; He will gently lead t he nursing ewes† (NASB Is. 40.11). Silas is gently leading his nursing ewe, Eppie. Silas, in protecting and shepherding Eppie, is portraying distinctly Christian ideals. Eppie does not do anything to gain Silas’ love and likewise she can do nothing to lose it. Before she does any of the things that Silas later comes to love, Silas loved Eppie. Silas loves her from the first night she toddled into his home. She does not earn his love, it is based on Silas’ goodness and not Eppie’s merit. That is why she cannot lose it. It does not depend on her performance. â€Å"Here was a clear case of aberration in a christened child which demanded severe treatment; but Silas, overcome with compulsive joy†¦could do nothing but snatch her up and cover her with half sobbing kisses† (687). This is such a beautiful picture of what Christ does for the believer. Eppie runs off and disobeys Silas. He tirelessly pursues her until he finally catches her. Christians likewise stray from the fold of God, but Christ pursues them and is overjoyed to find them and bring them back. â€Å"If any man has a hundred sheep and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the 99 on the mountains and go and search for the one that is straying? If it turns out that he finds it, truly I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over 99 which have not gone astray† (NASB Mt. 18.12-13). This is how Silas feels for Eppie. Silas mirrors God with his unmerited and unconditional love for his daughter. Silas loves Eppie so much he is willing to sacrifice his happiness for her betterment.   Silas on the other hand, was again stricken in conscience and alarmed lest Godfrey’s accusation should be true- lest he should be raising his own will as an obstacle to Eppie’s good. For many movements he was mute, struggling for the self-conquest necessary to the uttering of the difficult words. They came out tremulously. â€Å"I’ll say no more. Let it be as you will. Speak to the child. I’ll hinder nothing. (714) Godfrey has now come and is asking Eppie to come live with him and his wife. Eppie is the absolute joy of Silas’ life. Even so, with those words, Silas is letting her go. He is relinquishing his daughter and his happiness that she might have a higher station in life. This is a truly sacrificial love. This again is in keeping with the Christian model Silas has been following all along. â€Å"But he was pierced through for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon him and by his scourging we are healed† (NASB Is. 53.5). The greatest sacrifice of all is Jesus’ death on the cross. Obviously Silas Marner is not crucified for Eppie, but he is willing to sacrifice his entire happiness for her betterment. Silas’ small sacrifice is a shadow of the Lord’s great sacrificial love for his people and clearly Christian. Sometimes this story is thought to have too many coincidences or be too much like a fairy tale to have realistic Christian ideals, but the Bible clearly disproves this. God is in control and He has a plan for everything. There are no coincidences in His eyes. It is not a coincidence that Eppie comes to Silas’s door. Silas then honors God with love he shows Eppie and God rewards him with happiness and fulfillment. It is a lie of the Devil that happy endings are only for fairy tales. Christians know Jesus wins in the end over evil. That is the happiest ending of all. â€Å"For I know the plans that I have for you,† declares the Lord, â€Å"plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope† (NASB Jer. 29.11). When the Christian is trusting in God’s plan and honoring Him, he can see that Silas Marner is a great story about a man who honored God with his love. Silas Marner’s love for Eppie is adoptive, protective, unconditional, and sacrificial. This clearly reflects the Lord’s love for his own children and thus the ideals in this novel are Christian. Works Cited Eliot, George. â€Å"Silas Marner.† Adventures in Appreciation. Laurence Perrine. Ed. et al. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc., 1973. 390-472. Print. NASB. Anaheim: Foundation Publications Inc., 1996. Print. Taylor

