In Thailand, it is important for things to be sa nuk, that is, fun. To be “not fun” is to be mai sa nuk, and that is something that Thai people, and those who go native, wish to avoid. That which is tough or unpleasant is “not fun” and is to be avoided in lotus land. It would appear, given what I have seen so far, that many of my students (and even at least one fellow teacher) have the (mistaken) impression that I am “not fun” simply because I am willing to do what is unpleasant and because I have a bit of a bias towards order and discipline.
This is something that I find personally offensive. I will give one example of how it has made this week a bit more busy and complicated. Yesterday I was confronted with a request from a student to go to his Lahu Land thanksgiving festival. I was then informed that all of the (Lahu) students were going to go off to the ceremonies to sing there. I was then informed that the other two teachers had been invited to go and had accepted their invitation (neither of them had told me anything about this, and I was pointedly not invited). Needless to say, I did not find it very amusing.
What makes this a particularly irritating experience is that this is the second time in three weeks [1] that a large group of students is ditching Sabbath services (with two of the teachers) in order to do a “fun Lahu” event and I have not been invited either time. This marks a couple of unpleasant and unacceptable trends. First, I dislike the cavalier attitude about the Sabbath–that it is acceptable to skip services to go to weddings or village parties (and especially that it is acceptable for teachers to do so when we are supposed to model proper reverence for God and obedience of His commandments). More personally, I am affronted and insulted when such celebrations go on and I am almost the last person to find out about them, especially given that I have the “mai sa nuk” responsibility of approving all requests to go home overnight or over the weekend. The fact that now there is a pattern of inviting every other teacher other than me for Lahu parties makes it likely that future requests may be denied out of hand simply because of the unacceptable approach towards both the Sabbath and towards attempting to maneuver around restrictions by getting teachers to go before one has received permission. I don’t appreciate pressure tactics or being insulted. The students responsible for this rude and insulting behavior, and those teachers who endorse it, should consider themselves warned that my tolerance for it is nearing an end.
My unease about such ceremonies in general comes about in part because of what I have heard about them. For one, the “Lahu Thanksgiving” is a somewhat typical fall harvest festival, with lots of singing and feasting, and it is the place where Lahu have traditionally found their mates (in this it is not too dissimilar from the Feast of Tabernacles for my own particular culture, minus the religious and prophetic focus). Missing out on mating rituals? Sounds like just another day in the life.
[1] https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2011/10/28/a-wedding-party/
Edge Induced Cohesion 
What does it mean where it is said in scripture that Jesus Christ is the Lord of the Sabbath, also if any man believe that every day be holy
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Jesus Christ is Lord of the Sabbath (Mark 2:28). But nowhere does it say that all days are equally Holy, as if you can keep whatever day you want to. God makes the rules, and He chose the seventh day Sabbath for Himself.
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I don’t believe that is what I meant by that except that if I rememebr there is a passage that says something like one man holds to one Holy day while another holds them all as Holy days, I suppose it may mean something like there are people who meditate on God 24/7.
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What you are referring to is Romans 14:5, let’s quote Romans 14:5-7 to give a bit of context: “ONe person esteems one day above another; another esteems every day [many translations add alike here, which is not in the Greek]. Let each be fully convinced in his own mind. He who observes the day, observes it to the Lord; and he who does not observe the day, to the Lord he does not observe it. He who eats, eats to the Lord, for he gives god thanks; and he who does not eat, to the Lord he does not eat, and gives God thanks. For none of us lives to himself, and no one dies to himself.” Given the context between this and 1 Corinthians 8 (a parallel passage), it would appear not to refer to the Sabbath, which is nowhere referred to here, but rather to questions about whether clean meats offered to idols and then sold on the marketplace were acceptable to eat, or whether the manmade fasts of the Jews, who fasted twice a week without divine command, were valid. Here Paul is saying if you do or do not do these things, it is okay, except that you should not judge your brother for manmade traditions and habits which are not biblical, for God is our judge and not ourselves.
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Hey I just realized there has been something I wanted to find out for the longest time and you would most likely be the one who knows. This may appear to be off topic but it may not be.
Does it say anywhere in scripture that sin rots your teeth, I believe that I saw that somewhere.
