I noticed in this article in the SMH that Michelle Leslie, an Australian woman facing charges relating to the possession of ecstacy in Indonesia, made a court appearance today where she said:
“I’d like to ask for mercy and justice from the court”

I would have thought that one could expect justive but hope for mercy, but how do you ask for both? If she is not guilty, then for justice to be done she will be acquitted and has no need for mercy. If she is guilty, then if justice is to be done – she would be punished; but if mercy were to be shown, she would be let go or given a reduced punishment.

Naturally, I thought of the life of a Christian – we trust that God is just and he punishes evil, which really means that everyone in this world deserves a strong punishment. However, we can throw ourselves on the mercy of the court, as it were, and ask for God’s forgiveness – and he is merciful and gives us a way out. See Ephesians 2:4-10

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Originally uploaded by Tim Johnson.

Tegan, Sanders (Tegan’s cousin) and I wandered down to Floriade near Lake Burley Griffin on the Monday of the recent long weekend. After all the hype I hear about Floriade and how this year was meant to be really good, I was quite looking forward to it and we were keen to do some good photography as well.

I had never been to Floriade before – I know, that’s sacrilege – spending 5 years in Canberra without going to Floriade. It was great to get out for a reasonable walk (4 or 5km each way) in the nice weather, but Floriade itself was a real disappointment. Yes, we did some fun photography as you can see here, but overall it was nothing special.

I found it to be quite plain – just tulips, mainly. I like tulips, but tulips alone hardly make a ‘Floriade’. Oh, there were some beds of pansies as well, which all looked like they had died in the heat. Now maybe we had just been spoilt by seeing the Hong Kong flower show earlier this year – here’s an example of the difference between the two: we spent an hour and a half or more at the HK flower show and could have easily stayed longer. We spent maybe half an hour at Floriade, at the most, and that was more than enough.

We were pretty happy with some of our photos though. They also gave us some ideas about how to take even better photos of the kind we like in the future, so that was positive.