BUT A POOR REFLECTION: Easter Island, here we come!

Sunday, September 09, 2007

Easter Island, here we come!

Okay, visitors from outer cyberspace! Mike asked me to continue our interesting virtual island hopping tour and who am I to say no? So... pack your backpacks and follow me on this next stage of our world-wide expedition. Let's all go to EASTER ISLAND!

Mike doesn't know this yet, but I have just decided that he will be my assistant tour guide... so he will help me with finding some interesting information and getting in touch with the locals (don't know whether there are any islanders out there with internet connection, but finding out about this is part of the fun.)

This is our mission: we need to find out as much as possible about this island's location, geography, history, culture, population (if any), natural environment and spiritual state. My most important questions are: did the message of Easter ever reach the hearts and souls of the islanders, does the island have a rich Christian heritage and is there still a community of Christ followers that we can get in touch with today? I need all the help I can get, so you are all invited to send me useful links, cool pics and email-addresses from all your friends and relatives living on Easter Island (I'm sure you will all have some contacts there...)

There is also a special competition connected to this adventurous expedition: I want you all to make a picture of your very own Easter Island Statue - made from a potato, a piece of clay or cabbage or any other useful material. Upload your picture on your own blog and leave a comment here so that I can have a look at your creative masterpiece. The best home-made Easter Island Statue will receive eternal glory in cyberspace (thanks for the correction, Vicki) and the winner will be announced at the end of our tour. The winner will be selected by Vicki (President and only member of the jury) - before October 15, 2007. I am not a member of the jury, because I want to participate in this competition myself and I intend to win!

Why do we go to Easter Island? Well, because Mike asked me to go there, but also because I just found out that Easter Island was found and named by its first recorded European visitor, the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen. Yep, I come from a small country, but we did explore the entire globe in the past and I am planning to do it again. This time with the help of modern technology, some good blogger friends and nothing but peaceful intentions... Join me and start blogging about this exciting expedition and competition, so that we can make some waves and raise some attention for this virtual journey through cyberspace.

Click here (first island) and here (other visited islands) if you want to find out more about earlier stages of this tour!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...: Oh, this will be fun! Golly, I've never been a...THE...member of a jury before! Thank you for the honor! I hope we get lots of entries. I'm looking forward to seeing the creativity of your readers.

As for the prize, we can award the winner eternal glory in the blogosphere, but for heavenly eternal glory, that comes from believing in our Lord Jesus Christ! (But we'll be happy to provide any information or assistance!)

I'm looking forward to learning more about Easter Island! Thanks, Paul and Mike!; 9/09/2007 12:02 pm
Anonymous said...: We are off. This should be exciting. I know next to nothing about this place so I will have fun digging around.

The Dutch are always discovering things. Why is that?; 9/09/2007 8:22 pm
Paul said...: Our country is so small - where else can we go? ;-)

We have a drive to go away and find more space, new horizons. That's probably part of the explanation. But I guess it also has to do with the fact that the Netherlands are located at sea and we have a history of trade and transportation (also due to the river Rhine).; 9/09/2007 9:19 pm
little david said...: Well, count me in. I will start the thinking process immediately: What materials could be used for this sculpture?

When we lived in Hawaii, my son Greg worked for a wholesale tropical fish company that often received shipments from the Easter Islands (and other isolated Pacific isles).; 9/09/2007 10:30 pm
Anonymous said...: Little David - be creative! If you can build it, I'll judge it! It just needs to be recognizable as one of the Easter Island statues. I will be judging on creativity and appearance.

All participants: please leave a comment here to let us know that you have posted your entry. Thank you!

Also, please be sure that the material and the method are legal and moral. ;); 9/09/2007 10:58 pm
Carol Douglas said...: Darn! Finally a contest right up my alley, but I am traveling next week so will have to leave the sculpture to others. Look forward to seeing the results.; 9/10/2007 3:46 am
Paul said...: @ Carol - There will be plenty of time, Carol. Come on, how much time do you need to cut a potatoe? ;-) Have a good journey!; 9/10/2007 6:20 am

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God loves us

Have you ever wondered why God gives so much? We could exist on far less. He could have left the world flat and grey; we wouldn’t have known the difference. But he didn’t. He splashed orange in the sunrise and cast the sky in blue. And if you love to see geese as they gather, chances are you’ll see that too. Did he have to make the squirrel’s tail furry? Was he obliged to make the birds sing? And the funny way that chickens scurry or the majesty of thunder when it rings? Why give a flower fragrance? Why give food its taste? Could it be he loves to see that look upon your face?

Max Lucado - He Chose the Nails

Sadhu Sundar Singh

I do not condemn theologians wholesale, but it is unfortunately the fashion in Western thinking to doubt and deny everything. I protest this tendency. I never advise anyone to consult theologians, because all too often they have completely lost all sense of spiritual reality. They can explain Greek words and all that, but they spend too much time among their books and not enough time with the Master in prayer. It is not that I oppose all education, but education without life is certainly dangerous. You must stop examining spiritual truths like dry bones! You must break open the bones and take in the life-giving marrow.

Oswald Chambers

In the Bible clouds are always associated with God. Clouds are the sorrows, sufferings, or providential circumstances, within or without our personal lives, which actually seem to contradict the sovereignty of God. Yet it is through these very clouds that the Spirit of God is teaching us how to walk by faith. If there were never any clouds in our lives, we would have no faith. "The clouds are the dust of His feet" (Nahum 1:3). They are a sign that God is there. What a revelation it is to know that sorrow, bereavement, and suffering are actually the clouds that come along with God! God cannot come near us without clouds— He does not come in clear-shining brightness. (Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, July 29th)