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The Bible doesn’t appear to say exactly that. There are a few passages that are close to it. Ezekiel 18:2 has a verse which was the title of a recent blog entry that says: “The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” This was a false proverb refuted by God. Psalm 112:10 says: “The wicked will see it and be grieved; he will gnash his teeth and melt away; the desire of the wicked shall perish.” Amos 4:6 says: “Also I gave you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and lack of bread in all your places; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the Lord. So clearly the Bible does relate judgment for sin and teeth in some fashion.
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A study in the February 2009 Journal of Periodontology (JOP)* confirmed that stress may interfere with oral hygiene. In the study, 56 percent of participants self-reported that stress led them to neglect regular brushing and flossing. In addition, the hormone cortisol may also play a role in the connection between stress and gum disease. Chronic stress is associated with higher and more prolonged levels of cortisol; previous research has found that increased amounts of cortisol in the bloodstream can lead to a more destructive form of periodontal disease.
This is sin
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So you are saying it is a sin to be stressed? Or is it rather that life in a fallen world as a result of sin brings stress and physical suffering that would not have been present had we as human beings been content to live according to God’s ways. The stress that we have need not be our own sin, it could be the sins of others, or sin might not even be involved, just honest miscommunication.
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I am saying that when the world finally agrees on what the root meaning of the word sin is, then we may have a place to begin a new discussion, and yes stress entered into the world via Eve in the garden of Eden. Stress can be directly related to sin (true root meaning). We are all effected and affected by each other’s sinning yes. Again we need to find and agree on what the root meaning of sin is in actual truth. Get my point?
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Well, we certainly agree that the root cause of stress is sin. This is true as well in mental stress (where often the proximate cause of mental stress, and its related physical disorders, even to the grave extent of PTSD or Morgellons’s, which I have discussed elsewhere) is the effect of dealing with the sins of others against us. There is indeed much that could be said about the matter. The problem is that sin and its effects on others are objective but any kind of agreement people could come to is subjective that may not remotely approach the objective reality. Perhaps it would be better to say that people need to accept and deal with the objective reality of sin and its effects rather than relying on their own (mistaken) subjective pleasures and desires and thought processes.
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Have you ever found anything in the bible that lets us know the root meaning of sin?
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The Bible identifies many roots of sin. Perhaps the most fundamental is the deceitfulness of man’s heart, our inability to direct our own paths but our willful demand for autonomy (see Jeremiah 17:9), our desire to be free both to do what we place and free from any consequences from our actions. That is the real root from which sin springs–others are no doubt present, including a desire to do what is fun and pleasant and a desire against doing what is difficult and unpleasant (the principle of inertia), our love of money and power, and the triple threat of the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life.
If you are looking for the meaning of sin, there are two root words used. One means missing the mark, like an archer who does not hit the target of godly obedience. The other means transgression, or stepping over the boundaries into unacceptable behavior. Sin falls into one of those two categories.
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RE: “One means missing the mark, like an archer who does not hit the target”
Exactly, and how many people do you suppose always fall short of missing the mark (point), and who always have a difficult time understanding what is meant by what another person is trying to convey, also why is it this way? To answer this you might have to see what the problems are with rote systems first. Then you might look for truer meaning to autonomy.
RE: “of godly obedience”
Am I a fool to think that my physical father’s advice is not meant to be seen as commands and demands? Rather my physical father always lends me advice and guidance and is there when I need him most, he knows that I am not perfect and he is always ready to forgive me but he never gives up on me. My physical father loves me to no end and will always take me back just like a prodigal son that I am who left my father’s house and went wandering because I needed to find my own personhood (autonomous nature). I have never “opbeted” my physical father but when I became an adult I remembered his advice and “appreciated him and loved him even more for his discipline , but he never commanded or demanded anything of me other than I would look to find good things.
Original sin “is” missing the point of all things exchanged in a loving relationship where what is implied is honest and sincere implication it must be recieved without prejudice and judgement, however one cannot do this without a strengthemed ability to infer. To be able to infer we need to be able to think laterally, to be able to think laterally we need a certain amopunt of freedom, autonomy. We sin in many ways and we die in many ways. A thousand deaths.
God desires that we use our reasoning abilities to communicate truth with each other, also I believe that He knows that we must include all five God given senses in our inference to what you yourself described as “intuition”. We are living cognitive organisms which is to say that we are natural beings which is to say that we respond to natural laws exactly as does all living cognitive organism found in nature. We have ignored and thus forgotten that we originate from the dust. The dust is where we can leanr how to live natural and healthy lives.