Euthanasia: The Right to a Peaceful and Merciful Death Essay -- Medici

The arrogance of mankind has dampened the hope that individuals can achieve a dignified death. "Science says: 'We must live,' and seeks the means of prolonging, increasing, facilitating, and amplifying life, of making it tolerable and acceptable, wisdom says: 'We must die' and seeks how to make us die well." - M. De Unamund sss. Whoosh. Hum. Beep. Slurp. A clock alerts her. Time to flip him over. The tired woman struggles to lift the six-foot, four-inch skeleton for the fifth time that day. Time to suction the massive bedsores filled with pustules. Slurp up the puss again. "Ed, do you want to try to eat today?" No response. The eyes are vacant, and the expression is infantile. The tongue hangs from the mouth, and a string of saliva drools onto the bed sheets. The woman inserts liquid food into the feeding tube once again. Hsss. Whoosh. Hum. Beep. Slurp. "Ed, it's time to see if you've done your duty yet." The woman peers into his diaper and sadly realizes that for the seventeenth day in a row he has not had a bowel movement. Insert the suppository into his rectum again. Hsss. Whoosh. Hum. Beep. Slurp. This woman, once a strong-willed professional and competent mother and grandmother, has lost fifteen years of her life to the task of caring for someone who no longer recognizes her. Euthanasia is the process of mercifully ending a person's life, allowing that individual to escape terminal illness or an undignified death. The term has taken on many new meanings in this modern age of medical technological advancement. Scientists have devised numerous inventions to help prevent the death of humans faced with medical tragedy. The question is just how long humans should undergo life-saving and life-prolonging treatments befor... ...ave this world. No matter how much we wish to believe they are immortal, we must realize that our bodies cannot sustain life infinitely. Works Cited Branegan, Jay. "I Want to Draw the Line Myself." Time 17 Mar. 1997: 30. Caplan, Arthur L. "Future Directions in Medical Ethics." Microsoft Encarta 4.0 (2000). Microsoft. CD-ROM. Goodman, Ellen. "Who Lives? Who Dies? Who Decides?" Rpt. in Current Issues & Enduring Questions. Ed. Sylvan Barnet and Hugo Bedau. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1999. 560-566. Huttman, Barbara. "A Crime of Compassion." Rpt. in Current Issues & Enduring Questions. Ed. Sylvan Barnet and Hugo Bedau. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1999. 555-557. Marker, Rita L. "Kids and Euthanasia." Human Life Review 26 (2000): 30-36. Schaeffer, Pamela. "Rigali Intervenes: Feeding Tube Must Stay." National Catholic Reporter 37 (2000): 5-7. Euthanasia: The Right to a Peaceful and Merciful Death Essay -- Medici The arrogance of mankind has dampened the hope that individuals can achieve a dignified death. "Science says: 'We must live,' and seeks the means of prolonging, increasing, facilitating, and amplifying life, of making it tolerable and acceptable, wisdom says: 'We must die' and seeks how to make us die well." - M. De Unamund sss. Whoosh. Hum. Beep. Slurp. A clock alerts her. Time to flip him over. The tired woman struggles to lift the six-foot, four-inch skeleton for the fifth time that day. Time to suction the massive bedsores filled with pustules. Slurp up the puss again. "Ed, do you want to try to eat today?" No response. The eyes are vacant, and the expression is infantile. The tongue hangs from the mouth, and a string of saliva drools onto the bed sheets. The woman inserts liquid food into the feeding tube once again. Hsss. Whoosh. Hum. Beep. Slurp. "Ed, it's time to see if you've done your duty yet." The woman peers into his diaper and sadly realizes that for the seventeenth day in a row he has not had a bowel movement. Insert the suppository into his rectum again. Hsss. Whoosh. Hum. Beep. Slurp. This woman, once a strong-willed professional and competent mother and grandmother, has lost fifteen years of her life to the task of caring for someone who no longer recognizes her. Euthanasia is the process of mercifully ending a person's life, allowing that individual to escape terminal illness or an undignified death. The term has taken on many new meanings in this modern age of medical technological advancement. Scientists have devised numerous inventions to help prevent the death of humans faced with medical tragedy. The question is just how long humans should undergo life-saving and life-prolonging treatments befor... ...ave this world. No matter how much we wish to believe they are immortal, we must realize that our bodies cannot sustain life infinitely. Works Cited Branegan, Jay. "I Want to Draw the Line Myself." Time 17 Mar. 1997: 30. Caplan, Arthur L. "Future Directions in Medical Ethics." Microsoft Encarta 4.0 (2000). Microsoft. CD-ROM. Goodman, Ellen. "Who Lives? Who Dies? Who Decides?" Rpt. in Current Issues & Enduring Questions. Ed. Sylvan Barnet and Hugo Bedau. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1999. 560-566. Huttman, Barbara. "A Crime of Compassion." Rpt. in Current Issues & Enduring Questions. Ed. Sylvan Barnet and Hugo Bedau. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1999. 555-557. Marker, Rita L. "Kids and Euthanasia." Human Life Review 26 (2000): 30-36. Schaeffer, Pamela. "Rigali Intervenes: Feeding Tube Must Stay." National Catholic Reporter 37 (2000): 5-7.

