Playing sax for God

What is my purpose for playing the saxophone in a church band? Am I using my gift for God?

Tonight it came to me that one way I am using my musical gift for God is by creating music that people will enjoy hearing. If people enjoy the music that I produce, they should want to hear more of it. By creating good music, I'm strengthening the appeal of my church family. The more people are pleased by our church, the more people are closer to God.

That is, in my opinion, the least obvious of the ways that my musical gift glorifies God. Since I have not been given a verbal or rhetorical gift to bring people to know God, I use the musical one that I have been given.

Review of Silent Hill

Just came back from watching Silent Hill. The story was quite a bit different, but they did a really, really good job on the movie (in my humble opinion).

In the game, Dahlia Gillespie was the leader of a cult in Silent Hill. This cult wanted to bring the demon Samael into the world to do whatever evil they pleased. In order to control this demon, they decided it would be best to bring him into the world in the form of a child. So, through some science and rituals and whatnot, Dahlia had Alessa Gillespie.

When Alessa was seven years old, Dahlia burned Alessa in a fire because she believed that the tortured remains of Alessa (the essence of Samael would not allow her body to die) would be better able to project her horrible nightmares into the physical world. In the process of burning Alessa, the whole town caught on fire. Alessa ends up in the hospital of Silent Hill with the nurse Lisa Garland tending to her. Alessa did end up engulfing the town in her nightmare, decaying buildings and creating monsters. However, during the fire, the tramatized Alessa had created a projection of herself as a baby somewhere outside Silent Hill. Harry Mason and his wife found this baby, named her Cheryl, and raised her as their own.

Once Dahlia found out that Samael was no longer whole, she cast a spell to try to lure Cheryl back to Silent Hill. Without both halves of Alessa/Samael, her powers would be weakened and useless to Dahlia. When Cheryl was seven years old, Harry's wife dies, and he decides to go with Cheryl on a visit back to Silent Hill.

Upon arrival, it's really foggy and he wrecks his jeep because he thought he saw someone in the middle of the street. When he comes back into consciousness, Cheryl isn't in the jeep any longer. He spends the game trying to find her, of course. During the course of the adventure, Silent Hill shifts between the normal, foggy, ash-filled one and Alessa's nightmarish, dark one. Dahlia sees that Harry is searching for Cheryl, deduces their relationship, and decides to play Harry as a pawn in her game. She tells Harry that darkness is engulfing the town, that Alessa is behind it, and that he can use a relic called a Flauros to trap Alessa/Cheryl and stop her. She didn't, however, tell him that she only wanted to subdue Alessa/Cheryl so that she could control her again.

Meanwhile, the cop Cybil Bennett receives a call from Silent Hill, and she goes to investigate. She ends up meeting Harry and getting caught up in all the nonsense, as well. She ends up getting possessed towards the end of the game, and Harry either kills her or cures her with a drug he finds on his trek through Silent Hill.

At the end of the game, Harry ends up meeting up with Dahlia and Alessa/Cheryl. An old cult member runs in and throws a drug at Alessa, causing Samael to come out. Samael kills Dahlia, and Harry kills Samael. Alessa approaches Harry and gives him a new baby, who he names Cheryl and raises as his own (again).

In the movie, Harry is replaced by Rose, and Cheryl by Sharon. Instead of Dahlia being the bad guy, it's a cult of witch-hunters that burned Alessa. Dahlia's just some crazy lady. Rose and Cybil meet up and work together to find Sharon. Towards the end of the movie, the cult finds out that Sharon is the likeness of Alessa and they turn against Rose and Cybil since they don't want to kill Alessa. Cybil is captured by the cult while keeping them from capturing Rose while she goes into the hospital to confront Alessa. While Rose is talking to Alessa, the cult also finds Sharon. Rose agrees to help avenge Alessa's torturous death by approaching the cult. The cult burns Cybil, and before they could do the same to Sharon, Rose comes in. She gets stabbed by the cult leader, blood spills all over, and the church that they're in changes into the dark realm of Alessa. Rose's wound heals instantly, and Alessa comes up out of the ground and totally kicks some bootie with barbwire tentacles. She kills everyone except Dahlia, Rose, and Sharon. And that's pretty much the end of it.

Yeah, I just had to write down the differences for my own personal satisfaction. Lots of cool stuff from the game was in the movie. Lots of familiar scenes and enemies. Pyramid Head, anyone?