Author's "Flame of Resistance" debut novel excellent

Flame of Resistance by Tracy Groot centers on the French Resistance during World War II. The Resistance goes against the Germans in order to return France to the French and rid the country of the Germans.

When a downed American pilot becomes pivotal in a plot against the Germans, a prostitute forced into her profession by circumstance who's a patriot will also become a key part of the plan.

This is a modern retelling of the biblical story of Rahab.

The book is compelling, moving, and interestingly written. Readers will sympathize and emphasize with Brigitte and root for both. The leaders of the French Resistance are just as memorable. There a lot of plot twists as well. An excellent read and a different look at the second world war and the effects German occupation had on Europeans and the little flame of hope for freedom that burns inside all of humanity, seeking God and longing to be free of oppression.

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

The Scarlet Thread weaves two generations together

The Scarlet Thread shows the power of unity throughout the generations of the female members of a family.

A modern young woman in a struggling marriage discovers her ancestor's journal, an Oregon Trail pioneer in the 18th century. Her ancestor believes in God, and through reading about her experiences, Sierra starts to believe in God as well, which begins to change her life.

An ironic part is that Sierra is forced to move to Los Angeles, just like her ancestor Mary Katherine moved to California as well. A wonderful novel by my favorite novelist, Francine Rivers, The Scarlet Thread brought tears to my eyes. It's an enjoyable novel full of God's truth, a reminder of promises, and the restoration of broken relationships - to each other, to God, and to ourselves.

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

The Last Disciple is a fast paced thriller set against Nero's reign

"The Last Disciple" is a fast-paced thriller set in the first century in Rome. It follows a multitude of characters, but these are characters who either personally or intersect with someone who has intersected with Vitas. Thus its leading character is most decisively Vitas, a powerful and respected Roman and a member of Emperor Nero's inner circle. Vitas falls in love with Sophia, a Jewish former slave who becomes a Christian, and marries her. That appears to be the climax of the first novel, along with Vitas amazing and seemingly unrealistic escape from the arena, prompting the next book.

But the most important theme of the book is the different perspective on the book of Revelation, the last book of what we now know as the New Testament. This perspective is different from other interpretations of Revelation, generally seen as the events of The Last Days before The End of the World and the Return of the Christ, when God will right all wrongs and completely destroy Satan and His influence on the world forever (which will happen in some way or another).

It also brings up good points - to modern readers the significance of seven hills or seven stars doesn't mean much, but in the ancient world it would have been symbols of divinity and kings. Imagining a slain Lamb would have been different to the Jews than to the Romans or even modern readers. And, since the events of the crucxification were in their memories and John had actually seen it, it adds even more relevance. I'm interested to see how he handles the rest of the text in the later novels. And the characters are certainly memorable, Nero with his insanity, Helius with his overtures of promiscuity and obsesession with physical appearance and his insecurity in his own power as Nero's right hand, the bruteness of Tigellinus, Chayim and his betrayal. The others, Sophia, Valeria, Maglorious, Quintus, Vitas, even Jonathan who exchanged his life for Vitas' and his family's, are all realistic. All in all, an engaging, invigorating read with a twist.

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

The Atonement Child: Redemption Story

Francine Rivers has always been one of my favorite writers, Christian or non-Christian.

The Atonement Child follows Dynah Carey, a young woman who was raped by a stranger and became pregnant. She rejects the morning after pill offered to her by her doctor. She doesn't believe it's possible that she could become pregnant. She does, and her fiancee, unable to cope with what happened and the possible scandal surrounding it if people don't believe she was raped, leaves her. That makes room for another young man, who has always been interested in Dynah, to possibly win her affections. A multitude of twists pepper the story, like her mother and grandmother's guilt over their own abortion stories. When Dynah refuses to abort her unborn child - not easily, of course - that is when her mother and grandmother's guilt and stories come out.

This is a beautiful story about the power of redemption. Our own redemption story can be found in it; Christ sacrificed everything to make sure we were saved, just like Dynah sacrificed everything in her life for her belief in life and Christ.

Rivers communicates a powerful truth: God never leaves us nor abandons us, despite trouble and horrors that come upon us. Good comes out of the bad that happens to us, according to Romans: "God works all things out for the good of those who love Him."

God worked in Dynah's lives and the lives of her doting family, and he works in and through the lives of those who love Him as well as well.

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

Review: 'Almost Amish'

"Almost Amish" is a how-to book on living the simpler life. It isn't a book that tells everyone to live like an Amish person, though, like one might think when reading the title. It gives advice on the joys of living more simply. The Amish live nearly without technology or any of the modern conveniences of life, yet they manage to be incredibly content. Nancy Sleeth has discovered how to live like the Amish - without actually being Amish. Instead of being plugged in all the time, surfing the Internet all the time, driving and texting all the time, we can start to cut some of it out of our lives - and limit other parts of it.