A Woman To Her Lover Essay

Write a critical analysis of Christina Walsh’s poem ‘A Woman to Her Lover’. Compare and contrast the poem with others you have studied in the unit. Christina Walsh, a female poet, wrote the poem ‘A woman to her lover’ as a free verse. A free verse is a poem with an irregular stanza length, no rhyme scheme and no syllabus count. Writing it as a free verse reflects her point which is women is can change their attitude towards men. She broke all the rules of poetry, this shows that women do not have to be weak towards men, it does not have to be the same as tradition, the man does not have to control the women, they can have equal love. Stanza one in Christina Walsh’s poem suggests slavery. She uses the word ‘bond slave’, which means a slave that does something without saying anything. Christina Walsh uses an image of a war, ‘as conqueror to the vanquished’. As she is the defeated, then she is forced, which shows that they are enemies. She does not want to be possessed by any one, she refuses it, and ‘O Lover I refuse you!’ she also uses an exclamation mark that shows she is serious. Christina Walsh uses alliteration of the letter ‘b’ throughout the whole poem. This is called a labial plosive. ‘To bend†¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢, ‘bond slave†¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢ and ‘to bear’ are used in stanza one, this shows that she is angry and being very assertive. ‘To bear your children, wearing out my life’ uses caesura to balance the two ideas. She is saying that if she gives him children, it is equivalent to wearing out her life. She tells him ‘O lover’ right after the caesura that makes the phrase very strong. It is emphasized. Stanza two in Christina Walsh’s poem suggests a very different idea. It shows that she does not want to be treated as an angel that never does any mistakes or to be worshiped as a goddess, no one is perfect and neither is she. ‘Go! – I am no doll to dress and sit for feeble worship’, this shows that she thinks it is pathetic to treats someone like they are perfect and that they are just there to pleaseyou.Throughout the stanza, Christina Walsh uses alliteration in the letter ‘w’, ‘wed†¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢, ‘word and wish’, ‘wingless†¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢ and ‘worship†¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢ This gives a soft sound that reflects how the man sees the women. She then uses the word ‘Go!’ to show that what she is saying is straightforward, which again shows that she is against being loved for her beauty and perfecti on. She then calls him a ‘fool’ and tells him again, ‘I  refuse you’. This shows that she is convinced with her point and the repetition shows that she I against both points she has mentioned. ‘Sonnet CXXX’ by William Shakespeare can be linked with the second stanza of Christina Walsh’s poem. They both agree about the same idea. They both suggest that women should not be loved for her beauty. At the beginning of the sonnet, the reader starts to feel that Shakespeare hates the women. He says ‘My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun’, this shows that she is not good looking; she is not beautiful. However, he concludes that even though she is not beautiful he loves her more than any beautiful girl has ever beenloved.The poem is a sonnet. This means it contains fourteen lines made up of three quatrains and a rhyming couplet at the end. Only in Shakespeare’s sonnets, the rhyming couplets conclude his point. It is also written in iambic pentameter. Shakespeare is against the idea of tradition and courtly love; he is against the idea that the man describes the women as if she is the most beautiful women on earth. He says that his love to his mistress is ‘rare’ even though he does not describe her as beautiful. Describing her as beautiful would be ‘false compare’. The third stanza in ‘A Woman to Her Lover’ Christina Walsh is trying to show us that she will not be a sex object that satisfies her husband’s desires, and neither will any women of her time. She says ‘not for you the hand of any wakened woman of our time’. She uses the word ‘wakened’ to show that this concept is not for any woman, it is for any aware and educated woman that knows her rights. Christina Walsh repeats the word ‘Or’ in both stanza two and stanza three. This shows that she has a list of ideas that she will make her refuse a man. She also uses the word ‘creature’. This shows that if she accepts the face that a man wants to marry her tofu fill his desires then that is not any better than animals.  She says ‘women of our time’ to show that this way of a relationship is old-fashioned and no one will accept, as now it is not the same as the olddays.The poem ‘To his coy mistress’ shows a teenager that is trying to convince his girlfriend to have sex with him. The boy gives her a list of reasons why she should have sex with him now.  

John H. Ostrom - A Profile of the Famous Paleontologist

Name: John H. Ostrom Born/Died: 1928-2005 Nationality: American Dinosaurs Discovered or Named: Deinonychus, Sauropelta, Tenontosaurus, Microvenator About John H. Ostrom Nowadays, pretty much all paleontologists agree that birds descended from dinosaurs. However, that wasn’t the case in the 1960s, when John H. Ostrom of Yale University was the first researcher to propose that dinosaurs had more in common with ostriches and swallows than with snakes, turtles and alligators (to be fair, the heavyweight American  paleontologist Othniel C. Marsh, who also taught at Yale, had proposed this idea in the late 19th century, but he didnt have enough evidence at his disposal to carry the weight of scientific opinion). Ostroms theory about the dinosaur-bird evolutionary link was inspired by his 1964 discovery of Deinonychus, a large, bipedal raptor that displayed some uncannily birdlike characteristics. Today, its (pretty much) an established fact that Deinonychus and its fellow raptors were covered with feathers, not a popular image a generation ago, and one that even current dinosaur enthusiasts have difficulty accepting. (In case you were wondering, those Velociraptors in Jurassic Park were really modeled after the  much bigger  Deinonychus, disregarding the fact that they were portrayed with green reptilian skin rather than feathers.) Fortunately for him, Ostrom lived long enough to learn about the trove of indisputably feathered dinosaurs recently discovered in China, which cemented the dinosaur-bird connection. When he discovered Deinonychus, Ostrom opened the dinosaur equivalent of a hornets nest. Paleontologists werent used to dealing with muscular, man-sized, predatory dinosaurs--as opposed to familiar, multi-ton carnivores like Allosaurus or Tyrannosaurus Rex--which prompted speculation about whether an ostensibly cold-blooded reptile could engage in such energetic behavior. In fact, Ostroms student Robert Bakker was the first paleontologist to forcefully propose that all theropod dinosaurs were warm-blooded, a theory thats currently on only slightly shakier ground than the dinosaur-bird connection. ​By the way, he wasnt responsible for either discovering or naming this dinosaur, but the type species of Utahraptor (U. ostrommaysorum) was named after John Ostrom and Chris Mays, a pioneer in animatronic dinosaurs.