Historical trends show that at least every century and in just about every culture some people think the world is about to end. It’s not just the dramatic one that think every grievance is the end of the world, but the ones that see every natural disaster as a sign that the world is ending. In the Christian bible the book of Revelations is derived from the Greek word apokalypsis. Apokalypsis means to uncover or to reveal. In this book of the Bible God reveals the future to John while he was in exile. Many Christians believe the world is going to end because of the predictions in this book. Every major natural disaster or unexplained event is cause to relate the predictions from Revelations to the occurrences taking place in their own lives and the world around them. Many people fear the book of Revelations because the predictions are so symbolic and cryptically written it is impossible to pin point when the world is actually going to end.
During class we watched a movie about the ministry of the prophet Jeremiah. Although the acting was very cheesy, the message and story was very captivating and interesting. Jeremiah was a very depressing prophet that had many different issues he had to go through and overcome. He was a priest like his father and could trace his ancestry back to Moses, but was reluctant to fulfill God’s plans for his life in the same was Job and other prophets were reluctant. When the Lord speaks to him, he tells him that he “will be with you and tell you what to say.” When Jeremiah accepted the job he had no idea he would eventually have to witness the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians and King Nebuchadnezzar. It is Jeremiah’s mission to convince Zedekiah, the ruler of Judah, that he must surrender to the Babylonian army and seek God not the false idols that his people have begun to worship. One of the men working against Jeremiah was the false prophet Hananiah. Everything Jeremiah tried to tell Zedekiah about the upcoming year, he would rebuke and try to tell him what God has told him. The most memorable confrontation occurred when Jeremiah interrupted the coronation of Zedekiah strapped into an ox’s harness to symbolize the incoming imprisonment of the regional nations to the Babylonians. He tells them that they have sinned and King Nebuchadnezzar was acting as “God’s servant” to carry out the punishment. He warns them that if they don’t submit and surrender to the Babylonian King, God will punish them with “the sword, famine and pestilence.” When the crowd is disturbed by this news Hananiah fills their minds with lies, telling them that Nebuchadnezzar’s days are number and then breaks the yoke saying symbolizing that this is what God is going to do to Babylon. Jeremiah retorts by saying that although he has broken that yoke God is making another one made of iron. This could easily symbolize harsher punishment, like an iron fist. He also predicts that Hananiah will be dead within the year and that the ruler Zedekiah would be a slave to Nebuchadnezzar’s rule. To shut him up, Zedekiah had him imprisoned for almost a year as things he predicted began coming to pass. When Hananiah was killed like the prediction said, the king called on him for advice and he told him the same thing he had said the year before; if he did not submit to Babylonian rule his people would be killed and he would be a slave. This was not the answer Zedekiah wanted so he dismissed Jeremiah. He continued to preach to whoever would listen about the future God has planned for the nation of Israel. He said God was going to form a new covenant with his people. These laws would be obeyed because they would be written “on their hearts” and God would “forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more” (Jeremiah 31:33-34). At the end of the movie all the predictions came true. After Hananiah’s death the Babylonians invaded Jerusalem and King Zedekiah tried to flee with his sons. He was soon captured by the Babylonians and taken to King Nebuchadnezzar. When the king saw him he asked about the prophet Jeremiah that predicted his capture. He asked Zedekiah what the prophet said his fate was because he didn’t want to anger any nation’s God. Zedekiah said that he was not to die, so the king then killed his two sons in front of him and took a hot poker and blinded Zedekiah. He told him that the death of his children was the last thing he would ever see but he would not die at his hands. Overall the movie was pretty good and seemed accurate from what I’ve read about Jeremiah.
In regards to my grade for my blog and project, I can definitely say I earned an A for effort. This has truly been a difficult semester; transferring to a new state, dealing with the Xavier run-around, implementing a community service project in the Gulf Coast and keeping up with Dr. Homan and other teachers. My project I began was a difficult undertaking since I was involved with so many undertakings already but I truly enjoyed it. Working with the seniors struggling to stay out of poverty was truly a heart warming experience. I worked very hard in my research and execution of this project. It’s definitely not a semester long volunteer opportunity and I will actively be continuing to help seniors learn new technology and improve their positions in life. As a project grade I believe I should be receiving an A for both effort and execution. When it came to the blog I feel I should also receive an A in that category. From the beginning of the semester I’ve strived to keep up with the blogs. Even at times when I fell behind I made sure I took the time to write over 1000 words for each one and eventually caught up. My blog entries were also written in a clear and grammatically correct way that allows the reader to understand what topic I’m speaking on and what my view of that topic is. Although producing the blogs has been truly strenuous I’ve tried my personal best and have enjoyed writing most of them. I hope you take all the efforts I’ve made into account when grading these blogs

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 8th, 2007 at 8:16 pm and is filed under Week 14: Grade. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.