What I get out of it? When we trim that unfortunate parts of our lives out, we can start to make more time for our family, friends, and faith. We can grow closer to God and deepen our faith in a shallow world where too much activity has become the curse that drives us away from spending time with God.

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

S.M.A.L.L method example

Scripture.
John 14:2-3 - In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.

Meditate.
Jesus doesn't lie. "If it were not so, I would not have told you." He wants us. "That where I am, there you may be also." He doesn't leave us alone. Here he lists one of our four basic needs for physical survival. He provides us with our four basic needs for survival: food, water, shelter, and clothing. He is building us a mansion, a palace. How great and big heaven must be - there are over 2 billion Christians in the world today. If each of us gets a house...that's 2 billion mansions. And that isn't counting those people who have already died.


Absorb.
Writing out and saying the scripture out loud helps the brain remember Scripture.
John 14:2-3 - In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.

Live.
I can encourage other believers that Christ makes a home for us in Heaven. I can be okay in this life, with whatever shelter I have, because I know that someday I will have a mansion. I just have to make it to the afterlife.

Link.

Lord, thank you for reminding me of my mansion in Heaven, where you dwell and where Christ dwells. When I die, I will not be homeless. Even on this Earth, I am never alone; You will always provide for all my needs, physical and psychological. Thank you for Your strong hands that built it. Thank you that you died and rose again so that I would live with you forever. Thank you, Lord. Amen.


It's as simple as that! Prayers on you as you do your own Bible study and Scripture reading.

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

Scripture studying method - S.M.A.L.L.

Just came up with a new Scripture studying methods for those who want to be students of the Bible.

Big things have small beginnings.

Scripture.
Write down the Scripture God lays on your heart.


Meditate.
Spend a few minutes thinking about the Scripture. What sticks out to you from the passage? Does a certain word or phrase remind you of something? What is God saying?
  
Absorb.
Absorption is a fastest way to get healthy. Absorb Scripture. Memorize the verse. If you chose multiple verses, try to memorize the entire passage you selected or just one verse.

Live.
Think of practical ways you can apply the Scripture in your everyday life. This could be as simple as smiling at someone (kindness), or holding the door for someone (service). This could be anything; don't hold back! If God reveals something to you, embrace it!

Link. 
The last and most important part of Scripture studying is prayer. Linking to the Father, Son, and Spirit will do more to help you to complete the letters S, M, A, and L than anything else. Put God in remembrance of His promise. He will make your path straight.

Learning the Scriptures and applying them are not easy. Continuing to do it day after day is even harder. But the more you do it, the easier it is and the more fulfilling your life is. 

Good luck on diving into the Scriptures. My prayers are with you as you learn more about and explore the best relationship - the one that will never fail - you will ever experience. Get ready to meet or re-meet, and then embrace, the God of Heaven, the Comforter, and the Savior of the World.

To help you, my next post will be an example of Scripture studying using the S.M.A.L.L method.

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

The Hunger Games trilogy

Ok! So it's here. A blog post for The Hunger Games trilogy. This will contain spoilers, so if you post anything about it being unfair to post spoilers, refrain. If you do post it, I will remove your comment. This is your warning. Read on and you will not be surprised!! I TOTALLY EXPECT SOME OUTSIDE HELP, SO POST!!!!!!!!!

Ok, so about the ending of book three. Totally AWESOME that Peeta lived and they eventually made mends. I always supported Peeta and Katniss (since Peeta didn't have any other love interest).

The epilogue was a little bit like, ugh. It sort of felt like there should be three more books, you know? Like their kids were going to do something, which would be totally rad! It didn't seem like an ending, although I'm sure the author MEANT for it to be an ending. lol.

And Peeta? Peeta was the only normal person. I want the author to rewrite the series from Peeta's point of view. That'd be sweet.

I was glad to get to the end of book three. I didn't like being a seventeen-year-old girl when I was a seventeen-year-old girl, and Katniss is like horrible. She's crazier than I remember being (she's also in the middle of a war zone).

The books actually weren't that bad. Either it was my version or the tense changes occasionally changed and then changed back. I can mostly overlook a few errors if the plot is good enough...and the plot was pretty different (kids killing kids to survive? That's pretty twist-of-topic, I think). It's not like Snow was the shining model of awesomeness, either. But Katniss, except for her sacrifice to save her sister, hardly had a firm moral backbone. Really, Peeta shine as the best character in the novels.

