Friday, June 30, 2006

Approaching The Lonely Mountain / Confrontation with Smaug

Well, this Hobbit is tired and longs for a vacation in The Shire, but alas, I am still far from home. Sure enough, my life is mirroring The Hobbit again! I've been thinking about Smaug and how to be rid of him and successfully complete my quest. When, just like in the book, someone else has killed him for me. Amazing!

So what does all this allegory mean? What has been happening this spring and summer? In short, I was supposed to have already graduated by now. However, we had based our methods on the work of a scientist whose formulas turned out to be wrong!!! So much of my work had to be discarded, because it was based on that person’s faulty formulas which rendered my work useless. I had to start back at square one all over again (almost). Ack! Fortunately, my school recognized my dilemma and gave me extra time to graduate.

However, these last few months of extra time have been absolutely hair-raising! Everything that could possibly go wrong has. The extra time was evaporating, and I seemed no closer to finishing. It was Mirkwood, all over again! It felt like God wasn’t there anymore to help me at times. A series of disastrous events continued to plague my research. How was I ever going to graduate now? I wondered.


I emerged from Mirkwood and began the journey to The Lonely Mountain, and having faced Smaug, I prepared myself for the final showdown with him. Just when things looked darkest, out of the blue came -- relief! I was given another set of time which I sorely needed. Smaug was killed, but not by my hands! And I’m sure I have God to thank for it! Praise be to God! :D


De 7:9 -
Remember that the Lord your God is the only God and that he is faithful. He will keep his covenant and show his constant love to a thousand generations of those who love him and obey his commands,...
De 32:4 -
"The Lord is your mighty defender, perfect and just in all his ways; Your God is faithful and true; he does what is right and fair.
Ps 89:8 -
Lord God Almighty, none is as mighty as you; in all things you are faithful, O Lord.


Because this spring and summer have been like a journey through The Hobbit, I hope that doesn't mean that this fall semester will be like The Lord of the Rings trilogy! :P! *prays* Lol.




I love that song Into the West at the end of the LOTR trilogy. This remix is by Yulia. Here are the lyrics. Enjoy!

Into The West


Lay down,
your sweet and weary head.
Night is falling.
You have come to journey’s end.

Sleep now,and dream
of the ones who came before.
They are calling,
from across the distant shore.

Why do you weep?
What are these tears upon your face?
Soon you will see.
All of your fears will pass away.
Safe in my arms,
you’re only sleeping.

What can you see,
on the horizon?
Why do the white gulls call?
Across the sea,
a pale moon rises.
The ships have come,
to carry you home.

And all will turn,
to silver glass.
A light on the water.
All souls pass.

Hope fades,
Into the world of night.
Through shadows falling,
Out of memory and time.

Don’t say,
We have come now to the end.
White shores are calling.
You and I will meet again.
And you’ll be here in my arms,
Just sleeping.

What can you see,
on the horizon?
Why do the white gulls call?
Across the sea,
a pale moon rises.
The ships have come,
to carry you home.

And all will turn,
to silver glass.
A light on the water.
Grey ships pass
Into the West.

19 comments:

Mosey said...

hey, Aslan! I really like that song. thanks for comng to my blog. I've made a new post, and so has Elaienar.

Aslan said...

Hey, Mosey!

Yeah, "Into the West" is amazing. You're welcome!

Okey dokey, I'll have to come by and check them out! :)

Aslan said...

:D Yeah, thank goodness he's dead!

Not quite, with the extra time I can overcome the "roadblocks" that have developed and finish this fall!!! :)

Wayne said...

Hey, great post. I love the Tolkien/Christian life analogies - I've come back to them time and again.

And yes, beautiful song. Sad and haunting, but beautiful. Thanks for posting it.

Aslan said...

Hi, Wayne! Thank you. Yes, amazing allegory!

You're welcome. Thanks for stopping by! :)

Trufflehunter said...

man that's nasty about your schoolwork! I'm glad it's working out!! great verses...

Aslan said...

Yeah, sure is. But I'm trusting God all the way through (most of the time). I wish I could have perfect faith! :P

Thanks! :)

Janelle said...

"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart." Jeremiah 20:12-13

:)
hope things with school are going well... i could not imagine how frustrating that would be, i'd pretty much explode lol.
have an awesome summer.

Aslan said...

Thanks, Janelle! Today was pretty rough, and that verse was just what I needed to hear! :D

Hahaha. :) Thanks again!

Erin said...

Hi, I'm here through Muff's blog....I really love the song you have playing on your blog, and I was wondering: how do you GET music on your blog? Thanks. :)

mustang said...

my life just so happens to be one of the most sickeningly dull existences on the planet. I am also one of the few people who are naturally prone for disaster, and i'm afraid that's all the exitment I get.

I must admit, I came here for advice. I saw that you sid you know how to change colors on blogs. Please tell me how! my por blog needs a facelift among other things.

Also, I have the same question as erin how do you get music on your blog?

mustang said...

P.S. please visit my sisters blog, she is new, and she's my younger sister. the URL is http://flakesofme.blogspot.com

she posted something really boring, but I think she just needs encouragment. Of course she will never live up to me, but who could?

Aslan said...

Hey Erin,
Thanks! :)

Well, I just copy and paste an "embed" line into my blog template. Somewhere after the title line is a good place. Here's what mine looks like (it should be all one line):

(embed src="http://arwen-undomiel.com/music/ItWremix.asx"width="200"height="42" autostart="true" autoplay="true" loop="true" volume="800%" name="Into the West")(/embed)

There is one change to the above embed line: everywhere you see a ( change it to a less than sign [there is a comma on that same key]. There are two of these to change. Everywhere you see a ) you must change it to a greater than sign [that key has a period on it]. And there are two of these to change.

I would just type them out for you, but blogger won't show those symbols in the comments, so I described them instead. ;)

You're Welcome. Enjoy!

Aslan said...

Erin,

Also, you will probably want to change the song from time to time. To do that, just change the internet address (in the embed line). And that's it!

To find the address of a song you like, hover your mouse over a music link (mp3, etc.) on another website. It will say what the address is -- jot that down and type it over the address of the old song in your embed line.

Save your template changes, and voila! You're playing a new song. :D

Aslan said...

Hey, Eowyn! :)

Thank you. Things are going pretty well, just insanely busy. :P

I didn't expect you back so soon. I hope you had a good time!

Aslan said...

Hi Mustang! :)

I'm sorry to hear things are so boring. Lol, poor Mustang. Well, I'm sure things will get better! ^_^

Check out my comments to Erin for music!

For colors, whenever you see "color:" in your template, the "#FFA500" (or something similar) that comes right after it can be changed to other letter/number combinations. This changes the color. Don't change the "#" sign though, only the six characters that come after it, and these need to be letters or numbers.

After making a change, save your template, and look really carefully for a color change somewhere in your blog. It might only change some small lettering or it might change a large background area... Mess around with it to see what happens!

Here are a couple of good sites that tell you the letter/number codes for colors. I'm sure you'll find some colors you like at both places:

and here

here

I think things just got more exciting! :D

Aslan said...

Lol, Mustang. OK, I'll come by and check out your sister's blog! :)

Aslan said...

Hahahaha! :) The lion's roar alarms many a blogger from time to time. Hehheh.

Cool! Yeah, I guess you can't read on the job, :P! Oh, well. But you gotta read The Hobbit for fun when you're not working! :D

Thanks, Krissy. You too! ^_^

Aslan said...

Sweet! I'll have to check it out! :)