The bible has for me always been a source of health and wellbeing advice, a holistic approach to life, a scientific approach to life, a spiritual approach to life, and much more, however it has never been a source of commands and demands, and it was when I saw this that my life changed for the better, since that moment I saw God as He desires to be seen I suspect and that is as a loving and caring Father. He showed me in my own physical father what He desires of me, not commands, not demands, but rather sound advice on how to live in this present damned system without being adversely effected or affected by it, also to give me hope that I will be with my brothjer Jesus Christ after I have suffered enough of this physical torment.
This is not directed at you and it is not to be read as an overly emotional response, I just tend to go on at times and write in streams. 🙂
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Autonomy means “self law,” that we have the right to make our own rules for ourselves. That is sinful (in fact, it was the original sin, partaking of the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil to experience and decide what we want for ourselves rather than accept the authority of God in our lives).
Moving right along, we are extremely foolish if we view the Bible as only guidance and suggestion rather than as commandments. Disobedience to God’s commands brings sanctions and punishment (see, for example, Leviticus 26, Deuteronomy 27, Ezekiel 18, Zechariah 14, Romans 1, Revelation 20-22, and many other places). God does guide us through very subtle and providential and intuitive ways, because He did create us knowingly with our own will, and any obedience to Him must be consensual and not forced. That said, disobedience to Him has very real consequences, not only in this life through the workings of the created order of the universe (what is often termed “natural law”) but also through direct and personal sanctions in the judgment. We cannot emphasize only one aspect of God’s dealings with us (the more “fun” aspect of His gentleness and mercy) and forget the judgment. The point of this entire post, which is mirrored in these comments, is that people who wish to obey and follow God have to do the stuff that is mai sa nuk, or “not fun,” as well as the fun stuff. It is righteousness, not pleasure, that determines our actions. Sometimes people need tough love and correction.
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Autonomy (Ancient Greek: αὐτονομία autonomia from αὐτόνομος autonomos from αὐτο- auto- “self” + νόμος nomos, “law” “one who gives oneself their own law”) is a concept found in moral, political and bioethical philosophy. Within these contexts, it refers to the capacity of a rational individual to make an informed, un-coerced decision.
In this context it means that a person can stand alone without fear, anxiety or depression, it was not meant to imply that I make my own rules. I apologize for stepping out of context and this will not happen again. 🙂
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You may have a different meaning than “one who gives oneself their own law,” for autonomy, but literally, to give yourself your own law is to claim to be your own God, your own ultimate authority, and is an act of blasphemy and rebellion against the Creator and Lord of the Universe (i.e. God). We are not our own ultimate authority–our free will carries with it responsibility for accepting the consequences of our actions in light of our lack of ultimate authority. We can choose what we want to do, but we can’t avoid the consequences for our actions. Being free means being responsible to our Creator in judgment. Therefore we are not autonomous, since what is autonomous does not have to answer to anyone else–and we do.
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Yes I am aware of this and again what I meant was autonomous learning in schools as there is a great deal of thought about this and how the school systems have held back on creativity. A creative person that has no outlet and his/her creativity is not recognized in youth can have negative affects later in life, Depression is only one such affect. As you stated that the sins of others can cause us stress, well the sin of not recognizing or nurturing a young person’s creativity is stressful to the young person. We seem to be on two different pages and I wil try to keep my theoretical views out of your religious views in the future.
Before I comment on any future blogs I will try to be more clear. Again I apologize for the confusion Nathan.
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That’s okay. I enjoy the comments, but it is important to be clear. We are creative beings (created in the image and likeness of God), but we are not created to be our own authorities. Somehow we have to harness both creativity and order/structure in harmony rather than being either prisoners of the ideas of other (mistaken) human beings or letting our own creativity run rampant without any regard to others or to law. That’s a very hard balance to maintain. I will admit I am far from perfect in it myself.
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What you have actually shared in this post is the fact that you have been set apart, a peculiar people and you belong to God Himself so in spite of the seemingly disinvite, God has his hand on you. You aren’t allowed to go by orders of the Lord it seems to me.
Sometimes that is the cost of being ‘highly favored’. 🙂
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Yes, that is true enough.
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