Ok, so everyone who usually reads my blog posts knows that I always see a religious aspect in everything. Well, did any other Christian notice that Peeta seemed like a Jesus character? He even died (temporarily) in book two! He never gave up on Katniss, just like, according to the Bible, Christ never gives up on his bridegroom. He'll always return for her, he'll always forgive her, he'll always love her.

And Christ can orchestrate our deaths, too, but He never WANTS to do that. But He can't be brainwashed to do that, it's our actions that cause our punishment.

What do you think?

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

Eternity

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always, Rachel

Your Existence Gives Me Hope

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

'The Hunger Games' shoots straight and kills the box office

Katniss Everdeen of District 12 has to survive two weeks in a forested nightmare and be the last survivor, despite the fact that other teenagers want her dead in order to survive and be crowned the 7th Annual victor of their nation's twisted 'Hunger Games.'

"The Hunger Games" has come in first place in the box office (big shock). I went to the opening weekend of "The Hunger Games" with some friends. Only one of us - if any of us - had read at least one book in the series. This movie was made for people who had already read the books, or were strongly considering reading the books and felt inspired to do so after watching the movie (I am on chapter five of "The Hunger Games" now since Sunday). The movie was a visual aspect to the book, although the book had to be read for some parts of the movie to make sense. The movie was brilliant; I loved it. It was a little disturbing, I'm not going to lie, the way the kids killed each other and how it was portrayed on the screen. It was so unfair that all the small kids were either used by the older ones or killed. Cato was such a freak.

In fact, the whole concept of the Hunger Games seems horrible and hopefully will never come to pass, which Suzanne Collins, the author, said was based on a mixture of the ancient Roman gladitorial games, channel-surfing through reality TV, images of the Iraq war, and the mythic story of Theseus. Despite the concept, the movie was actually pretty great, except for a few details.
"The Hunger Games" starred Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss Everdeen, the 16-year-old protagonist who takes her 12-year-old sister Primrose's place as the District 12 girl tribute for the 74th Annual Hunger Games. Katniss has done her best to keep her mother and her younger sister alive, and this is just another element in Katniss' keep-my-sister-alive campaign. It is nonetheless extremely sacrificial and heroic, which later wins Katniss favor with "sponsors," rich people from the Capitol who can "be the difference life and death" for the kids during the Hunger Games, according to the overly-zealous, wig-wearing Effie Trinket (who's way too enthused about gathering kids who are about to die and really nothing more than an overly-done-makeup-wearing trinket and ninny).

Anyway, Katniss' district, apparently the poorest district in the nation, for their part in her sacrifice, merely stare at her and then kiss three fingers before raising them to her. (One has to go to the book to find out the meaning behind this, something I didn't like about the movie, which didn't EXPLAIN anything. The meaning, everyone, is that it's an old and little-used sign for respect, and, still rare, now is only used at funerals.) Fantastic! Katniss has a whole group behind her - behind her death, that is, for it appears no one expects her to survive. After all, there are 24 children, and only one survives; the one who survives has to kill the others, basically, or the ones that nature doesn't kill first. Not only that, District 12 has had exactly two victors, a dead person and a drunk named Haymitch, who is their mentor now. Oh yes. The boy, other than Gale, who's been in love with Katniss forever is Peeta Mellark, played by Josh Hutcherson, a baker's son who once threw bread to a starving Katniss - and of course he becomes the boy tribute from District 12. Naturally there will be romance. Lovers attempting to kill each other? A good adventure NEEDS a little romance, right?

So poor Katniss, who only wanted to save her sister, is thrust into the spotlight as an underfed, undertrained tribute and sent to the Capitol, a symbol of the punishment of the members of the Rebellion, in which 12 districts dared to rebel against the Capitol over 74 years earlier. Everyone assumes she will die in the rigged Games, and if she doesn't die, blood-thirsty, trained Cato will kill her. A wonderful and constantly twisting twist of fate is that they learn that two victors may be crowned, provided they're from the same district. Does that mean that Katniss and Peeta, star-crossed lovers, can both come out alive? Maybe...if Cato, some berries and unstable, ever-changing rules don't get to them first.


Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

Veiled Rose review

Veiled Rose is the second book in The Tales of Goldstone Woods. Released recently, it tells the story of Rose Red, who has a dark secret that causes her to shroud herself in garments. She lives in the mountainous woods with her father and goat, seeing no one until Leo's wealthy family sends him to the mountains for the summer. The two of them strike up a friendship and explore the woods - only Leo seeks the dreaded Monster that supposedly hides there. Rose Red desperately wants to assist him, but she knows more about the Monster than she lets on and is terrified of it. She knows how to find the cave the Monster supposedly hides in, but she doesn't want to tell Leo for fear of the Monster's wrath. Leo wants her to leave the mountains and go with him to his country - but the Monster has something to say about it.

The writing is simplistic. At times the novel is hard to get through, but it has one of the best opening lines. "Hill House, though abandoned, had remained unscathed during the years of the Dragon's occupation" (7). If the reader had previously read Heartless, the first in the series, they would know that the Dragon took over the country and left nothing untouched by poisonous smoke - except apparently Hill House. Why? Readers have to continue the book to find out what's so special about Hill House that the Dragon left it. And, we find out more of the story of Leonard and Una and why he gave her up when challenged by the Dragon in Heartless.

The ending is heartbreaking but I won't spoil it for readers!

Looking into the author's statement and life, one finds the story is a Christian allegory, which may turn some readers off, but it's not a heavy allegory. Lets see if the readers can put together the allegory - I think I managed to do it.

The genre is fantasy and will thrill people who love fantasy!

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

Leap Year

I HAVE to write about Leap Year. After all, we only get to write 2-29 every four years. Today were two wonderful speakers, Byron McCauley, director of Public Relations, at noon and Kurt Warner, the football player, at 7:30 p.m. I felt like I HAD to go to both (since both were free for students) and from BOTH I got extremely inspired. Even though Warner didn't know it, I came up with a very good question, which my friend Lisa asked him. He was rather surprised. That's because it was a) good, and b) she didn't talk at him, but to him. Plus she sounded totally dreamy and like she was madly in love with him. Honestly, I should have asked him a question just for the experience of it. I mean, I'll NEVER have that opportunity EVER again. I also need to get involved in SAC so I can actually MEET these people. It was just as great as meeting Michael J. Fox, if not better. This year's Speaker Series have gotten a lot better! I can't wait for Bill Nye the science guy :) YAY!

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

Candlewood

I know that everyone is hearing the good and bad about Candlewood. But we haven't heard anything this semester about living on campus in an off campus environment.

It has definitely gotten better, or I've adjusted to it personally. I know that some students are eager to leave but have remained and some are dropping off like flies struck by electricity. I know that some students like it and are happy here.

I am somewhere in the middle. I like the space, the TV, the DVD player, and the Internet connection in my room (as well as not getting kicked off said Internet connection every 15 minutes or so). The laundry is fine. I like feeling more independent. I like the free commuter parking pass, because now I can basically park everywhere on campus (at certain times). I like the option of cooking, but I have decided I will probably never be a gourmet chef. I am a lot more confident in my cooking skills - I know that I can cook at least! Other people love it! All the more power to them! They probably don't have problems with stove top food burning. (Don't judge me!)

Actually that leads to my two dislikes: cooking myself food (I like for other people to make it for me although I do like to cook for other people as well, so it's a terrible mix), mostly because I don't have an oven, and that gravel parking lot.

I already explained about cooking. But one more. I love stoves, and I miss having a stove. I miss muffins and toasted ravioli and fries and baking desserts and everything else you can put in an oven.

Now.

The gravel parking lot. Now, I am not from the country and do not appreciate parking on gravel all the time (although the fun part is that everyone makes up their own parking spaces). It's highly annoying, and luckily I didn't have to experience gravel with ice on it (I don't know what the results would be) because of our super warm winter. Sometimes I have to park in a grassy/muddy area if I get back "too" late (after ten). The drop between the entrance/exit to the parking lot and the ground is steep and I swear my car scraps the ground, and my car is not that low to the ground. I just can't stand it. I want a solution. Plus, the parking lot does NOT have lights and I feel in danger walking through it (I don't know why, but at night that parking lot is CREEPY!). Plus vandals have struck our cars twice - once each semester. My locks are broken. I mean, seriously?!

So, that is the major differences, and the factors I have to think of in deciding to stay in Candlewood next year, or go back to Dearmont.

Great.

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel

The Vow

The Vow was very romantic, and perfect for the Day of Love. It was a little disappointing, but also left hope for the audience. I was disappointed the couple divorced. He was sweet. I felt he gave up too quickly. He was a good husband, and very defensive and protective of his wife. She seemed bratty after the accident, and I didn't like her most of the time. The movie probably could have had more depth, and reflected the couple better. Basically, the creators of the movie took Christ out of the story in the movie, and it seemed deflated without it. The movie had a Nicholas Sparks feel to it, even though he did not write it. It seemed like something he would write, except no one died. It's hard to believe she had such traumatic brain injury and could still survive.

Praying you have faith, hope, and love always,

Rachel